Nobody ever enjoyed receiving The Talk from our parents – for most of us it was an awkward sit down, with our parents or sex ed teach going on about the birds and the bees. But what if we could have the same very important conversation with our kids in a much different way?
While we may not like it, talking to our kids about sex is something that we definitely need to do, no matter how awkward we may find it. Eliminating the shame around sex and talking about it is the first step to making sure our kids have will grow up to have healthy and happy sexual experiences, so today we’re talking with Ariel Saint White from My Little Yoni about how to talk to our kids about sex, without turning it into The Talk.
It’s no secret that in most schools sex ed is pretty severly lacking – if talked about at all. It’s been proven that promoting abstinence as the only way to have safe sex doesn’t work, which is why making sex education part of the things we teach our kids is so important. In this episode we’re looking at how to work these oftentimes scary conversations for us parents (masterbation, how babies are made, etc.) into our daily teachings of our kids. It may seem scary now but Ariel brings fantastic approach to talking to our kids about sex and everything to do with their bodies, so we can’t wait for you to give this episode a listen!
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Guest Expert
Artist and entrepreneur, Ariel Saint White, has reached audiences from more than 30 countries with her unique ideas. Founder of the sexual wellness company, My Little Yoni, (the world’s first vulva superhero!) Ariel partners with top OBGYNs to break down taboos and give parents & kids quality, body-positive education. Her 10 book sex ed series has been featured in Entrepreneur and is lauded by parents as a solution to making ’the talk’ easier and more approachable.
Whether set on the stage, a wall, the screen, or the page, Ariel’s art focuses on the themes of eros, female sovereignty, and connecting with nature in the technological age. Her collaborative work, edifying real love stories, has been featured on the Oprah Winfrey Network and commissioned by entrepreneurs and celebrities. Ariel lives with her husband and stepson in Topanga Canyon, freediving & writing songs in her spare time.
In This Episode We Talk About
01:14 – Who is Ariel?
07:22 – How did sex education turn into what it is?
13:06 – Why should we continue sex education at home?
19:36 – The basics of sex education.
33:16 – Tips on how to talk to our kids about sex.
42:12 – Where to find Ariel and other sex ed resources.
44:10 – Final thoughts.
Watch the Video
Listen to the Audio
Resource Links
Join the UM Club!
UM Club Facebook page
My Little Yoni
My Little Yoni Complete Book Series
13 Keys Sex Ed Guide
Ariel’s Instagram: @MyLittleYoni
Read the Full Conversation
Hello and welcome to another episode inside the unapologetic moms club. Today I am very happy to be here with Ariel Saint White from My Little Yoni, who is going to be talking to us all about sex education for our little ones. A very important topic, one that can be a bit awkward for some. So I’m really glad we can come here to talk about it unapologetically, put all the facts out for you so you can feel confident navigating these conversations with your kids. So without further ado, welcome, Ariel.
Thank you so much for having me today.
Thank you. Yeah, I loved stumbling across My Little Yoni, taking a look at the guide you have, and you have so much in there and such a great sex positive approach to having these conversations. So I’m really looking forward to having you here to share all of your expertise with us.
Yeah, it’s always great to let parents know that sex ed – well, for a lot of us, we didn’t receive great sex ed as kids – that times are different now. And there’s a lot more resources out there for making conversations easier and even fun. That’s our goal.
Absolutely. I love it. So let’s hop right in. Who are you, what do you do, and why are you so passionate about it?
What a question. As you said, my name is Ariel Saint White, and I have a pretty interesting background. So my background spans across sexual wellness for women, art, I’m an artist, and then business and investing in philanthropy. So My Little Yoni is those three things all together. But from my background in female sexual wellness, it was through conversations with lots and lots of women. And then often they would also bring up their relationship issues. It just became clear that wow, a lot of the issues we face as adults could be prevented if we had better education as kids.
And so when I first created My Little Yoni, I’m holding up one of the original art dolls. These are handmade in Bali. But yeah, so the character of My Little Yoni. Yoni is the ancient Sanskrit word for vulva or womb. And it means sacred gateway. So I love that definition. Wow. Like, just imagine if we all related to the womb and the vulva as a sacred gateway. That would change a lot.
