apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

i have a one year old daughter who loves being naked. i try to let her be naked as often as possible. i'll let her crawl around in the bed naked or outside, or nap on my lap (if we're outside) she will often pee on me or on the bed, but the sheet can be changed and i can be washed. i think about how the whole 9 months in utero she was naked, and how she was born naked, and how uncomfortable those first days of clothes must have been. I've also read that children who regularly see their parents naked are more comfortable with their own bodies. I would love for her to be more comfortable and confident about her body than i am with mine. The human body is so beautiful and so natural. i want to celebrate that.

I understand the whole "its natural" arguement and don't see anything inappropriate about nudity in this context, however, as guest I do not want to lounge on sofas or lie on beds where your young naked child (or anyone for that matter) has be lounging. And I don't want them climbing in my lap. Their bed, outside, floor...fine...but not the adult furniture. Fresh from the bath is one thing, obviously, but after a day of play...no thank you.

And I agree that its fine for kids to see their parents in the nude (in the appropriate context, of course) until a certain age (esp. for opposite genders).

I want to be ok with children's nudity, but I admit it makes me a little uncomfortable. On the rare occasion when I've been at a friend's house with their naked kids running around, I feel like I have to avert my eyes or try to very obviously only look at the kids' faces, so that I don't make the parents uncomfortable thinking that I'm looking at their kids' nakedness--so then I feel self-conscious, and probably make the whole thing more awkward than it should be. So I guess I support it in theory, but I have that American fear of nudity pretty deeply ingrained.

On the other hand, with my almost 1 year old daughter, I've already had people tell me I shouldn't share pictures of her in the bath, or just in her diaper or whatever, because she'll be embarrassed later and you never know who might look, etc., etc.--which I think is a little crazy. I mean, she's still just a BABY, and I definitely don't think it's weird when I see friends' pics of their unclad babies.

hyzen..whatever you do, don't post any of those types of shots online...blog, etc.! I'm not saying don't take them for albums, but don't put them online or they can end up in the wrong hands for the wrong reasons.

When my daughter is born there will be no problems with it. Since my husband is an artist and most of our friends are as well, we are pretty used to see naked people of all age groups in non-sexualized situations. This is something we are not worried about.

Enamorada, I agree, I wouldn't post most of the shots publicly--I don't have a problem with that. But this was more on the order of "don't send digital files of those pics to friends and family"--well, ok, I guess they COULD fall into the wrong hands by doing that, but I really wasn't that concerned about it. I mean, this very post has a picture of someone's sweet child naked, and I didn't find that troublesome at all. The picture in this post is a wonderful expression of the freedom and un-self-conscious joy of childhood, and it made me happy to see. I guess some people can sexualize anything, but I'm not sure we should live our lives in fear of it to a huge extent (although I'm not militant about this for sure--I have one sketchy neighbor, and the thought of him watching out his window keeps me from wanting my daughter to be out in the yard unclothed--sad).

Hyzen, I used to let my little guys take baths in their pool in our backyard until my husband saw a man on the sidewalk watching them in a decidedly inappropriate way. Now I make sure they are "covered up" at all times outside.

I don't know how much this really affects kids either way. I was not allowed to go anywhere other than the bathtub while naked as a child and I don't really have hang-ups about my body today. Just because you don't show it to the world doesn't mean you're ashamed of it. :)

Personally I'm fine with it. my 3yr old loves to run around naked and so does my almost 2yr old. when we have people over sometimes she doesnt wear underwear so i make her put on pants, some people are uncomfortable with it. It doesnt bother my in laws at all either. they live secluded so when we visit they tease that if they decided to go naked the neighbors wouldnt see so what does it matter if the kids want to feel the sun all over. they have a 6yr old so they understand. My girls still jump in the shower with me and ask about their body parts and mine. my 3yr olds biggest concern is that she want to be big so she can reach the sink. i dont see the harm in it.

As the child of European parents, I was often naked on the beach or backyard until I was around 7 years old. My parents were occasionally approached by other people pointing out that my brother and I were naked. My parents would laugh and say that we were only kids and it wasn't a big deal. I've spoken about this with my husband as we are now expecting our first child. His upbringing was more puritan, but I talked him into it and we plan to have little nudists as well. It's interesting that the article brings up early sexualization of children in this context. I completely understood the concept of sex from an very early age as it was discussed frankly in my home. I was also a virgin almost into my twenties. My husbands family NEVER spoke about sex with him and he was in sexual situations much earlier than I was. It's not a large sample size, but I thought it was interesting.

we have no naked hangups here - my daughter loves being naked. she's 2, and as far as i'm concerned, the less clothes the better.

I actually encourage my 2 1/2 year old to be naked at home b/c we are potty learning and he will use the potty if naked. If he is wearing anything on his bottom he just won't. Often he is wearing a shirt but naked from the waist down. If we have a playdate I will bring it up to the mother before hand and if she is not comfortable with it I clothe him, maybe they don't want their children to see. For other people who come over I let him be naked if he is. Maybe it's wrong of me but we are all adults, mostly parents and we've seen plenty of naked people in our life. It's my house and it works for my family so that's what we do. We also have our potty in the living room b/c with my son it's out of sight, out of mind. My DH does has one friend who always tells me to clothe my son and to put his potty in the bathroom but he has 6 of his own kids and I really think he should just suck it up. I'm picking my battles and it's just easier potty learning this son the naked route. If people don't like it they shouldn't come over. :P

Oh please, only Americans can be so puritan. This is a non-grata issue for the rest of the World.

