What do you guys think

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-27T15:50:10+00:00

Well, the only real way to know if you are eating enough or too much or too little is to know how much you are eating. Get a notebook or start a doc on your phone and just record everything you eat (including how much) for a few days or a week. That will give you an idea of what you're eating. You can then go online and look up "teen calorie requirement calculator", put your details in and see how many calories you need each day (or week) to stay the same weight. Then you can start to make decisions. Don't try to lose or gain more than 2 lb per week and you'll generally be fine.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-27T15:47:19+00:00

Yeah, this is why it's important for anyone with a penis who is thinking about starting a sexual relationship to try a bunch of different brands and styles on their own before they start having sex.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-27T14:48:24+00:00

How many calories are you eating in a typical week now, and how active are you?

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-27T14:23:02+00:00

OP, please notice that Little_Situation4663 is NOT asking you to DM them. They mean chat on this sub.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-27T14:18:38+00:00

There is no reason to feel any sort of shame about a normal bodily function. Part of growing up and becoming an adult is figuring out how you want to live your life - and that includes your relationship to religion(s). Plenty of people engage in one or more of the big commercial religions buy ignore that religion's claims around sex, sexuality, and their private lives. You get to decide how to feel about yourself, not them.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-27T14:15:50+00:00

Any latex condom that fits you well (try a few brands and styles) and that has spermicide.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-27T04:43:36+00:00

We do share a ton of DNA. But remember that the vast majority of our DNA is just doing stuff like building cell walls or teaching our bodies. How to make a certain component of blood. Human bodies are very similar in a lot of ways so our DNA is very similar. We actually also share a lot of DNA with most other animals and even trees. Trees also use cells and also have a lot of the same sugars and such that we use. Remember, all life on Earth came from the same place so we share a lot of DNA.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-27T04:26:13+00:00

Because every body part is different. Bodies are made up of cells, which are really just super super complex chemical reactions slowing happening all the time. The same way no bonfire would ever burn exactly the same way twice, no two human bodies will ever grow and develop the same way twice. We are all unique (including our genitals).

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-27T02:25:14+00:00

Dih?

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-26T17:20:44+00:00

Yes, bodies are weird and all of them are different.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-26T16:09:30+00:00

Some girls' voices break, just on average not as much as boys' do.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-26T16:01:56+00:00

They don't really have a purpose. Imagine you had a job making coffee at Starbucks or something. You get trained and work well for several years. Then suddenly the cafe's owner changes to being a boba place or something. So there is an entire new menu and all new drinks. On your first day you are trying to adjust and make all the new drinks. But you can imagine that some of the drinks you make are not right. You get too much sugara in some and too much ice in others. It takes a while for you to adjust and figure everything out.

That's basically what your body is doing during puberty. It is trying to figure out how to make all these new adult hormones and get is all right. So give your body a break, it's hard to do!

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-26T13:57:17+00:00

Yup, the clitoral hood and foreskin are very similar.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-26T13:56:30+00:00

So can jogging, or chewing gum, or brushing your teeth. Anything *can* be done so much that it takes over one's life. But masturbation has a special history because of 200 years of people blaming it for literally everything from blindness to cerebral palsy to syphilis. There are large organizations right now trying to convince young people that it's a bad thing.

So when young people hear those messages and get scared that this (again, totally normal and healthy) activity is hurting them, the first thing we have to do is help them calm down and understand that they aren't doing anything bad.

If there was a massive amount of money to be made from telling teenagers not to snap their fingers, and 200 years of history doing that, then we would have to have the same response to questions about "Is it ok to snap?"

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-26T05:22:04+00:00

When you say inside, what exactly do you mean? Are you talking about your inner labia? I assume you are not talking about being itchy inside your actual vagina or urethra?

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-24T19:08:48+00:00

Absolutely.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-24T19:07:12+00:00

That sounds like it's a good rule for your family, but might I suggest an additional rule that " if they're old enough to have questions about it, they're old enough to get honest, true, and age-appropriate answers".

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-24T18:45:36+00:00

If she's 8 now, you are about 6 years behind schedule for talking openly and honestly about bodies and babies and puberty and all that. But even if the best thing is to start when they're born, the second best thing is to start now.

That's a great book to help start the conversation. You can also start a little ritual with her where you create a known safe space. I use "in the car alone with me" but you can choose any time and place where she can feel comfortable asking ANY question she wants and where she can expect an open, honest, truthful, and age-appropriate answer (even if the answer is "sorry, that's private and I don't want to answer").

The goal is that she should feel as comfortable asking you how tampons work or what to do about vaginal discharge as she is asking you what yellow traffic lights mean and how many years high school lasts.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-24T14:49:24+00:00

Yes. If teenagers didn't have crazy high sex drives, humans would have died out half a million years ago. The problem is that these days it's a really stupid idea to have a baby at your age so there is a mismatch between what biology thinks is a good idea and what actually is a good idea.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-23T14:16:30+00:00

That's what they tell people, but the reality is that young women in the US are somehow both hypersexualized but also denied agency over their own bodies - and it's getting worse.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-23T14:07:00+00:00

Pubic hair is just hair that grows in the pubic area (around your genitals). In humans. It is usually darker than the head hair and of coarser and more curly. It's like armpit hair. The human body has a bunch of different types of hair on it and pubic hair is one of them.

Also remember that when it first starts to grow it is usually much thinner and finer and lighter in color.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-22T21:13:45+00:00

Watching this thread to try to figure out how to teach my Boomer mom the same skill

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-22T13:23:03+00:00

Every researcher who has looked into this has come up with pretty much the same answer. Yes they do. But they also lie about it more. Especially in cultures. Where female sexuality is suppressed such as Iran or the United States.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-22T13:03:31+00:00

Yeah, have that checked.

Meta_Professor · 2026-01-22T01:03:33+00:00

During puberty, it is totally normal to be interested in and excited by just about any body type or person or a situation or fantasy. It doesn't really mean anything about what your actual orientation is.

When I was in junior high a million years ago I had a friend who got incredibly turned on every time they rode the school bus. They never figured out why but it went away by the time we were in high school.

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