But anyhow, so My Little Yoni is the world’s first vulva superhero. And when I first created the character, and made these dolls, it surprised me. I did it more as an art project originally, and I created them. And then mostly women were buying them, and sometimes they were buying them for each other for themselves, but a lot of the time they were moms, and they were buying this doll for their kids. And I found that really interesting. Wow, seeing My Little Yoni as a symbol that made conversations around anatomy and sexuality and sex ed easier.
So it was a combination of the insight of knowing wow, most adults didn’t receive great sex education. And then the cue I got directly from moms and the conversations and using My Little Yoni as a conversation starter, that’s when we, as an organization, fully aligned our mission with sex education. And last year we created a 10 book series, all focused on early comprehensive sex education. And I guess the rest is history.
I love that, it’s so true that so many things can be prevented by having these conversations and ongoing conversations early on.
Well, so you just touched on something that we’ll just dive right into it, because you said ongoing conversations, and that’s one of the biggest refit frames we like offering parents, is when it comes to sex ed or the birds and the bees, most of us, a lot of us, think of it as there’s so much pressure, because there’s a capital T talk, The Talk. And so we like offering that actually more helpful way to think of it, and definitely more useful to your child’s development, is that it’s an ongoing series of conversations.
And the earlier you start the better, but not to worry if your kids are already a bit older, you can still start, it’s never too late. It’s never too late to start these conversations and to start building trust and rapport with your kids in this subject matter, and to establish yourself as an open, trusted adult to come to. Because the issue is when we’re not established in that way, kids are going to learn somewhere, and at least in the USA, school very rarely is handling it sufficiently. So there’s a lot of unanswered questions. And so kids inevitably turn to the internet and to porn. So the reality, the harsh reality, is that porn is actually the main source of education for a lot of our youth.
And so our message is not one of anti-porn, it’s more of educating parents, because once they learn these basic stats, it’s pretty easy to say, and to see and to be motivated, to bring that conversation into the home more. And to take charge of that a bit more. Because before I started learning this, I was in the same boat, I would assume that school handles it. And it wasn’t until I learned some pretty basic stats that I realized, whoa, there’s a real problem here. And if we wait for government to do it, we could be waiting forever. So that’s why I think it really is mom to mom, parent to parent, household to household.
Yeah, absolutely. There’s so many layers to it. Like it’s so much more than providing sex education, and having them learn about their bodies, learn about relationships. And like you had touched on, building that rapport with our kids, which applies to so many things like we really do. I know for me, one of my biggest parenting values is I want my kids to be able to come and talk to me, no matter what, I’m that safe space. And so having these ongoing conversations about these tricky subjects and kind of being that go to for our kids, when they hear something on the playground they can ask, “hey, Mom, I heard this, what does that mean?” And being able to maintain that throughout them growing up is going to be so helpful for them and for our relationship with them.
100%. Yeah.
Well, let’s dig into a little bit of the history of it. We like going in and laying the foundation here. And I like that you touched on it in your guide as well. So in the States, I think we know a lot of it is abstinence education, it is a little bit different here in Canada. But why is it the way it is? Like how did sex education get formed in the states to make it what it currently is?
Yeah, it’s a really interesting, and I’ll say depressing, history. Yeah, so, it was in the peak or the kicking off of industrial society in the US, but it was kind of turn of the 20th century, so early 1900s. It’s actually around the same time that adolescence was coined and became a thing. So we kind of assume adolescence is just an evolutionary stage of development, but it’s actually connected to culture.
Because prior to industrialization, there weren’t child labor laws, kids might be out in the field with their parents plowing or doing whatever. And so it kind of went from childhood straight to being an earning member of the family. But with factories and industrialization there, all of a sudden, for the first time were child labor laws. So now all of a sudden, there were, you know, kids with raging hormones with a lot of time on their hands. And so it was just like, you know, I guess the establishment thought more problematic, you know, kids with time on their hands with raging hormones, they’re gonna get up to some things.
And then also just coming off of Victorianism, and just the whole emphasis on abstinence and all of that. But there was this one character named Stanley Hall and he was a very influential doctor. And he published a lot of propaganda – well, I mean, you could say medical journals. But anyways, he was very influential and, and his ethos spread like wildfire. And he’s the one, Stanley Hall is the one, who first created sex ed curriculum for youth.
Just to give you a little window into his psyche, he prided himself on – so he was married, but he prided himself on never sleeping with his wife. He was like, I am upstanding, you know, member, like I represent what it means to be a disciplined industrialist. And so he never slept with his wife. But every morning, he received an enema from a handsome male orderly. I’ll just leave that there. Just interesting.
