15yr old and choking

[Lostfraggle]

So, I just read my DD's diary (yes, I know I know) and she has written all about her first snog (with tongues!) with a boy at his house (we drove her there at the weekend because he lives in the next town). Ok, fine, she's just turned 15, snogs happen. But then talks about how he choked her and it was so good as she went dizzy and it was really hot (ie sexy), and she thought she "did ok" (with the snogging) but maybe she should be more "dom" next time. She previously mentioned talking about choking with him, which apparently "turned him on".

He was also clearly trying to woo her previously but has just ended up apparently dating one of her friends, so she's also helping him cheat.

Then they were taking about how he wants to "fuck" but she wasn't sure, maybe next time she writes.

Help - how do I handle this? Is this because of ubiquitous porn? How do I talk to her that choking (when you are only just 15!) is not safe, and tbh inappropriate when you are only just exploring sex /sexuality?! Plus she's under the age of consent (for sex anyway), plus the very poor moral judgement of cheating.

We've got the "safe search" controls on her phone, so this must be from other friends' phones or just generally taking to each other.

I don't really want her to know I've found out about this through her diary, but on the other hand there's no way I'd know about it otherwise. And she has straight out denied previously that they are dating.

She has appeared so innocent up to this point, I'm a bit out of my depth....

Are you OK? You sound angry.

You've misunderstood. I didn't shut anything down, dear.

Lighten up.

Agree 👍

I agree too. My Mum read my diary, she was worried about the crowd I was spending time with . Of course I was annoyed, but even at the time I did understand why. I wasn’t having sex as a teenager so there wasn’t anything like that exposed, but I think most people would understand why a worried parent might feel the need to snoop.

Don't talk about the diary.

Just have a frank discussion about safe sex boundaries, saying no and not pleasing men!

“…but I would say the chances of dying during consensual choking are miniscule.”

Not true I’m afraid. The whole object of this stupid activity is to deprive the brain of its usual level of oxygen. Additionally, brain damage (of various levels) can, and does, occur.

It’s irrelevant to include straightforward murders in the choking discussion here on MN. That consent website mixes the two issues together, which is fine of course for their objective of exposing the overall picture of unacceptable violence against women.

I’m astounded that young teens are experimenting like this. 😢

😮 at the first sentence quoted in post above by @swimlyn

@FrancescaContinifor your post, all I can see is a small blank rectangle at the start. Puzzled.

It seems like many posters on this thread have mother issues and are projecting onto the OP. Men strangling women and young girls is absolutely fine in comparison to reading your teenage child's diary.

I wonder if psychotherapy would be helpful to the posters who say they cannot get over that betrayal to the extent they'd ignore their child or other children being in danger.

I don’t think those saying it’s not good parenting to snoop in your child’s diary think it’s a ok for men to strangle women 🙄

Also how is this knowledge going to help exactly? Is the teen going to listen to mum? How can mum prevent them meeting up if they are determined to?

Thanks for all the further thoughts and comments, including the ones on the diary-reading issue. Plan is to ask her about the PHSE sex ed day earlier this week and then bring up safe sex (oh for the days when that was just about pregnancy and STDs!), normalisation of extreme sexual practices, porn, the place of sex withing a loving relationship, fidelity...

Re the "We can't consent to this" - it is a bit difficult that that appears to mainly (entirely?) list actual murders where the perpetrator lied and claimed the rough sex defence, and it would be easy for DD to think, well, "Tom" isn't a murderer and I am consenting. Although I guess it's possible that some of those cases were genuine "rough sex gone wrong"? But it's still not at all safe, particularly when they are both so young and not able to undertake risky behaviour safely.

I was always going to chat to her about how the sex ed day had gone, but will now use that as the hook.

The "oh look at this thing I read about on Mumsnet" is also definitely a good one since it's something I already regularly say! Can use that to drip feed other pieces of information about these issues.

I can't believe that people re still pussy-footing around about this 😮

The boyfriend, as I see it, committed a Criminal Offence ie GBH with Intent.

He apparently strangled her until she nearly passed out, he intended to do this and he did not have her consent to do this.

If any lawyers are reading this then I will be happy to be corrected.

He's dangerous and she should be kept away from him.

I would be asking the police advice about this before I went any further.

Couldn’t agree with you more, @MrsPapadopolis

Some people have entirely lost perspective if they’re more upset about a diary being read than about a child being strangled.

I also agree with MrsPapadopolis

Interesting article in the Guardian today: here - headline is "Kinks, BDSM and even torture porn are everywhere. Why has vanilla sex disappeared from our screens?"