Hey Enamorada - you know some people have sex in various parts of their house right?

My five year old has always LOVED to be naked. He comes home, takes off his shoes and then all his clothes, and plays. I never say anything about it. I prefer it when he and his three year old brother play naked in the backyard when playing with water so they don't get their clothes all wet. Sometimes they venture out front naked if I'm talking to a neighbor and that's fine, too. If they have a playdate or I have a friend over for longer than a few minutes I like them to have at least undies on, but I have no concerns about nudity in our house. It's not that I'm actively trying to teach them to have comfort with their bodies, I just don't see anything wrong with it. As far as I'm concerned, they can be naked in the house for as long as they are comfortable with it. When their own feelings of modesty kick in they can cover up.

My kid is naked in our house, in our yard. I think it's great. It doesn't happen every day, but if it did I wouldn't care.

As for him lounging on furniture after a day of play, I don't see why my guests would have an issue with that. They should probably be more concerned about me or my husband sittiing there after a long run, or the cheerios ground into my area rug. I don't let my child on my furniture if he's dirty, but I also don't consider naked to be dirty.

I wouldn't post pictures of my children online, but I also won't lose sleep over naked pictures "falling into the wrong hands." We can only control so much, and in all likelihood if something like that happened my child and I would never even learn about it.

I generally believe that within the family culture, in the privacy of the home/yard it is up to the parents to do as they see fit and safe. BUT, in the company of acquaintances, strangers, neighbors and others, children beyond the age of 5 should be required to wear undies or a swimsuit. I think this not because the human body is to be hidden or anything like that, but because age 4,5,6 are appropriate ages to begin to teach socialization skills regarding the awareness of others' feelings and societal norms. I truly believe that advocating for your children's self image and comfort is great, but having the attitude "if you don't like it, then get outta here" does not serve as a very good model for the future leaders of our society.

Yeah, this is really a non-issue in most of the world.

That being said, I also have felt a little awkward when visiting friends with sans-clothing children... I can relate to what hyzen said about it. It's sort of like what I imagine visiting a nudist camp would be like; I don't think there's any problem with being natural and unclothed, but I do feel like I have to go out of my way to not look anywhere other than the person's face.

It's just sort of annoying to have to pay so much attention to not looking at someone. After awhile I can get used to it, but I'm the type of person who tries to not even look at people too closely when they're in bathing suits... lest they think I'm staring at their stretch marks! I know that's the prude in me, but it is what it is. I think I fall into the pro-clothes category, at least when new company is around. I'd feel equally as awkward if I visited a friend and their grandpa was sitting around naked. Okay, more awkward... but for me nude grandpa falls into about the same category.

I was a NAKED Kid! - Never outside or anything, but in the house I'd crawl, waddle, and toddle my way out of my clothing! In Florida it gets too hot to keep on all those clothes! Even as an adult I limit my clothing in the house to thin tank tops and cotton shorts or to short Cotton dresses. I think we sometimes scare our kids into thinking Naked is BAD! - I know my husband even as an adult Hates being naked because it was always frowned upon in his house hold growing up.

That being said - if company is coming over for goodness sake PUT SOME CLOTHES ON! :) Its just polite! Now unannounced guests... That is another thing all together!

The only issue I've come across is when we have gatherings with family / friends, we're extremely limited with what photos we can share on the Internet. We had a gathering recently where a friend's little girl was completely naked in nearly every shot. I would never post that publicly. Too many people out there for whom that is not an innocent photograph but fodder for horrible ideas.

Oh--- and just to be clear, she always seemed to run through the background at just the right moment, etc. Not that the lenses were trained on her or anything like that.

Reading through the posts, I wanted to add something. My dad's old partner is a sergeant in the pedophile unit down in Houston. He said, "I would never, under any circumstances, post a photo of my child on the internet." That said, I do share pics of my kids on our family blog, but I would sincerely never, ever, post a photo of a nude child. To further support that, I had a roommate several years ago who we discovered to be trafficking child pornography through a server he had set up with a friend of his in Thailand. I discovered the photos on his machine while scanning some pictures for work one day and they literally made me physically ill, I was so panicked by them. I had to go through the whole police thing, turning him in, allowing them to review the files on his hard drive, setting him up to be arrested while at home...The officers then told me that there are many more people like that than we would ever imagine and that photos like the one above are also collected and distributed in their circles. I can't honestly say what I would do if I ever found out someone had downloaded images of my daughter with bad intentions. I'm certain rusty blades would be involved.

Kids running free, yes. Posting photos of them on the web, no.

I think that the biggest catch is for a parent to have a child understand that it's ok to be naked in some situations, not in others. For instance, it's ok to be naked at home when nobody's visiting, but it's not when you have poeple over, since I agree it may make them feel awkward.

And there's the "clothes are not put on to hide shameful parts of the body". But then again, being French, it's not an issue here, except for teen girls who hesitate between almost total nudity and being covered up to their necks.

I'm seconding what vanessacatvet said, way up, about talking and accepting the sexuality from an early age helping to archieve an harmonious sexual developpement. When nudity and sex are not shameful or rebellious... well doesn't it feel better ?