But what I will say is repression is an interesting thing. Like, that’s a perfect example of just like, things come out sideways, when we, you know, repress things. But then on top of that, this is also why – very few people know this – it’s also why circumcision became popularized in the USA. So not related to anything religious. I mean, if you’re in Europe, a lot of the guys are not circumcised. And so same thing in the US until 1906/1907, somewhere in there, most American men were not circumcised.
But with the propagation of this propaganda, Stanley Hall said that the downfall of productive society would be masturbation, we had to prevent our youth from forming these bad habits. And so he recommended boys get circumcised. And he was so effective. That’s like, I mean, now sometimes parents our age are starting to rethink it. But a lot of American men are still circumcised. And it has nothing to do with medical reasons or cleanliness or religion. It’s because of this guy, Stanley Hall, saying that masturbation was bad.
And on top of that, he also recommended that they did experiments with putting acid on the clitoris’s of baby girls as well. But that was so barbaric they stopped doing that. Anyways, yeah, I mean, hardcore. So I’m not trying to scare you. But it’s like, this is the history. This is the guy who came up with original sex ed. And to be fair, there are states like Washington state’s doing a great job. I think it’s the only state out of 50 in the US that actually does require now comprehensive early sex ed, which is fantastic. You know, something that the Netherlands or Sweden has been getting right for a long time.
Yeah, I’m not too sure exactly what it is throughout Canada. It’s definitely not abstinence. It is more thorough, but I don’t know – I know there are still some complaints about just how comprehensive it is. And that there’s definitely room for improvement.
Oh, I see. Yeah, yeah.
So what are the implications behind if we were to just leave it up to these different sex ed programs to teach our kids? And we’re not getting ahead and getting out there and doing it? What kind of implications does that have for kids?
Yeah, well, I’ll find my way into answering that just by sharing a bit more of the shocking stats, such as only 27 states in the US require sex ed at all. And that doesn’t mean more might not be offering it. But just in terms of requirement, there’s no federal mandate. So it’s state to state. Only 23 states require sex ed to be medically accurate. So less than half. Means they can be saying anything. And that’s where a lot of the abstinence only curriculums come in, which are proven, I mean, that the data is in, not effective. Not effective.
High teen pregnancy rates, high STI rates.
Yes. Only seven states require consent education. So when you start going down the line, it’s like, wow, so what are we considering sex ed even, if something as basic as consent is only required in seven states. And then the other thing I would add to that is often, even when it is required, it’s not being talked about in school until generally at the earliest fifth grade, often not until seven or eighth, sometimes High School. And yet at the same time we live in such a hypersexualized culture, from the time we are teeny tiny like we’re being exposed.
I guess on average we’re exposed to 14,000 sexualized images a year. And this doesn’t necessarily mean porn. I’m just saying like romantic things. I mean, you can even argue that Disney, it’s not overtly sexual, but there’s a lot of tension. It’s a lot of build and romance, oftentimes. So it’s just conflicting messages, hypersexualized except don’t talk about it, and no preparation.
So I think, in knowing that, I’ve actually never encountered a parent – we’ve had hundreds, maybe thousands of conversations at this point, I’ve never encountered a parent who after learning that information says, “oh, it’s fine.” So yeah, so there’s a lot of implications when we don’t prepare our kids a bit better.
And I can speak for myself, my sex ed I received was certainly not sufficient. I would say I fared better than many others, but still. And I actually was very curious. So I learned a lot pretty young, but it was from older siblings. My mom was a sexual assault survivor. So she shared things with me that probably I was too young to know. But she thought knowledge was power. So she wanted me prepared. So you know, I learned about kind of the scary stuff without the basic, you know, there is age appropriate subject matter to share at different stages.
So that’s why even when it comes to consent education, that can start as early as five. And it’s not even related to sexuality at the beginning. Like consent education starts just with knowing that your body belongs to you, other people’s bodies belong to them, learning about boundaries at a developmentally appropriate way that makes sense to them. And that lays the foundation for once they do learn about sex, there’s already a foundation that lays on to future developmental stages.
