Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Original poster

Sex before marriage

287 replies

toonosy · 13/05/2010 13:25

This is really nosy...but was wondering if anyone actually waits until they are married before having sex these days?

Me and DH waited, we were together almost 6 years before we married. Our decision was for religious reasons, however I can't bring myself to ask my RL friends their opinions on this!

Would love to hear what everyone thinks, was going to put this in Religion but thought I'd get more responses here.

OP posts:
kittya · 15/05/2010 01:01

I know plenty of couples that have only ever been with each other. Not waited until they got married but have stuck together since teenagers, I think its lovely.

Wotnosex · 15/05/2010 11:09

DH and I waited for 6 years until we got married. It was mostly because of my feelings of Wanting to keep it special. Dh was really good about it. We did everything else but penetrative sex so I guess it wasn't that much abstinance.
With hind sight I really wished we hadn't waited. You know how exciting a relationship is at the beginning and I feel I didn't fully enjoy it because of the lack of sex. And after marriage the sex was ok but not as passionate as it could've been in the first flushes of love.

KerryMumbles · 15/05/2010 11:11

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

BritFish · 15/05/2010 18:03

purplepeony: thanks for that info, but what i gathered from that is early exposure to the virus. i wouldnt like my daughter to be having sex at 12, but personally i dont think the correlation between having sex young=cancer is strong enough to worry about my 16 year old having a sex life.

and of course i would intervene if she was a heroin addict. heroin and addiction themselves are both very dangerous, whereas sex...well...isnt, if you are clued up on protection and so on and so forth.

also, yeah, maybe i am 'helping' it take place within the boundaries of an established relationship....i do not see what is wrong with that. thats a good thing to encourage surely? i let them sleep in the same bed because i feel that, as adults [or very nearly at 16/17] they should be encouraged to see it as an dult relationship. banning them from sleeping in the same bed has no positive effects, whereas allowing it does. also, my children pay me a small amount of rent [my DD doesnt anymore as she is at uni] and i think the adultness of that would be challenged if i treated them like irresponsible children the rest of the time.

thats just me though! if my DS gets anyone pregnant and catches something that makes his willy fall off, i will reconsider!

2rebecca · 15/05/2010 18:23

Didn't wait but I'm an atheist. I do think alot of women move in with men too quickly these days. To me sex isn't that important, giving up your independance and living with a bloke is far more of a committment, having kids before you are married or have decided your relationship is serious and you want kids is just daft in the 21st century.

StarExpat · 15/05/2010 19:20

I agree 2rebecca.
to think I'll someday be thinking about this with my toddler DS.

Sex isn't important to me, either.

TrillianAstra · 15/05/2010 20:17

I don't say this often, but I agree with Mal.

There is nothing wrong with having sex. Why shouldn't a 17 yr old do it?

TrillianAstra · 15/05/2010 20:21

What other enjoyable activity would you personally do, but discourage your (teen or adult) children from taking part in, even when they are legally old enough to do so?

Help them to do it the right way (when they are ready, without being pressured, with someone they trust, safely), but don't try to stop them.

bathbuns · 15/05/2010 22:29

I think Mal you have a great attitude and I bet your daughter has a really healthy approach to sex and her body. Parents who say no to their children having their partners over once they reach a certan age seem rather deluded if they think that will stop their child having sex full stop.

Although I do wonder, who changes the sheets the next morning if they have had sex? Your daughter presumably? That's one thing as a mum I wouldn't want to be doing!

SolidGoldBrass · 15/05/2010 22:49

2Rebecca: You're absolutely right, moving in with /marrying someone is a far bigger thing than having sex, and that's something I would discourage my DS from doing at a young age (Hey I'm 45 and I've never done it, and am very glad of the fact).

allsweetness · 15/05/2010 23:07

Message deleted

Poshwellies · 15/05/2010 23:14

We waited about 5 hours after meeting .

Been married 9 years this year.

Horses for courses but the physical side to a relationship is just as important as all the rest,so waiting wouldn't be a option for me.

2rebecca · 15/05/2010 23:19

I wouldn't want my kids having sex in my house before they leave home. If they're old enough to be wanting to sleep with someone then they should be moving into a shared flat or bedsit (preferably not with boyfriend so they have some personal space. Parading your boyfriend in front of mum/dad on a morning is not on. I moved out at 18 before having boyfriends staying with me and will expect the same from my kids. I'm not running a B&B.

allsweetness · 15/05/2010 23:21

Message deleted

GOODASGOLD · 15/05/2010 23:36

There is a book somewhere that describes how the whole 'nice girls don't' is a crock of male dominated crap.

It goes I think along the lines that women are ready and best suited to having babies young. And that the reason we don't is to fit into male roles of having xxx career first. When biologically we would actually be better off having babies when we are 14-18.

TopsyKretts · 15/05/2010 23:39

I completely agree with 2rebecca.

LadyBiscuit · 15/05/2010 23:51

You're not Hilary Mantel are you GAG?

I chose to delay having children until later. Granted that was because of living in a capitalist society dominated by men. And actually it's late teens, early 20s that are the best years. Only Mantel thinks that girls in puberty who haven't finished growing are best suited to become mothers. It's not a recipe for long term health

SolidGoldBrass · 16/05/2010 00:06

Allsweetness: it's fuckwitted 'abstinence' education and the peddling of romantic love as all-important that leads to teen pregnancies: good sound sex education emphasises the importance of contraception and sexual pleasure in ways other than vaginal intercourse.

allsweetness · 16/05/2010 00:09

Message deleted

LadyBiscuit · 16/05/2010 00:11

allsweetness - in case you hadn't noticed, the world is a rather different place than it was in the 1920s

GOODASGOLD · 16/05/2010 00:13

No I'm not Hilary Mantel. But I do think that we should question everything, especially if it has been prescribed/recommended by a patriarchial religion.

What is the long term health point?

allsweetness · 16/05/2010 00:14

Message deleted

SolidGoldBrass · 16/05/2010 00:16

Allsweetness: have you got stats for which countries had the highest rate of teen pregnancies in the 1920s? And are those stats regulated for teen marriages?

allsweetness · 16/05/2010 00:21

Message deleted

GOODASGOLD · 16/05/2010 00:26

Perhaps the reporting methodolgies have changed?