Episode 22 - Sex Positive Families: Preparation Over Prevention

37 year old (we think) Melissa hosts the Sex Positive Families podcast which I’ve followed on Instagram for several months now @Sexpositive_families. She’s a social worker/sexual health educator doing amazing work I felt was useful to Something Positive for Positive People. I didn’t have good sex education growing up, many of the people on the podcast have expressed the same, and I can speak from experience, that lack or absence of proper education is a contributing factor to the stigma around STI’s that many of us struggle with. Melissa teaches us how to have sexual health conversations with our youth. This episode was fun, informative and definitely useful.

The most interesting takeaway to me was tickling and how it relates to sex as an adult. In tickling, the tickler often feels the other person is enjoying themselves due to the amount of laugher taking place. The tickled is laughing, and at some point is saying no or stop, and their no goes ignored. In sex (as an adult), I could find myself doing this enjoyable fun thing with someone while they are showing signs of enjoyment, but if they say no, I could go on to ignore that because ohhhh they don’t mean no, they can’t mean it because they’re having too much fun. I thought that connection about consent between tickling as a child and sex as an adult was powerful. There are many other cool gems in this episode to listen for, so I hope you’re able to get them and have some awesome SEX-ual health convos with the youth you’re closest to.

In relation to the focus of this podcast, AFTER reaching out to Melissa, I found out she is HSV-2 positive!!! We still do the ‘Hi I’m Courtney and we’re speaking with ______ about their experience with _______’, but the important lesson here is that as someone living with HSV, I wouldn’t have known she had HSV had I not been open about my own. The fact that I was reaching out for the sole purpose of connecting our listeners to her work goes to show you just how common the herp-glerp is.

Telling your kids about your diagnosis - Should I Disclose My HIV or HSV status to my children: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLEFZ9DrQE8

Melissa of Sex Positive Families can be found at www.sexpositivefamilies.com, on Instagram @SexPositive_Families, Facebook @sexpositivefamilies, Twitter @sex_positivefam, YouTube Channel: Sex-Positive Families

You can find Sex-Positive Swag at www.redbubble.com/people/sexpositivefamilies  

Please continue to rate and review the podcast as it does help with the rankings and get this podcast to those who need to find it. Many people have been connected to the resources available that they may not otherwise have come in contact with so soon. I’m on Instagram, Twitter, Tumblr and Reddit @HOnMyChest

I really do wish I could speak to more STI’s but finding people with HIV/AIDS who are willing to share is quite a challenge. If you’re ready to share, please reach out.

Stay Positive!