Prepared for Adolescence?

Our son is turning 11 years old in a few days. He "borrowed" my deodorant the other day because he said "his pits stink." I mock-thanked him for sharing [TMI!!!] and seriously-thanked him later for taking more responsibility of his life [now, if he would only take as much interest in cleaning his room before I make him on Fridays!!!]. I share this [with his permission BTW; BIG thanks and WTG to Josh for letting me blog this!!!] because he has become increasingly aware of who he is as a pre-teen recently thanks to an audio book by Dr. James Dobson entitled Preparing for Adolescence [click pic to buy your own].

We stumbled onto this resource a few months ago and have been working through its contents together ever since. With CDs just for parents in addition to CDs for you to listen to with your child, the content will prepare you for "the sex talk" in addition to bravely answering difficult questions about sexuality [such as those surrounding masturbation which Christians usually ignore or leave shrouded in guilt]. Nothing is out of bounds. And everything is answered for boys and girls thoroughly, kindly, and [I believe] Biblically.

Dobson suggests listening to this content on a long road trip over one weekend culminating in a father / son [mother / daughter] fun day s/he picks. We're still going to do that "just us" weekend, but what we're doing before then is listening to 15 minute segments of each CD at night before Josh goes to sleep. We turn all the lights out and lay on his bed and listen, pausing when necessary, to laugh, talk, or wonder about what was just said. The number of questions and honest reactions to the content I thought too complicated for him to understand has staggered me. It has not only given Josh a clearer understanding of what is happening now, it has diminished some of the fears I didn't even know he already had about the future! And it has drawn us closer together. Lydia doesn't know what adolescence is all about yet, but she's already looking forward to it [!!!] so she can go on her "mother / daughter" weekend as soon as she and Jackie finishes the CDs too!!! [PS - This material has been re-packaged and updated recently. The new pic looks like the smaller one above]