LostFraggle, there is a passage on this in Caitlin Moran's new book

'So look, that's all the heavy stuff out of the way. Apart from sexual strangulation, on which I have to say THIS IS NOT A FUN AND REASSURING SEXUAL HOBBY TO HAVE. DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY PROFESSIONALLY TRAINED HORNY STRANGLERS THERE ARE? NONE. IN THE UK, 60 WOMEN HAVE DIED FROM STRANGULATORY SEX THAT HAS GONE WRONG. COMPARE THIS TO THE NUMBER OF WOMEN WHO HAVE DIED FROM "SOMEONE GOING DOWN ON THEM REALLY WELL FOR 20 MINUTES", ON WHICH THE STATS ARE: ZERO. YOU KNOW THERE'S AN OBVIOUS CHOICE TO MAKE HERE, DUDE. YOU ARE MESSING WITH SOME HIGH-STAKES SHIT. IF YOUR PARTNER WANTS TO FEEL "A BIT DIZZY", JUST DO WHAT EVERY GENERATION BEFORE YOU HAS DONE AND GIVE THEM SOME POPPERS, FOR CHRIST'S SAKE. OR SHE COULD JUST HOLD HER BREATH! NO RISK THERE! TRUST ME - THE LAST THING YOU WANT AT THE END OF THE NIGHT IS AN UNCONSCIOUS OR DEAD WOMAN. THAT IS REALLY NOT SEXY.'

What book is that please @Parisj ?

@swimlyn - I think it's called "What about Men?".

Update: so I took advantage of a car journey to talk to her about how her sex ed day at school had gone - sounded like they had a great external company facilitating it, covered STDs, porn, objectification, bunch of other good stuff. Talked to her about porn normalising the more extreme sexual practices, dangers of violent sexual behaviours (even if ostensibly consensual).

From how she responded as we were chatting, I'm still not sure if her diary entry was entirely fantasy, or part fantasy part based on reality (ie they kissed but the choking didn't happen), or entirely true.

She seemed to think that in relationships and sex someone would need to be more dominant, which I don't think is true at all - and as her closest example of a romantic relationship as her parents I don't think she sees that either DH or I are the more dominant partner (in day to day life).

Also need to talk more about what sex in a loving trusting relationship means etc etc....

All the responses on here have been really helpful...

@Lostfraggle It sounds like you have opened up the dialogue very naturally and you are giving her guidance that she needs. Nice job.

@Parisj that passage makes it all too real
But it's the truth

No one should be practicing choking out it seriously worries me

Been listening to too many dateline podcasts last night. Strangulation freaks me out

Re She seemed to think that in relationships and sex someone would need to be more dominant, which I don't think is true at all - and as her closest example of a romantic relationship as her parents I don't think she sees that either DH or I are the more dominant partner (in day to day life).
Which one does she think you are?
Does she know that in these types of relationships (although it should be 50/50) it is fine for HER to be the more dominant partner. And doesn't need to be with only boys who are pushy etc

Sounds like you've messed
up. Both in not thinking you need to talk to her about very common yet possibly harmful sexual practices which and in reading her diary. This shows why you need to talk to teens about more than the basics. But you know that now.

The diary reading is a huge betrayal so I'm not sure how you now talk about these things without her knowing you read it. Perhaps by starting with mu general conversations about consent and enjoyment?

It might be more diplomatic to not mention the diary reading. My mother read my diary when I was 15 (she denied it, but I knew because she slipped on what she knew) and I can still never fully trust her.

Are you on TikTok? Search "choking". Enough will come up for you to start a conversation about this disturbing trend you've seen on your fyp page. It is a disturbing trend!!

I dont think its just down to porn.
I never watched porn as a child and this is the type of crap idve probably written at 15. You just want to be edgy.
I wouldnt tell her you read her diary, and remember her diary is a space for her to vent her thoughts... its not necessarily reality... often just ideas a teen is trying out.
Best policy here is to initiate some kind of chat about sex in general.. about consent.. about the various dangers of things.. about S&M... and how things that might seem interesting or cool in theory or fantasy can end up effecting us very differently in reality.
I do remember as a teen.. a bit older than 15 maybe 16.. getting into my first sexual relationships and doing all kinds of stuff id never do now.. just out of interest... or because a boy suggested it and it seemed to turn him on and I liked that.
This is a journey a lot of women go on and sadly there's not much you can do to prevent it apart from tool your daughter up to be confident in saying what she does and does not want. Teens can be experimental and all you can do is hope that you've raised a daughter with enough confidence and self esteem to say no to anything that she doesnt turn out to like.
And at some stage as she turns into an adult you may have to realise that if you read her diary you might read things like this and she might be having a sex life that you personally cannot comprehend and find disturbing... and that is why you do not read your child's diary as they enter their late teens. It never ends well.

Just in case some haven't seen these;

https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/tiktok-blackout-challenge-deaths-b2236669.html

https://ifas.org.uk/strangulation-as-entertainment-the-normalisation-of-violence-against-women-on-screen/

Some of the scenes described there sound horrendous.
I am surprised that they refer to Steel Town Murders though, I watched that recently, it is a drama based on the murders of three teenage girls in Wales in the 1970s. The girls were raped and killed by being strangled, and the manner of their death is mentioned as part of the crime investigation, but there are no scenes at all of violence against the girls, no scenes of strangulation or rape, the series is focused almost entirely on the investigation afterwards, with some scenes of two of the girls going out on the evening they were killed. Unlike many crime series the violence is not shown or used in a glamourised way. So I am not sure why they have used that as an example because it is quite the opposite of the other dramas mentioned, where scenes are described using choking as part of sex.
Steel Town Murders was very sensitively done, in contrast. Should anyone be concerned about watching it or their teenagers watching it, I would watch it with my teenage daughters for instance.