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My 11 yr old who for the most part still acts like a 7 yr old. Still watches kid movies, giggles at silly jokes, loves to spend time with his grandparents....

Anyway, he has been slamming his laptop lid shut a few times when I entered his room. I tried to get into the history. The history wasn't being saved despite having it set up correctly in IE10. Well, my daughter used the laptop but opened google chrome, there it was. Hardcore porn in the history.

When I questioned my son about slamming the lid he directly lied about the reason. When I told him that I could now read the history he would not admit to it till I actually went to the computer (kinda like the parking lot confession).

He says that he doesn't know why and he has been viewing it for months. I feel like a failure as a parent. I peek over his shoulder while he is online but when he took the laptop to his room as assumed he was just doing what he normally does, facebook, minecraft. I was so so so so wrong. I would still check on him but I guess he was good about hearing me making my way to his room.

We have taken the computer away. I will install some sort of parental controls when he is allowed back on.

Hardest part was dealing with my H explain to him all the reasons porn is terrible. My H isn't aware that I know he views porn...unless he reads this...

Any advice????

Any advice????

Yep, this is so normal...so don't feel like a failure at all.

My advice is to have a chat with your son and not just about the birds and bees.

Unfortnetly with the land of easy access internet and the fact that you can find and get anything you want, keeping him from this new found fun is unlikely.

its time to teach him about responsiblity, privacy, and the difference between privacy and secrecy.

Also, dont make him feel like an abnormal kid for looking - we all peaked at something that was taboo at some point.

And just because he 'acts like a 7 year old' doesnt mean much. His body is gearing up for puberty and so he's probably getting a lot of feelings he's not used to.

Talk to him like a human being, tell him that there are things he needs to know that the internet shouldn't really be teaching him, and open the lines of communication for when things start getting really interesting.

You want him to be able to come to you in the future.

You want him to be able to come to you in the future.

Ahhhh, you are so correct. He shutdown when I was trying to talk to him. I was so stunned at the videos he was watching that I really wasn't making much sense to him. H and I talked all about privacy and secrecy and his hormones...ahhh...

I am not ready for teenage years, not yet anyway.

I am not ready for teenage years, not yet anyway.

Ready or not...here they are.

And the truth is that what porn is to you, is not what it is or will be to him.

I am all for parental controls, don't get me wrong. But the more you force the issue the less he will be open with you. He doesnt think that this is 'terrible'. H probably had an issue with it because he doesn't think its horrible either. Men are sight/vision creatures.

Your son know's its there, he's probably been hearing about it for a while now. He probably knows more then you think he does.

The crux is that you need to treat him like an individual and a human rather then just your son. This is bigger then him watching porn.

This is him becoming interested in females on a deeper level, this is about teaching him how to respect bounderies, and what you can and can't do with members of the oppsite sex.

Also, he will only get the Health Class text book version of all of this which in my opinion is about 1% of what they need to know.

I have a son and a daughter, and will be having this discussion well before I am ready...i totally feel you.

[This message edited by Undefinabl3 at 3:28 PM, October 22nd (Tuesday)]

I'm going to bring up an object lesson that has served me well in many discussions and issues with my kids.

Corrie Ten Boom, author of The Hiding Place, described a conversation with her father. She asked him a question about "sex sin". He didn't answer her immediately but instead, said, "Corrie, when we get off the train at the next station, I want you to carry my suitcase." (The suitcase was quite heavy, full of watches and tools) She said to him, "Papa, I can't carry your suitcase. It's much too heavy for me." He answered her, "So is the answer to the question you asked me. So I will carry that for you until you are stronger and ready to carry it."

My son was just a little older than yours when we discovered porn on his Nook and also in the history on our computer. And I used that story. I told him that while his body was ramping up and changing, and becoming ready for sexual expression and it was normal for him to have that interest, his mind and his heart were not ready for that kind of information at this time. And that he'd have to trust me and his dad to carry this for now.

