In my journey to become culturally competent in reaching people with I/DD from other cultures, I asked Bin Feng to give me some insight on working with Chinese families. Bin lives in New York with his son, , with autism. He is very involved in providing sexuality education to Chinese Families by serving in communities, but also teaching classes for Chinese parents on How to Talk to you Children about Sexuality and Relationships. Here are his words of wisdom:
When parents reach out to me, they usually have questions about sexual behaviors and how to stop these behaviors. This is true for Chinese parents in both China and the United States. What I often see is parents who are in crisis or not, but want their questions to be kept private.
- These courageous parents reach out because they are already in crisis. For example, their son or daughter has been suspended from school or hurt by other children.
- The parents may not be in crisis, but they come to me privately, after seminars, asking to keep in privacy.
- The biggest issue for them with their kids is how to stop sexual behaviors such as masturbation in public.
There is a strong cultural influence from Chinese history.
In Chinese traditional culture, it is believed that all human lives have “samsara” or re-birth. A life will return to the world after several circles in another world. Your life will be determined by what you did in your previous lives. If you committed some terrible crimes or wrongdoing, in your next life you would be punished. Having a child with a disability is considered punishment for what you did in a past life.
Even as times are changing, many Chinese families still have this deep belief especially Chinese mothers whose child has a disability. They are sometimes abused by their own family or husband, they may feel guilt or shame, and they usually keep this information quiet and hidden from friends or their communities.
Chinese people are very socially conscious, we call it “faces”, which means they want to keep their pride among their friends and community. They also don’t want themselves; especially their own family members get embarrassed. Chinese people always say, “Keep your shame at home”, don’t let other people know so you and your family would be embarrassed.
A child with disability, is usually regarded as an embarrassment, and the sexual misbehavior from a disabled child or adult, would be the top of those embarrassment. This is the reason why many the parents ask for how to stop or prevent sexual problems from happening, because it is a source of embarrassment, but most of all, their child could be get punished or suspended or even beaten up which is also embarrassing.
For hundreds and thousands of years, China has developed its own culture, the Chinese traditional medicine is one of them many people are using. In China, there are two systems of hospitals, one is for modern medical doctors, one is for Traditional Chinese medical doctors.
The Traditional Chinese medicine originated from ancient Chinese philosophy and herbal medicine, one of the old beliefs is that man’s sperm is the most important for his health. Blood is regarded as his life stream, but sperm is ten times more important than blood. There are ancient Chinese novels that are full of stories man dying after losing too much sperm. This is why some Chinese parents are so afraid of their children masturbation, because of embarrassment, but also death.
Based on those background, we always take those in mind:
- Be prepared that no one will raise their hand and talk publicly about their concerns. Leave your contact information and encourage audience members to contact you after class, and ensure them all would be in private and confidential.
- Always make sure parents understand that their child’s disability is not their fault. It is not because you raised them wrong or are being punished for your past life.
- Normalize the behaviors, explain the reason behind those sexual behaviors, and how to intervene.
- Make sure they know that according to both modern medicine and Chinese medicine, masturbation will not harm their child.
Here are some helpful resources for parents as well as some handouts that we had translated into Chinese.
- 智能障碍儿童性教育指南
Teaching Children with Down Syndrome about their bodies, boundaries, and sexuality
Author: Terri Couwenhoven
华夏出版社
- 迎接我的青春期
The Boys’ Guide to Growing Up
Choices and Changes During Puberty
Author: Terri Couwenhoven
华夏出版社
- 迎接我的青春期
The Girls’ Guide to Growing Up
Choices and Changes During Puberty
Author: Terri Couwenhoven
华夏出版社
- 发展性障碍儿童性教育教案集
主编： Glenn S. Quint
主译： 解慧超
华夏出版社
- 身体功能障碍儿童性教育教案集
主编： Glenn S. Quint
主译： 解慧超
华夏出版社
- 当智力障碍和孤独症青少年进入青春期
作者： Freddy Brown
Sarah Brown
辽宁科学技术出版社