Keeping Your Kids Sexually Pure A How-To Guide for Parents, Pastors, Youth Workers, and Teachers

great expectationsLift up a standard for the people.Isaiah 62:10 KJVMy daughter had two choices: Either she was going down the aisle a virgin or she was going down the aisle in a coffin. This, of course, is hyperbole. Restated, it means that in our home the boundary lines for sexual purity were clear: Nothing less than virginity was acceptable.I looked into the eyes of this child whom God had given me to raise, my twin sister''s daughter. When she was born, I suggested naming her La Nej, which loosely means "snow" and for me was symbolic of a fresh, new beginning.Eleven years later La Nej was in a foster home on Long Island, New York. Through prayers, letters, and urgent calls to the Department of Social Services, I was able to assume custody and flew three thousand miles to get my niece. I would later marry, adopt her, and raise her as my own daughter.When I drove to the facility in upstate New York, the Holy Spirit was my navigator. I had no idea where I was heading, but I was determined to get there. The paperwork that would grant me custody was not yet final, but La Nej was permitted to come to Los Angeles on an "extended vacation."The child was distraught when I arrived at the foster care facility. I later learned that her foster mother had taunted her, saying I wouldn''t come for her after all. The quiet panic in her eyes turned to relief when she, standing outdoors despite the wintry weather, finally saw me walking toward her. "Kiss, kiss! Hug tight! Never let go!" she said as she wrapped her little arms tightly around my neck.It was a phrase I would hear often, one that would become a precious signature of the commitment we had made to each other. We gathered La Nej''s things, most of which I soon discarded. Her thick hair was braided in ugly little pigtails, and the striped woolen cap scrunched on her head looked third-hand. Since this was the day before her twelfth birthday, we had a wonderful excuse for a little pampering. I drove right to my favorite beauty salon in Manhattan and marveled at how different La Nej looked after a simple shampoo and set. Then we shopped till we dropped.The world of beauty had been my career for more than ten years. A former magazine beauty and health editor, I had written two beauty books and in the process had relocated to Los Angeles, where I continued to write, travel, and consult. How would I juggle these responsibilities now that I was a single parent? I decided to think about it one day at a time, a lesson I had come to learn in my daily walk with God.On the plane back to Los Angeles, the relief of finally getting La Nej out of the system gave way to the reality of my new responsibility. I realized that I had no idea how to raise a child. I thought about my own childhood and the emotional scars that had remained hid-den for years, scars that resulted from being displaced from my parents at times, living with grandparents off and on, and occasionally in foster homes too. Perhaps I saw myself in La Nej. All I know is that I wanted her to make different choices than the ones I had made- poor decisions that resulted from raggedy self-esteem.We sat down for our first serious talk immediately after breakfast while we were still in our bathrobes. Her eyes tried unsuccessfully to hide her surprise as I pulled out larger than life charts of the male and female reproductive organs, visuals I had used in public school classrooms during my volunteer years as a board member with Planned Parenthood."These are the ovaries. The egg comes from here once a month," I said as I made a fist and placed it below my stomach. The lecture continued as I charted the course of what happens when the sperm meets the egg. "The best way to keep the sperm from meeting the egg is to say no," I concluded.Although I''m uncertain of how much she actually understood at that time, of this I am certain: La Nej knew that keeping herself sexually pure was of the utmost value. Later she would hear her options for going down tTolbert, La Verne is the author of 'Keeping Your Kids Sexually Pure A How-To Guide for Parents, Pastors, Youth Workers, and Teachers' with ISBN 9780310238607 and ISBN 0310238609.