We are hoping to help you have these conversations with your kids and students. These are meant to be “best practices” but every situation is different. Hopefully these thoughts can help you as you navigate tricky conversations at home.

Below are a few solid resources, as well as our two favorite resources on faith, sex, and gender! For this article we’d like to pull out 3 specific areas, but this is only a starting point.

What age should my kid be allowed to date?

This is the wrong question. As parents, it would be great if someone just gave us a number, then we could hold our kids to that, and feel great about our parenting. So, what age should your child date? We don’t know them well enough to give you an age. However, we would like to suggest that there be different levels of dating. Each of these levels is less based on their age, but more based on their maturity. We love a quote from the “parent map” article below, “I’d say you’re ready (to date) when your head, heart and crotch are all in sync. But sometimes people aren’t there till 26.” While said in gest and with a little hyperbole, it’s not far off! How can we help them date in a way that develops them in these areas? There could be a phase where dating happens only in group settings without an official title. Maybe a phase where they start using titles, dates are in public places, but there is still parental supervision. Maybe there’s a phase where they go on dates alone. We don’t know what the phases look like, but instead of just drawing a line at 16 and say “nothing before” and “anything you want after”, there’s a way that you can help them develop their “head, heart, and crotch” along the way.

What boundaries should I put around dating?

The best advice we can give here is to have boundaries set in place BEFORE they are old enough to date. From a young age, maybe you have rules in place like: No boys upstairs, or no girls in your room, no car rides alone with a person outside the family, etc. Those rules are therefore not a reaction to their new relationship. If you’ve missed the mark setting those expectations, or feel the need for more boundaries….This might sound crazy… Talk with your teenager about it! What do they think is fair? How do they think they can honor God, and you, in there relationship? What boundaries do they see would be beneficial? Maybe there’s an opportunity to meet in the middle, but also help them see the heart behind the rules!

Dating in a digital world

There’s way too much to say here, but it’s important to understand that to teenagers today, the digital world is the real world. Teenagers are actually having less sex than 25 years ago according to several studies, but they are viewing more pornography, more sexting, and sending more explicit photos than ever. 25 years ago, you might be concerned with what happened in the backseat of a Chevy. Today we should be more concerned with what happens 3 inches from their face on a screen. This does not necessarily mean you should take their phone away. It does mean that if you want your kids to have a healthy real-life relationship, you will have to help them navigate healthy digital relationships as well!

Bonus thought: Do everything to befriend, and get on the same page, with the parents of your child’s significant other. This can be huge, not only for you, but for both of your kids as well!

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