I reassured him that he was normal and not sinful. (That was a major reaction that he had) But that his dad and I want him to have a healthy outlook on and relationship with sex, and that exposure to those images now was not the way to accomplish that.

But that his dad and I want him to have a healthy outlook on and relationship with sex, and that exposure to those images now was not the way to accomplish that.

This is what saddens me. I hate that one of his first exposures to sex was these horrific videos. And they were terrible! He was googling threesomes...

I did my best to explain this is not what sex is for most people.

I too recently caught DS 11 watching porn on my iPhone. He lied about it at first, but after reassuring him that he wasn't in trouble, he came clean. He's a crappy liar, so that helped Anyhow, I was in shock. My baby??? what happened to my baby??? When I asked him how he knew about it, he pointed the finger at dad. Totally believable. Dad watches porn on his phone when I'm not home and DS says he can hear it. (I've addressed it with H). This led to a discussion that it's not wrong but he's too young to see stuff like that. We talked about his body changing and that he's going to feel things he's not felt before, etc. BUT, I want dad to talk with him since dad knows more how he feels than I do. Dad has yet to discuss it with him. Bottom line, I totally feel you on this. TOTALLY. I've already caught him masturbating, now I catch him watching porn. Dad has not seen anything. I'm all traumatized.

Mine are still a bit young for this, but my sister has a 15 year old. They watched his computer history, and he went from Legos, to boobs to baseball. typical guy stuff.

She had a brief discussion with him about how it is normal to want to look, how they feel about porn, and to come to them for questions.

Well, we're in a little different situation, in that my H is a recovering SA.

We HAVE to be blunt with our kids that addiction runs in the family...with DH being a recovering addict and one of his grandparents being an alcoholic.

From what I've heard, kids find ways around parental controls really easily.

Also, we do not frame that something is terrible. We frame everything as whether or not it is appropriate behavior. Even for something simple as chewing gum..it was a rite of passage at age 4. Then it was appropriate. Not appropriate for a 2 yo.

We are handling other vices the same based on our family values. I don't expect him to abstain from alcohol for his whole life. I do expect him to use alcohol appropriately. My oldest knows drinking can be appropriate. (We let him have tastes of this and that with us.) He also knows drinking and driving will land him in some serious deep shit. Not appropriate behavior.

Same thing with porn use. DH got in trouble because he was using porn to self medicate at that age, to feel good about himself. That's not an appropriate use. Porn can be appropriate in a loving adult relationship..

I was taught to abstain from sex when I was younger. I did so, only because I knew having a baby at 15 wasn't an appropriate choice for me. Supporting two people on $4/hour (minimum when I was a teen) didn't really appeal to me. And I knew my parents would not help me at all.

So, I became active when I could better handle the risks of an accidental pregnancy.

FWIW...

[This message edited by IRN2006 at 7:06 PM, October 22nd (Tuesday)]

He's pubertal and curious. And he will start masterbating soon so get ready for that. He needs to be trained in loving images rather than S&M, threesomes, beastiality, etc. As a physician ( board certified in adolescent medicine I might add) I try to normalize behavior as much as possible (sexual feelings are normal and healthy) while guiding people to more healthy practices (monogamy, protection from STDs, birth control, romantic soft porn imagery,etc.)

Hi hitbyatruck,

I am so so sorry your baby was exposed to such trash. Sadly, it appears none of us are able to keep our kiddos away from this stuff as long as we have phones, Internet, etc...and even if we had none of that, they would somehow manage to see it when at a friends house.

Google and YouTube this: Robert Jensen - "Getting Off: Pornography and the End of Masculinity

It is a very long YouTube video, but I think extremely important for all of us to watch. What our kids are being exposed to is the raunchiest of the raunchy, and hugely damaging to young people, setting up their future expectations of what sex is, and, as I have told my son, not by any stretch of imagination what most women want in a sexual relationship. Much of what is shown is very very VERY demeaning to women, (and, IMO, also to the men involved).

