Those of you telling your children to wait until marriage to have sex, do you expect they will be married fairly young?

I don’t have kids, but if I did I’d never expect them to wait that long. I’d just make sure they knew how to be safe.

No. & it is more important to teach my kids safe sex instead of telling them to wait until marriage. Most kids won’t.

If they manage to stay virgins till that age I don’t think it will be that difficult to stay after too .

And I won’t tell them don’t do that because I wasn’t able to “hold it till after ” so it’s gonna be difficult to tell them so .

People should get married as soon as they can [ after 18 or the legal age for their communities ] because that way they learn to live together fairly easy and they will keep themselves on track .

My daughter waited until she was 24, but not until she was married. All my kids waited until they were 18, even my boy who was Mr Popularity with the girls, and got a lot of attention after a school musical where he had to wear long johns on stage. Uggggg.
It was a goal and an ideal. They all knew that I didn’t wait, but they waited longer than me, and longer than most of thrir friends.

I would never give them that line or any other “line”.
I try to advise based on common sense and values and not dish lines to keep them in line.
Truth and open honest communication has worked for me.
I do not believe the concept you are asking about works. They need to learn about sexuality and seeing it is a key component to a healthy relationship or marriage I would not teach that approach.

I think in some ways safe sex is a different topic, although I agree I would teach my children about safe sex and their bodies. This is more of a question of when it is ok to have sex.

@JLeslie I think the when depends on the kid. Some can handle it when they’re in their teens, some can’t.

@Adirondackwannabe So you gauge the advice based on the individual child? You don’t have a pat answer you tell all your kids?

@JLeslie Is there ever a pat answer in life?

No, I don’t expect them to marry young if I told them that, because I’d be telling them to concentrate on getting a good education and job first before marrying. Hopefully I would have done my job as a parent if they grow up having a strong moral compass, and know that sex before marriage is not the best way to go, and that establishing themselves with a good education and job first is.

My standard is to not have sex before marriage, although it is statistically unlikely that will happen. My teenage son knows that I am aware it is unlikely… but he also knows my standards and my reasons. He also knows that if he doesn’t wait until marriage, I expect him to wait as long as he can, respect his partner, and use protection.

I absolutely do not expect him to marry young. I think marrying young is practically a marriage death sentence today. However, whenever he chooses to marry, I will give him my blessing if I think he is ready for it.

@Hibernate Get married young? That’s far from what I would recommend, unless you want kids that get divorced a lot.

I think people shouldn’t get married ‘til they’re in their late 20s at the earliest.

I don’t have any pretense that my kids will be virgins when they marry. For one thing, I think it’s a big mistake to not know if you’re sexually compatible until after the ceremony.

If my kids want to wait to have sex when they are married it will not be because I had a say so or a parental directive in place. I just want them to make smart choices and I will be a happy dad.

@Hibernate How would getting married at age 18 keep anyone “on track”? I imagine it would create huge issues between a couple as they develop in different ways, and/or hinder a person’s emotional and social growth.

My parents told me that for years. Then I get pregnant at 18 a month before graduation. Woops.

Even if you tell us what to do we’re gonna do whatever we want anyways.

I ask the kids if they’ve got any of those couples at school where the girl is pregnant or single pregnant girls and then I ask what they think of the whole situation, what they think will happen for the couple/the girl and the baby after. I ask them if they can imagine at their age to know while the rest of their friends are graduating and going to college or travel that they might be in the other kids’ shoes and be filling out papers for welfare, assistance, taking child rearing courses, etc.

They cringe, I like it when they think it’s crazy and scary because it is. Their parents were “that couple” in high school and they need to remember that, to try and not throw their parents mistakes, sacrifices, efforts and lessons learned the hard way back in their faces by being careless themselves.

even if they did make those mistakes, it’s possible to make something good of it. My daughter is 2, I’m in my third year of college, never signed up for welfare, worked, and went to Italy a few months ago. Just sayin’... It’s possible.

@redfeather: Sure it is, I’ve seen it too but only a few times compared to the dozens of times I’ve seen the other scenario. I’d be a fool to support my kids to gamble that kind of longshot.

@Neizvestnaya just makin sure you knew some of us can make it work! :)

No. I taught her safe sex and encourage her to live with a guy before marrying him, so she knows she’s not making a mistake.

I’d be more concerned about a child marrying too early than being sexually active before marriage.

It doesn’t make sense to me. I just tell them to make sure they use protection.

I hear that statistics in the South where folks are encouraged in their churches to think that way, trend toward younger marriages than the rest of the country. Also the highest rates of divorce and remarriage. Serial monogamy bracketed by marriage/divorces rituals.

I’m not advocating wild promiscuity, and I think a lot of people thrive with committed relationships. I do. But I think the Amish have a idea worth considerring that their intended couples live together for a while before marriage. I know they are restricted from sex but a real eye-opener.

@dabbler I have never heard of this custom among the Amish. Do you have a source? I’d be interested to read it.

@lonelydragon haven’t found more comprehensive answer yet but the practice of bundling is part of it. And they spend a lot of time together for like a year as if married to get to know each other and decide to go forward with the marriage. The first person who told me about the custom in his community was a Mr. Kensinger an Amish farmer in southern Pennsylvania. He said the custom was for the couple to live together, often at one of their parents’ homes, as if married except without full intimacy. Most of the time the couples decide to go ahead and get married.

Bundling was done in Colonial times but not in traditional Amish communities. The Amish that I am familiar with DO NOT live together prior to marriage. They even keep courting secret until two weeks prior to the marriage. Do a little more research. I looked at your “bundling” link and it doesn’t appear to bear authority.

@quiddidyquestions & @zenvelo marrying young should help a couple [ not the ones who do not try to keep it together ] . WHY people nowdays divorce often ? Because they have no interest into keeping it real [ the marriage that is ] . They don’t even try to make it work, at first sight of trouble ” Okay hunny bunny we’ll divorce because it’s to hard for us ”.

I tend to take my principles out of the God’s words so it’s obvious most won’t agree .

@perspicacious Sorry I’m not claiming that is an authoritative source or broad knowledge of the topic. I’m just reporting what a fellow told me in 1976 about what his community does in southern Pennsylvania.

My point is that I think it’s valuable for a couple to live together as much as possible (never mind intimacy) to learn about each other in ways you never see when dating.

@Hibernate I’m just curious, how old are you? Are you married? And, how long have you been married?

I think the majority of people who get divorced never wanted to give up or wind up divorced. Sure, I agree some people give up to fast, or don’t understand the committment, but most I think married the wrong people for the wrong reasons.

I think this site is saying those that marry younger are more likely to divorce, unless I misunderstand the data near the top? Not 100% sure.

@Hibernate What does marrying young have to do with preventing divorce and not giving up on a relationship?

My wife and I were 19 when we married. Our kids were in their early 20’s when they married. I don’t expect that they were virgins when the married, in fact, I try not to ever think about that. It is the same feeling you get if you think about your parents having sex.

I still think that the early 20’s is the best time to get married. In my experience, you need a lot of energy to raise teenagers. Since we were in our thirty’s, I believe, we handled it well. I can’t imagine what it would have been like having two teenage kids when my wife and I were in our 50’s or 60’s

Of course I didn’t want my kids to have sex before marriage although I can see the practicality of knowing that a couple is sexually compatible before they get married.