Mom thought I was playing with myself

Dear Pastor,

I am a 15-year-old girl, and I want to ask you something. I am living with my mother, and I did not know that she was observing me.

I look older than 15, and people always say that I am a pretty girl. I learnt from a nurse at school that a female should always check her breasts. So one day I sat before the mirror and was checking my breasts, and my mother saw me and shouted at me that I should stop playing with my breasts. She said it appeared to her that I wanted to have sex.

I told my mother that that was not my desire at all, but the nurse at school told us that we are not too young to check for breast cancer. My mother said the nurse was only telling us because the nurse knows that when a girl plays with her breasts, she is playing with herself to give herself pleasure. She said that she is my mother and she has never had to check her breasts for cancer. So I decided to write to you and ask you if I was doing something that was wrong.

When I check my breasts, I am not thinking about sex. But I am very afraid of this thing that is called cancer. That is why I was taking the nurse's advice. In three months' time, I will be 16 years old, and I am a virgin. I don't have a boyfriend and my mother should know that I am a good girl.

R.S.

Dear R.S.,

It is unfortunate that your mother accused you of wanting to have sex with a man when she saw you checking your breasts.

But let me say that your mother is well aware that a woman's breasts are erogenous zones and so a woman can get excited and turned on by the fondling of her breasts. So right away as she saw you examining your breasts, that is what came to her mind. But you know you were only examining your breasts to see whether or not there was any lump in them. So I encourage you to continue this practice even once every month.

Pastor