That’s also where going even younger, as early as two, three, and above, naming body parts accurately. You know, just basic, accurate anatomy. You know, that is like the most primary foundation. And it also makes it easier as they get older to have the subsequent conversations because we’re already, you know, how often when we’re – well, this is a phenomena that is very interesting. Oftentimes, in households with girls, they just skip over naming the vulva at all, like body parts. It’s like this strange phenomena, just like don’t even name it.
Yeah, we did a whole episode on Vulva 101 because it is, like most people, like I was taught vagina, I didn’t know about Vulva until just a few years ago, looking it up myself.
Totally. And it’s also easy to like skip it or to have it have a really cutesy name, which is fun, but it’s important. It’s also good to look at why, you know, is it because there’s discomfort of just being like, “here’s your vulva, check it out and get to know your whole body including that.” And this coming from the person who founded My Little Yoni, but we try to be very clear that a word like Yoni – first of all we think it’s a great word to learn because it is an actual word. And I already shared the definition, sacred gateway, versus the Latin definition of vagina, sheath for a sword.
Very different perspectives, that’s for sure.
Very different perspective. But that being said, we try to be clear that Yoni’s the character, My Little Yoni is the superhero and My Little Yoni the superhero teaches accurate anatomy. So learning vulva, learning clitoris, learning all the parts.
Okay. So we touched on a bit of that foundation with the consent and naming the body parts. What are some other parts of that foundation that we should be laying in these different conversations starting early on?
Yeah, for sure. Well, so in our book series – I mentioned there’s 10 books and we do order them. Our big thing is empowering parents to have conversations. And also just knowing that, you know, your kids do develop at different rates. So while we have recommended ages on our books, for example, our first two books, we have Amazing Truth, which is female anatomy. And then we have Spectacular Truth, which is assigned male anatomy. And then the next book we have, actually before the consent book, is What’s the M Word? And that’s all about masturbation. And we say, you know, ages five to eight plus, but I’ve had parents buy it for their four-year-old because they’ve already seen that their four-year-olds are masturbating. So that’s where at the end of the day, it’s to your discernment and listening and paying attention to what are the questions your kids are asking? Or what are you noticing behavior wise?
But the reason why we have Anatomy 101, then M word, then consent is that is that M word, masturbation, is a huge part of it. Because you start learning about consent, in that subject matter, as already from the beginning. Meaning that’s where you start learning your body is yours. And it’s totally normal to get to know your body, your whole body. And it probably feels good to touch your body, your whole body. And that might include your genitals and thumbs up. And your body belongs to you. No one else should be touching your genitals, right? And it’s something you want to do in private.
Now, sometimes people get freaked out about masturbation and how it relates to kids. But, I mean, we know that embryos touch themselves inside the womb. So it’s actually the most natural thing ever. That being said, it’s more about paying attention to your kids, like, some kids aren’t masturbating that young. And that’s okay. You know, if by eight, there’s been like no hint at it, you still might want to give them this book or have a conversation. You know, just, that’s helpful.
But some kids – it’s not about, I think where people stumble is, this isn’t about teaching kids masturbation technique, or something like that. Like literally, this is what some people think. And they’re like, “AH they’re teaching kindergarteners how to masterbate!!” It’s like, no – literally, there’s headlines. Like, that’s not it, it’s more taking away shame, making sure they’re safe. And knowing that any discomfort we have is ours, like kids don’t come into the world with that shame and discomfort. So like, just to be able to metabolize that and work through that. So that our kids are safe, and so that they don’t grow up with the shame and stigma. And they can learn the techniques much later.
Yeah, I love that. It’s so much more than like, that’s something you do in private. It’s like validating what they’re doing. Yes, it feels good. It’s okay to feel good. And that helps with kind of preventing that different shame that can build over the years.
Yeah, that’s something you brought up earlier, and I’ve heard this from a lot of parents. It’s interesting, so much communication is nonverbal, too. So sometimes even when we think we’re being really positive and pro, there can still be some shame sneaking in. So that’s where like, yes, privacy is important. But you might not even want to lead with that.
So if you notice your kid humping a pillow in the living room, or at a party, whatever. Finding a time soon thereafter, where you can say, “hey, it feels so good to have a body doesn’t it? And it’s totally normal to get to know your whole body and to touch your whole body including your genitals, including your vulva or penis or whatever. It’s also really important, that’s something your body belongs to you, and it’s something you get to do in private, like in your bedroom.”
