Conversations You NEED To Have With Your Teen To Prevent Teenage Pregnancy

How to prevent teenage pregnancy? It can be helpful to talk. See our tips for starting conversations about sex and relationships started with your teen.

Many families wonder how they can prevent teenage pregnancy, and it is not easy. We know that teenagers can be easily influenced by living in the moment. The key is having regular and open conversations with your child so that they know your values, beliefs and understand the risks of having sex young. These conversations are most effective in smaller bits, rather than one large awkward “talk.”

How To Help Prevent Teenage Pregnancy Through Conversation

The US Office of Adolescent Health reports that teens who have regular conversations with their parents about sex are more likely to:

  • Delay the age when they first become sexually active
  • More likely to use condoms and other contraceptives
  • Have better overall communication within romantic relationships
  • Have a lower risk of teen pregnancy
  • Have sex less often than other adolescents

Explain How A Baby Can Impact Them Now

There are teens out there who want to get pregnant. They often do not fully understand the Effects Teenage Pregnancy Can Have On A Baby or on themselves. One way to reach out to your teen might be through technology. The Candie’s Foundation has created a free Cry Baby App that can begin to give your teen an idea just how demanding a baby can be over 24 hours. Some other topics to talk about include:

  • Exploring future plans and how a baby early makes those plans harder
  • Health issues of having babies young
  • Emotional reasons why having a baby is tough
  • How having a baby changed YOUR relationship with your partner
  • How financially difficult having a baby can be
  • It’s ok to feel sexual desire, everyone does. It is not ok to act on it in unsafe ways.

Explain Contraceptive Options & How To Access Them

Teens value your opinion (even when they seem like they don’t!) but will make choices that are their own. If a teen does not have access to birth control it leaves them very vulnerable if they decide to have sex.  If a teen decides in the moment to have sex, it is likely they will have sex regardless of having contraceptives. Some teens will try methods such as the pulling out or charting their cycle, which leave them open to both STD’s and pregnancy.

Some parents feel by putting their daughter on a birth control pill is giving them permission to have sex. How do you discourage teenage sex when you have just given them a pill to prevent pregnancy? This becomes a personal choice that depends on your own personal beliefs about sex, love and reproduction. If you choose not to make any forms of contraceptive readily available, you are putting your teen at a high risk for pregnancy. Make sure to discuss your beliefs with your teen and why you feel the way you do. It is EQUALLY as important to have this conversation with both boys and girls.

Related: Teenage Pregnancy Effects On Mom: Physical Effects Before And After Baby

Talk About Unhealthy Relationships

When talking with your teen about how to prevent teenage pregnancy, it is also a good time to talk about what unhealthy relationships look like. Warning signs in a relationship include:

  • Pressure to have sex in the relationship
  • One or both people are not enjoying the relationship
  • The relationship pushes you away from friends or family
  • Manipulation to get what one person wants
  • Verbal or physical abuse of any kind

What conversations are you planning to have with your kids to prevent teenage pregnancy within your own family? Tell us in the comments.

Image Credit: Postcards from Inside

13 thoughts on “Conversations You NEED To Have With Your Teen To Prevent Teenage Pregnancy”

  1. I have a 16 yr. old. We’ve had the talk, just in case. More than once. Those talks stick too because they are something the teens want information on, even if they don’t ask.

  2. It’s so important for parents to open up and not be afraid of these conversations. Children will understand and respect it better coming from their parent more than what they learn in the classroom.

  3. I’m a big believer in having open conversation about bodies, touching, and sex (as different ages and maturities require different levels of knowledge). I really don’t understand when parents are reluctant to discuss this kind of stuff with their kids. It’s definitely setting them up for problems in the future.

  4. Thank you for not just saying to abstain. In my graduating class, there were at least a dozen mothers or pregnant girls. It’s something that’s easily stopped, but parents have to put in the effort to help stop teen pregnancy.

  5. Having an open and honest conversation concerning sex & relationship is the best way to equip teens with important information.

  6. I have always been an advocate for teaching children about babies early on. So many kids are sexually active at 13 or 14 it is frightening.

  7. Great post! It’s so important to have open communication with teens, especially nowadays! This wasn’t ever an issue when I was a teen, but the teens now are so different!

  8. I think it’s important to let your teen know that they can tell you ANYTHING. I had lots of talks with my daughter about sex and pregnancy and I’m proud to say she was a virgin until a late age.

  9. I love how detailed these tips are. It’s important to educate your teen about prrgnancy and what it can do, so they understand why they should avoid sex, etc.

  10. Robin Masshole mommy

    Absolutely. There is no reason kids should be getting pregnant in their teens if they are educated properly.

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