Porn is a business. A HUGE business, that cares absolutely NOTHING about anything other than pushing the envelope further, and further and further in order to make more money. It's depravity is insidious, and many people are unaware of just how horrible some of it is.

For those of us that are old enough to remember porn from the 70's and 80's, what porn has morphed into in recent years is absolutely unbelievable. Acts are being performed in porn that 20 or 30 yrs ago simply did not even exist except for maybe in an extremely small fringe of the population.

The majority of porn is geared toward males, and in order to keep them coming back for more, these producers of porn are pushing the limits of human endurance. What is being done to these young woman and men performers is quite often horrendous and torturous to the female body. For young men to grow up and base their sexual desires on what they see in porn is disturbing.

Our society has opened a Pandora's box and I'm afraid we now have a huge and very serious problem on our hands.

I think you have received a lot of good advice above, and how to handle this with your very young son will be tricky for sure. I wish you well.

Personally, I believe these boys FATHERS, or UNCLES, or a very close trusted male friend needs to watch the video I have suggested above, and address many of those issues with these boys.

PPGA

Thank you. I will be watching the video along with my H.

No new advice (sorry) but wanted to let you know you are not alone.

I found out my DS was watching porn (he was about 13) by getting a surprise copy of my x-MIL's cable bill in my mailbox. DS had watched 15 hours of paid-porn at her house while he was there over Christmas visitation.

(Let's not even go with the fact of WHO was supervising him during the porn'fest on Christmas!)

I was traumatized, like you are feeling. I had to tell my brain this is the "new" porn. Two decades ago it was a mom finding a Hustler under the mattress. I find it very difficult because porn today is so visual and that is their exposure (ie centerfold versus the video I witnessed of a cheerleader being passed around between 4 football players in the locker room).

It frightens me to hear/see about how the 'norm' has changed. High school kids are telling me giving oral is no biggie....it is 'just' the equivalent of a greeting/handshake and really isn't sexual.

WTH??????????????

oral is no biggie

compared to the hardcore stuff that's in porn now, 'oral' is the least of our worries, I can assure you.

It's horrible.

My 13-year-old (many moons ago) got in trouble when my local video store called me and (very embarrassed) explained that the mainstream video I had just returned was in fact, hard core porn he had copied from an older boy at boarding school. Guess who was embarrassed then?
Luckily, my son and I had a very open relationship where he felt he could tell me things. I gave him the talk about developing appropriate ideas about the opposite sex and not objectifying women, but I'm sure that wasn't the last time he watched porn. Men/boys are visual. Before the onset of the internet, boys pirated Playboy and Penthouse. What disturbs me about the internet is the appalling lengths to which porn can go. I am concerned about young boys learning to sexualize violence, rape, bestiality and the like.

I am shocked at all the similar stories about catching kids with porn. I hate this. To me this is way more than sneaking a peek at Playboy. I hate that my son saw the videos he saw. We have been talking openly about it though. He really thought this was normal sexual behavior. That this is what everyone was doing...good gravy.

Yep caught my 14 year old daughter looking at it. Had a long discussion and have since restricted access to one computer that is password protected. No cell phones or devices here. We had a long discussion that we know she is curious but these images do not represent a healthy sex life. It is as fake as any other movie made in Hollywood.

It also helps that our church has this discussion in youth group and regular church about once a year.

Keep the lines of communications open. She is now almost 16 and we openly talk about sex and sex outside of marriage can create a number of problems. Hopefully you son will come to you or H in the future about questions.

He really thought this was normal sexual behavior.

That's what simply kills me. Millions of young people are growing up believing that this is what normal sex is.

Because they see it in porn, they automatically believe this is what sex is supposed to be like. The boys are fed this horror, and develop an appetite for it. The girls follow suit because they too have seen it on video, and they think this is what the have to do to keep a boyfriend. What an absolute nightmare.

It really breaks my heart.