Sex and Raising a Human

By Amy Yurwit

Some of the most startling realizations from the last couple weeks: 

At least among the population of Nigerian women in Fürstenfeldbruck, sex ed is severely lacking. The social workers try to organize workshops because the people receive no training on HIV/AIDS prevention and many women are apparently under the impression that babies grow in the stomach! Interestingly, the government provides tampons but not condoms. There are so, so many pregnant women because 1) people can’t afford, don’t know how, or won’t use condoms 2) are mistaken about Germany having a birthright law like the US (babies born in Germany are not automatically entitled to citizenship) or 3) when one is living in limbo, not allowed to work or even cook, what else is there to occupy your mind other than sex, with physical connection, I imagine, being one of the few attainable comforts in such a grim situation. 

When we explained the evil but prevalent practice of separating women from their children at the US-Mexican border, our partners were shocked; in Germany, even if a woman is imprisoned by the state for an actual crime (if she isn’t dangerous, she can keep her baby with her. Our friends at the Innere Mission München (IMM), in a facility where asylum-approved families with young children are assisted with integration, described their struggle to re-culture (can’t think of a more fitting word) mothers and children. Children from war zones, they describe, are in survival mode; they do not trust the persistence of resources which they normally would need to steal or never see again. They learn desperate behavior. One IMM worked described seeing a child try to strangle another with a rope over a squabble for a toy. “That’s not the natural way kids play,” she said. “That’s something you learn through exposure to violence.” She has to foster a sense of trust in people who aren’t used to having enough. This involves introducing Western diets and discipline to mothers of other cultures. They explained that, in Africa, children are necessarily fattened as much as possible to better their chances of living. At less than a year old, they are fed sweet syrups and puréed meats. One social worker recollected the story of a baby girl who was so fat she couldn’t walk and had to go through six months of physical therapy. The Germans try to offer meal preparation classes and persuade the mothers, who are understandably deeply attached to their traditions and truths, and often remain skeptical and uncooperative. Apparently, African and Middle Eastern parents are more likely to beat their children, even slapping them in public, which is strictly forbidden in the German system. 

Social services will take the children away, and another maze of bureaucracy will plague the refugee family, but of course no one wants to be told the way they raise their child is wrong. The entire way of life must be adapted to this western way in order for the family to have hope of surviving in this foreign society.