9 year old son asking questions about where babies come from 😕

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My 9 year old son has started asking questions about how babies are born and how they are made. The problem I have is, I'm not sure how much detail I should go into !! He's never asked anything about this stuff before so it's come as a bit of a shock !! I've bought the Usbourne book 'what is happening to me?' but after reading it I found it rather too descriptive !! Any advise would be most appreciated.

graphista it's not really fair to assume the op hasn't talked about body autonomy and such. That pretty mean.

Couple of people have mentioned this, but speaking from personal childhood experience, I got my period just turned 10 and it was horrendous. This was even with having had all the chats from Mum way, way earlier and (sort of) knowing what to expect and her being lovely, I shook like a leaf when I realised and hid it for a day or two. I remember sobbing when she (very gently) told me that in this regard I was a woman now (I didn't want to be!). You really have to make sure they are informed and prepared, girls or boys.

Good luck OP, sure will be easier than you fear.

Waswebb - that must have been hard. I was a late developer and am so thankful of that - because my mum didn't tell me anything at all so it would have been very distressing. I can clearly remember in primary school going with all the other girls for 'the talk' and being completely shocked when the teacher's first line was 'so, between your legs are three holes'. This was total news to me! I am not sure I took much in after that revelation but I think it covered the basic biology of making babies. I can still picture the drawing of the Fallopian tubes on the blackboard and wondered what on earth it was. I felt so stupid!
My mum is so lovely and I can't fault her parenting generally but in this respect I did feel let down. I really wish she had talked to me about it, it's very isolating thinking other people know about things you don't. I was a shy child anyway and this did nothing to help. As another poster said, you may feel uncomfortable, but there are lots of things parents have to do they don't want to, and this is just one of them.

Then in secondary school thank goodness for the talk from the 'tampon lady' about periods (before mine started). But I was still none the wiser about sex until I found a book at my cousins house which filled in all the gaps. I was a teenager by this point.

But what would have happened if my periods had started early; or I hadn't found the book; or my schools hadn't organised the talks? (It's not compulsory for them to do so). At the end of the day it's the parents responsibility and in my opinion it's more harmful to leave it to late than to do it too early.

So yes I do feel quite strongly about this!!!

Fizzbomb I disagree. Op said:

" He's never asked anything about this stuff before so it's come as a bit of a shock !!" Suggests they don't discuss human sexuality which IS worrying

" I've bought the Usbourne book 'what is happening to me?' but after reading it I found it rather too descriptive !!" Yet several posters, and I agree, don't think this book is 'too descriptive'.

The op is prioritising their discomfort and embarrassment over their child's healthy sexual development and safety.

And you're entitled to disagree. But it's entirely possible that op has had the talk about private areas etc without talking about sexual intercourse in order to make a baby. It's unfair for you to dig her out.

(Fwiw I would have had the talk before 9 y/o and will do when my babies are older, but that's not the point.)

And I think it's unfair to leave children vulnerable due to lack of knowledge.

I never disagreed with that

I said it was unfair that you were assuming the op's kid has been given no advice/ education about abuse or body confidence.

When you can't possibly know that is the case. Unless you know her personally?

I was in year 5 (age 9/10) when I finally pieced together the jigsaw puzzle of what different friends had said and worked out how conception happened. At that age, my mother had started to discuss puberty with me ( I was a late developer so it was plenty early enough) but not sex. We did have a picture book at home which showed various animals copulating and on the last page, a drawing of a man and woman lying together in bed both smiling, but I never actually made the connection from that!

Congratulations, you're in the Mail!

As with every other poster my opinion is based on what I read here.

That's all I have to go on.

And what I've read is that the op is reluctant to discuss the basics of sexual reproduction with her son, thinks it will 'taint' his innocence, thinks a perfectly good book on the subject is too detailed, is indicating in my opinion, by their posts and their tone that they think 9 is too young to know this important information.

My dd hadn't asked me by the time she was 8.5 so I decided to discuss it with her then. I didn't want her to be in a situation where they were starting to talk about it at school and she was naive to it.

I got a book (may be the same one as you) and went through about half of it with her in one evening. She was starting by that point to get grossed out by some of it and was a lot of info to take in at once. So I left it there, showed her where the book was kept and told her she can come and get the book anytime/discuss with me anytime/ask me anything etc. She has since asked where the book is once only but not sure she read it in the end. I will leave it now until she starts mentioning it again, learns about it at school or hormones start to show.