And so that is so much different than just “hey, do that in private.” Because the message of do that in private, even though that’s a lot better than what many of us had, like the “you’ll go blind don’t do that.” Definitely, it’s better. But kids pick up on like, if all they hear is do it in private, they might be like, “oh, is something wrong?” Versus the combination of “that feels great. Totally normal. And it’s something to do in private.”
I’m so happy you touched on that. Because we try to be very sex positive and proactive with how we’re teaching our kids. But I hadn’t even thought about it in that way. And we were mainly saying like, “oh, no, you do that in your room.” And keeping it very simple. So I’m really happy brought that up, because when you hear it laid out like that, it’s like, yeah, that’s obviously the better way to go.
Yeah.
So we’ve kind of touched on like body parts, masturbation, consent. What are other kind of stepping stones that we’ll want to add on as our kids get older?
Yeah, well, so after consent. And I mean, a lot of these subjects, they’re in tandem, you know, and that’s why we have an order and a flow. But the biggest thing is just seeing what are your kids interested in, right? So some kids are going to be interested in different things at different moments, so that’s why we’re not about being rigid. It’s more about really encouraging conversations. And at certain times, maybe you don’t know how to answer a question. And it’s okay to be honest to say, you know, “hmm, I’m not sure, I’m gonna get back to you.” And then you bring it back up, or to say, “hey, let’s learn together and read this book together.” Or, “hey, how about you read this book? And then we can talk about it if you have questions,” right?
But getting into generally, when kids are young, they’re very curious about how they got here. How are babies made? So we have a book called Creating Life, which is really focused on the embryo and how that’s formed. Beyond that, we have – I mean, there is Beyond the Birds & the Bees, which is getting more into partner sex. Because that’s the other thing, and a lot of times that starts getting talked about more like eight plus. But some kids might be asking younger, and some kids, like my stepson at 10, he still hadn’t asked so we had to initiate some conversations.
And then we have a book called Loving LGBTQ+. And again, it totally depends when you want to introduce that. In our household, my stepson’s uncle is gay so it’s like super normal, was never a big deal. And then we have Breaking the Binary, so really focused a bit more into gender identity. Let me see what age we have on that one. We have that 6 to 8 plus, but again, down to the parents discernment. You know, it depends on if you have family members that are trans, or if your kid is already like questioning identity.
One of the things that makes me sad in the US at least is just the divisiveness of so many of these topics. Where I’m like, hey, Progress to me is us respecting each other’s beliefs and having the education to have conversations with as much compassion as possible. Versus dogma in any direction.
And then, actually, on that note, one of our books is called A New Baby is Coming. And that depends, you know, so we have that towards the end of our series, but you might have a four year old and you’re pregnant or about to have another baby. And so that book is all about understanding pregnancy and emotionally preparing to be an older sibling. Which is pretty cool.
But we when we sent that book out, because we had an incredible community of reviewers when when we were creating our series, getting testimonials and also just review and feedback. And with the A New Baby is Coming, one of the feedback we got was that because we use the word mother, it wasn’t inclusive. And we really sat with it, because we’re like, whoa, we see ourselves as very inclusive. But at the end of the day, we’re like, you know what? In a book about birth, it’s important to us to include the word mother.
And for me personally, it didn’t feel right. I didn’t see how erasing the word mother was progress. Although I myself am a queer lady, you know, like I don’t present any particular way. I kind of look just like a cisgender, straight white woman. But I’ve always been part of the LGBTQ community. So I do believe I’m embracing, but that was a hard one. And I feel called to share that because here we are on the Unapologetic Mom podcast. So we kept the word mother.
Yeah. And that’s all part of it. Like we can have opposing views and have the conversations and really sit and reflect on our values, what truly matters to us while being considerate of others, and make our decisions for us and our family, because there is no right or wrong answer for everybody.
Totally. So I hope that story, it’s more like relating to decisions we make all the time as parents, maybe as business leaders, whatever the roles are. And then the last book in the series is The Power of Periods. And so most of our books are actually for all genders. So for example, the amazing truth, which is all about vulva anatomy, we have boy moms buy it for their boys, because they’re like, “hey, boys should understand vulva anatomy.” And vice versa with the male anatomy one. The books that I would say, What’s the M Word, that one is focused on girls, but even The Power of Periods, that’s a great book to buy for boys.
