TOTALLY GEEKED!

Dear Prudence,
A few years ago my now 11-year-old daughter found the “back massager” stowed under my bed. I told her that it was for massaging sore muscles and this is, indeed, the way this massager is marketed. In fact, I use it during sex with my husband and for masturbation. Recently, this back massager has been disappearing into my daughter’s room, where she says she uses it to massage her muscles. I just discovered she is also experimenting with it on her genitals. I don’t have any problem with her discovering her sexuality, but it seems awkward and inappropriate that she is using the instrument that I use. I also think it is too powerful for her. Last night she told me that she had used it on her genitals and that they were swollen and hurt. I told her that she needed to take it easy and that the massager should only be used on sore muscles. What should I do? I feel like she will continue to ask me for the massager and potentially use it for sexual pleasure. Again, I have no problem with her masturbation or discovery of her sexuality, but it just doesn’t seem right that it is with my massager. When I hide it, she asks for it, and I don’t want to give her any sense that she is doing something wrong. What should I do? 

—Sharing Is Not Always a Virtue

Dear Sharing,
If there’s one thing I’ve learned from this column, it’s that vibrators have a yearning to wander and they end up in the darndest places. I love the idea of your little girl sighing over her aching sacroiliac in order to borrow Mom’s “back massager” for relief. No surprise she’s got sore muscles—as you’re finding out, she’s got a sore love muscle from all the battery-operated overuse. I agree that your daughter has to explore her sexuality, but not by appropriating the goodies under your bed. (Ah, the memories of the stuff under Mom and Dad’s bed! That’s where I discovered Human Sexual Responseby Masters and Johnson and My Life & Loves by Frank Harris. The marijuana was in the underwear drawer.) It’s unsanitary physically and messy psychologically for you two to be sharing this magic wand. You have to make clear to your daughter that while she’s entitled to some privacy, parents’ privacy rights trump kids’. That means she can’t just search your bedroom and take anything she pleases. Explain that she can no longer borrow the massager because it’s your personal item. Since she’s comfortable enough to come to you with her masturbatory misadventures, you should address the subject head on. Tell her what’s she’s doing is perfectly normal, but she’s just too young to use an electronic device (frankly, it will be better for her not to get hooked on such powerful stimulation). Let her know that for countless millennia 11-year-olds have been mastering masturbation with just their hands and she should try that route. Say you’re available to talk with her on this issue anytime, and also give a copy It’s Perfectly Normal or another straightforward book on sexual development, in case she has questions she doesn’t want to bring to you. Then put your massager someplace your daughter can’t get it. Until manufacturers come up with a specialty vibrator safe, one of these should do.

—Prudie