Kids Suddenly Modest About Private Parts? It’s Time to Take Cover

There was no precise moment. Kathleen Matulich just remembers that her 6-year-old son began carefully bolting the bathroom door of their Santa Monica home behind him and began turning his back to her when he got dressed.

“He actually started saying, ‘I want my privacy,’ ” recalls Matulich, 45. “When he discovered his private parts, my private parts became private parts. I stopped being naked around him. I just followed his lead.”

When children begin displaying such “modesty cues,” often at about 5 or 6 years old, parents should begin covering up, said San Clemente pediatrician Dr. William Sears. This does not mean an injury-inducing dive for cover when a child bursts in on a parent while that parent is in his birthday suit because that sends a message of shame. Parents should be casual and relaxed when reaching for that bathrobe.

“One of the earliest and most important sexuality concepts you want to teach your child is that the body is good and that all parts of the body are good,” said Sears, author of “The Discipline Book” (Little Brown, 1997), in which he discusses the issue of parental nudity. “Mommy and Daddy should bathe with baby nude in the tub. But all children eventually develop a sense of modesty. Signs of this are a quick cross of the hands over the genitals or turning the back when naked. When this happens, you can be sure the unclothed years of childhood are over.”

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By age 5, many children start thinking of their bodies as something that needs to be covered up and something that is private, a message often learned from parents who’ve had a “these are your private parts” talk with their kids. For some children, however, self-consciousness and modesty don’t hit until the dawning of puberty.

“When my older daughter started to develop at about 11, she started seeking privacy by locking the door when she showered and when she was in the bathroom,” said Maureen Wood, a 40-year-old Buena Park mother of two. “I pretty much tried to stay covered up, and I had to crack down on my husband to cover up. I don’t feel like we are hiding anything. It is showing respect for her feelings. On the other hand, our 10-year-old doesn’t care at all. She still walks around the house naked.”

Some parents display their own modesty cues. “I have never made an issue of nudity,” said a Thousand Oaks mother of two boys, 7 and 10, who asked to be anonymous. “I still shower with my boys. But I think very soon I won’t be showering with my 10-year-old. It is the way he has looked at my breasts. It makes me feel uncomfortable. I thought, well, that is it. No more showers. He is closing in on puberty and starting to have questions.”

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For some parents, there is a vague fear of accidentally arousing a child of the opposite sex by appearing naked in front of them. Not to worry, said Sears: Children are not likely to become aroused by the sight of their parents’ nakedness. “You have to be careful not to apply adult values to kids,” he said. “I mean, 1-year-olds get erections all the time and that is not a big deal.”

At some point, kids just don’t really want to see their parents naked in the same way that they can’t imagine them ever having sex. “I remember seeing my dad’s butt once when I accidentally walked in [the bathroom],” said Wood. “I backed out in time, thank God. It was scary. You just don’t want to see your dad’s naked butt.”

And many parents just don’t want their children to see their naked flesh. Ever.

“I don’t want them to see my naked body,” said Dodie McCarthy, a 45-year-old Newbury Park mother of four. “Oh, yuck. It is not very pretty. I don’t want to scare ‘em to death.”