Yeah, I explain my tampons to my boy, like when my period comes around, I explained the different things to him. It’s important for him to know and have his future if he, whether it’s friends or more of a romantic partner, and they have their periods, like I don’t want them to feel shame around it. Like he can be there shopping for things, if they choose to. But I don’t want to have to add that extra layer of like weirdness onto whoever that female identifying or person having a period in his life is.
100%, yeah.
So I think that’s really great hearing about all those different kinds of topics to touch on as we have these conversations, but I’d love to circle back to you like how were babies made? Because I know that’s another like, really awkward, like, “oh, I don’t know how to approach this conversation.” So I’d love to hear some of your tips for how we can speak about that with our kids.
Yeah, I mean, generally when kids are really young it’s more just them learning that in order for babies to be made, it requires two parts, you know, one coming from – and you can decide for yourself how specific you want to get on this – but one from, if in your household it’s daddy and mommy, one part from daddy one part from mommy. Right? And that these parts come together inside mommy and create the embryo and that grows.
Some people say they think that that’s confusing, like you should get a little more specific and say like daddy’s penis goes into mommy and from that there’s these two parts that came together. And some schools of thought they say, “hey, really just talk about the parts because kids are into that.” You know, they’re really interested in the formation of life itself. Like, wow, these two things came together and that grew inside the womb. Like that’ll keep kid’s interested for a long time.
Now, that’s different in different households also, like IVF is more and more popular. And in that regard, talking about the parts forming makes even more sense, because it’s not always through intercourse that a baby’s created. So even though some people say, “hey, talking about the parts coming together is confusing.” I’ve seen with kids they find it very interesting.
Yeah, yeah, we took a similar stance on it, the way we tackled it, when it came up is talking about as daddy planted a seed in my egg, and then I grew a baby in my belly. And that was kind of like the basics of it, and then slowly elaborate more and more, as it comes up in conversation and they ask questions.
Yeah. That’s not language we use necessarily, because metaphors can get confusing, sometimes. Doesn’t mean you did anything wrong at all. Like, that’s great and it worked for you guys. The biggest thing is have these conversations, you know, and do it in a way that’s fun and interesting. But I think as long as like anatomies there, as long as they’re learning about the actual formation – and it depends on the kids too. If they’re confused they might be like, “what, I don’t see a flower, they planted a seed,” you know? If it’s confusing in my ask.
But, yeah, generally, depending on how it happened, if it did happen outside of the womb via IVF, it would be hey, this actually happened in a laboratory, where the assigned male part or if the dad identifies as the dad, Daddy’s part and mommy’s part came together. And this is how the cell started forming. And then that was put into mommy’s womb. Or even saying like, Daddy placed his penis inside mommy, if that’s what happened. But the emphasis is not on that, the emphasis is on the two parts coming together.
Okay. And rather, like I was thinking of like sperm and seed and egg.
Sperm, yeah, that’s it. So you could say, Daddy gave his sperm – like, yeah, if you don’t want to get into the intercourse side of it. Which if they’re really young, that might be a lot.
Yeah, I’m thinking three, and then as they get older it can kind of develop more and more into bringing more of the parts into it.
Yeah, we have five. So for us, the creating life is five plus, but again, sometimes kids are asking younger. So I know I’ve repeated this like 18 times, but it’s all about listening to where your kids are at. But yeah, certainly at three, that’s like a lot. That’s why usually at three, it’s more just about anatomy at that point, right? But just using the names, like I love the idea of seed and sowing seeds, and all of that. But I would say it’s also nice to say, “the daddy’s part that turns into the baby, it’s called sperm. And the mommy’s part, it’s called ovum or egg. And the sperm and the egg come together.” And then that sets off this whole amazing thing that creates a baby. So as long as sperm and egg are in there, then yeah, there can be other things too. But yeah, the accurate language is helpful.
Yeah, I’m glad you brought that up. Because that came up in another episode we’ve done about talking to kids about death and illness. And she said how important it is, when a family member or someone close to them dies, is to move away from metaphors, and not necessarily they’re in a better place or they’re up there. She had some kids that would want to go on a plane to visit. Or because they’re in a better place, how can I get to the better place? And so it adds to that confusion. So very similar here wanting to stay away from metaphors, because that can kind of bring a whole different idea and take away from the actual lesson that we’re talking about.
