SEX ED & THE CITY
Would you allow a teen ‘sleepover’ — in your home?
Sex and the City? We didn’t mean in the childhood bedroom!
Fans of the HBO series were shocked when they tuned in for the reboot, “And Just Like That,” last Thursday and saw that the next generation was getting it on. Brady Hobbes (played by Niall Cunningham) — the now-17year-old son of Cynthia Nixon’s Miranda — is in a hot and heavy relationship with his high school girlfriend, Luisa (Cree Cicchino).
In an effort to go with the flow, Miranda and husband Steve have decided to let Luisa sleep over regularly — and are dealing with the gross consequences.
“I stepped on a used condom in Brady’s room this morning,” Miranda confesses to Carrie and Charlotte over brunch, mere moments into the “And Just Like That” premiere. When her friends don’t react with sufficient horror, she adds, “Wait, I was barefoot at the time.”
Not in my house
Elizabeth Trinca said she immediately phoned her two sisters after watching this “oh hell no” scenario unfold.
“I couldn’t believe that Miranda was just allowing it to happen while she was home and picking up his used protection,” Trinca told The Post. “You need to have respect as a teen for your parents.”
Indeed, the Long Island mother of two said she would never sanction that kind of behavior from her young son when he’s older.
“I do not want to hear my son having sex. Do it when I’m not home,” she said.
But other moms say they see the wisdom in Miranda’s permissive parenting.
“It’s not just a TV plotline — it’s a major reality check,” said Robin Gorman Newman, who has an 18-year-old son. “My trainer would tell me how the kids would rent out her gym to have parties and how they had to stand guard in the bathroom while the teens tried to have sex in the bathroom. It’s a thing.”
The Long Island founder of MotherhoodLater.com said that while she makes her son keep his bedroom door open when his girlfriend is at the house, she’d ultimately rather he have sex at home than in a random, and potentially dangerous, setting. “You don’t totally know what’s going on with your child
. . . If teens want to have sex, they’re going to find a place to do it.”
Kimberly King, a certified early childhood education teacher and mom of three, agreed that that’s the big advantage of a liberal privacy policy with teens.
“Your child will not be trespassing on public or private property [if they’re having sex at home],” King said.
“They won’t get charged with disturbing the peace or sex in public. They won’t have sex in the car,” she said, adding that it could also be a good opportunity to talk about “respect and boundaries.” However, she warns that pitfalls can arise, especially if there are younger siblings around. “It can set a bad example for other kids in the house,” she said. That’s precisely what happened when Long Island mother of four Christine Rose tried to turn the other cheek to the activity coming from her son’s bedroom downstairs.
One day, she said her 6-year-old son stood by the steps and exclaimed, “OMG — Danny’s bed is shaking really loud.” “We all knew he was probably having sex with his girlfriend,” said Rose.
Still, she stands by her choice to let him explore his love life under her roof. “You have to be realistic as a parent today,” she said. “There’s really not much they can do to upset me. Teens will have sex and drink — you have to be real with them.” Yet for author Lisa Milbrand, Miranda is letting things get a little too real in her Brooklyn brownstone.
“Set some boundaries already, Miranda,” she wrote in a blog for Parents online. “Like — maybe don’t let Brady’s girlfriend [sleep over] if you’re not comfortable with it? Even the coolest moms I know would definitely nip that in the bud.”
So I’ll be uncool
Mom of four Lauren Schmid doesn’t care if she comes off as uncool with her rules.
Would she let her preteens sleep with their partners at home one day, like Miranda and Steve? “Absolutely f - - king not. It’s one thing for teens to be having sex, but to act like that in my home where I pay the bills? Absolutely not. It’s being so disrespectful. Not a freaking chance in hell. I’m not about to create opportunities to become an early grandma, either.”
The former New Yorker — who now lives in South Carolina — said that to avoid any confusion, she maintains ironclad ground rules. “No boys or girls in bedrooms — hanging out in the family room only.”
Schmid said that what was good enough for her as a teen is good enough for her kids. “I mean, I was that age and I would have died had someone’s parents heard me or saw me like that. I did the proper thing and sneak[ed] around.”
Additional reporting by Lambeth Hochwald