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April Newsletter 2011 | |||||||||||||||
| Just Friends, for 90 days...
By the time I introduce the 90-day challenge to teens in the classroom, I've already discussed physical and emotional consequences of being sexually active, pressures to "just do it," and how people become attached in relationships. The conclusion of all that preparation is to ask teens to consider just HOW to go about having
 healthy relationships with the opposite sex. Author John Van Epp has a very interesting proposition in the book "How to Avoid Falling in Love With a Jerk." He says that research shows that it takes about 90 days to BEGIN to see patterns of behavior that reveal a person's true character. The truth is, we can all put
on a pretty sustained "show" for our date...at first. But over time, the real "me" begins to show, warts and all.
When I ask young people how much teens really know each other before their first date, they admit that it's hardly at all. Maybe they've been around each other in school for a couple of years, and have recently been texting and talking during passing periods. But do they know each others' families? Do they know their past dating histories? Do they know each others' hopes and dreams? Rarely. So isn't that what dating is for? Well...it should and could be. But typically, teens have their first date in a movie theater, and they are not talking because they are, well, watching a movie. The pressure is not to know each other, but to get physical, which can be a problem, even if it's just holding hands. Within less than a minute of any prolonged skin-to-skin contact, an attachment begins to form (Google "oxytocin" and "bonding" some time). Second, a natural progression begins. Middle schoolers tell me they are kissing within the first few dates, making out within a week or two, and maybe even going under the clothes (and worse) in the first month. As the physical relationship progresses, the "getting to know you" tends to stall out, and the couple is surprised to discover incompatibility or, worse, major character flaws, only after they have formed an attachment.
Hence, the 90-Day Rule. Just friends. No touching. At all. Admittedly, teens will look at you like you have a third eye. I concede to teens that it might cut down the number of dates that they get. But then I ask, "What did you just find out if someone isn't willing to get to know you as friends first?" I had one pretty, vivacious girl come back to class the following day, excited to report on a little experiment she conducted: "I asked the guys in the two classes before this what they would do if a girl said she wanted to do the 90-day rule. The guys in the first class said they wouldn't do it...but in the second class, two guys said, 'Well, if I really liked her, and she was worth it, I'd do it.'" She just beamed with smug satisfaction. She had just found out which guys were the decent ones who cared about getting to know a girl, and which ones were out to fulfill their own selfish desires.
Happy Parenting,
Tori Libby
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