Yeah, totally. And I mean, kids are living in such a magical reality so much of the time. Yeah. So for us, we’re like it’s a metaphor that’s pointing to something very real. For them, they might just be like, wow, that’s how it is. That is what’s real, like kids really believe in the stork if that’s what we tell them.
The one place we do use, well, this is more like characters, like Yoni’s a character. We have shame monsters inside the narrative of the Yoniverse. And like, that’s helpful in describing something like shame because shame is so amorphous, you know. So like that’s kind of a fun way of starting to describe a concept like shame, which is not tangible to begin with. And it’s like, Oh, shame monsters. Like, basically, we want to be like here’s your friend Yoni that smashes shame monsters, and you can too, and part of the ways you can is just by feeling proud of yourself and proud in your body. And sticking up for others. And we don’t want shame monsters, because if we carry shame, monsters around, they can grow and spread to other people.
But shame is a very, you know, amorphous kind of complex thing to share with kids. So I think that’s an example of where it’s not even metaphor, but we’ve created characters around it. And that’s helpful.
But it’s still tying it into like the real concrete information. And we can bust the shame monsters by doing this, this and that. So it’s still making sure you have that basic information of the concept.
Well, I gotta say, you’ve got me excited for this now. I’m like, oh, I want my kids to ask me where babies come from again, because they’re really interested, like, I have the best conversations. They’re almost three and four-and-a-half. And like, I fully explain everything, and we look up YouTube videos, and now I’m like, oh, we’re gonna be looking up like embryos and watching them grow, and they’re gonna think it’s awesome.
And they’re gonna love the books!
Yeah. So for anyone else that is feeling some excitement like me or wanting to learn more, where can they check out more of what you have to offer, those books which sounds fantastic, definitely checking those out, and everything else that you have going on?
Thank you. Yes, well, we’re going to offer this I believe – we end this as how we first met – we do have a 13 keys sex ed conversation starter guide for parents. It touches on some of what we talked about, but then goes more in-depth, it is 13 keys, and even some steps of just how to make this conversation easier. So that’s a free guide, we’ll create a link where you can sign up and download that for free.
And then we have our 10 book series, which we talked about. And that’s available at MyLittleYoni.com. What’s really cool is we also have a charity arm, so every book series that we sell, we are able to donate a book. And I love that. And we do book pop ups where we give away books in partnership with organizations in disadvantaged neighborhoods. And so for us, our mission really is to get this information out as widely as possible. And to make sure that, you know, for people who can afford the books, that’s great. It’s 100% you’ll get your value and that’s amazing. But also knowing that when you purchase the books, you’re guaranteeing that families who can’t afford them also are receiving this education.
And then of course socials, that’s how we met, Instagram @MyLittleYoni, maybe sometime we have you on for an Instagram Live.
That’d be great.
Yeah, basically My Little Yoni everywhere, you can find us.
Okay, great. We’ll have that all linked up. Any last thoughts or anything you’d like to share before we sign off?
Just that kids are naturally curious, and if you reframe this conversation as “wow, we can relax a bit.” It’s not about getting it right the first time. There’s more than one chance to have this conversation, it’s ongoing. And then to you bring some play and even though it’s very serious subject matter, if you have fun, and if you are curious as well. And if you’re open to learning alongside your kid, then that’s a huge component of them truly being interested and getting that positive foundation.
And that’s why we created Yoni, because she is a delightful character. And she is safe, and she is fun. And I think that that’s something – I mean, I know I can get too serious. So I think that that’s just a good message for all of us. And yeah, it’s amazing how much I’ve learned alongside of having conversations with my stepson, of creating this book series, and of also just been inspired by someone like My Little Yoni.
I love that, that’s just what’s so great about kind of doing the work, having these conversations with our kids on all different subject matters, and keeping that conversation open, ongoing over the years. It really helps us build that connection with our kids, helps them feel empowered, we do a ton of learning alongside them. And it’s just great for everyone.
So thank you so much for being here, sharing so many helpful tips. We’ll have everything linked, so make sure everyone is checking that out afterwards. And for listeners, you can go ahead and pop into our Facebook group and group chat and we can chat about things more. I’d love to hear about your comfort level and different big takeaways you’ve had from this. Until next time, take care!
Thanks for listening this week! If you want to chat about this episode with me and other moms, check out the exclusive UM Club Facebook page! Thanks again, and we’ll see you next week!
