Helping Girls Through Early Puberty

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How Early Puberty Affects Girls
If your little girl is undergoing puberty sooner than you might have hoped, it’s certainly not the end of the world. But it is important you know how to help her through it. Any adverse consequences are not going to come about because your daughter sexually matured at an early age, but from the external strife that might come along with it.

Many parents fear that their daughter’s early exposure to sexual realities will somehow harm her development. As Meg Meeker complains, early puberty means “girls are prematurely forced to confront their own sexuality.” (The Week, 8-27-2010) Yet this isn’t a valid concern. The idea of childhood sexual innocence is a myth dreamed up by adults, and children have been sexual creatures from the very beginning. They’ve been developing a sexual identity since birth. Puberty will bring an intensification of the sexual stirrings they’ve already experienced, but it’s nothing they aren’t capable of handling. Children in other cultures are actively exploring sexuality from a very young age without any harm. (See our section on natural human development.) It is the tendency of adults to hide this realm of life and shroud it in shame that’s harmful. If anything, your daughter’s early maturation offers you a chance to correct course and de-stigmatize the topic, becoming more open and honest with your child.

One of the biggest concerns is teasing. When girls mature early, it sets them apart from their peers. They feel different, out of place, and at odds with the world around them. No child wants to feel separate and distinct from their peers.

When girls undergo puberty early, it’s lamented that some seem to grow up too fast or take an interest in more mature activities. Yet it’s not so much that they lose appeal in childish things, it’s just that their body development leaves them feeling like an outcast among their peers. So they start looking around for a culture where they fit in better. Inevitably this means older children and teens, who appear more like them. Thus they can start to take more of an interest in brand commercialism or whatever it is children a few years older seem to be interested in. What seems like a rush to grow up isn’t so much a rush to adulthood as it is a search for a place they feel they belong.

Helping girls through early puberty

Here are some tips that will make this transition easier on girls:

Try not to treat them any differently
When you talk to girls who matured early, one of the most universal complaints they have is that adults around them began treating them differently because of it. Their fathers pulled back on physical affection. Teachers were suddenly reluctant to give them hugs. Other adults become more hostile, acting as if their emerging sexuality were a threat to the world order.

Actress Emily Ratajkowski was an early maturer who hit puberty before everyone else in her class. She describes being singled out by adults for her burgeoning sexuality. “Once I had a teacher, who was a woman, snap my bra because she was mad that it was showing. She did it in front of the class. It was, like, something I became very used to. I had a girlfriend who was Venezuelan, and her body developed in a different way. I had big boobs, and she had a big butt. She would wear jeans with no pockets that would show it off, and we were constantly in trouble at school with the dress code. We were harassed, and, damn, that was the worst part of [maturing early].” (Harpers Bazaar, Aug. 2016, p. 166)

We live in a sexually neurotic society that has a million-and-one complexes about sex and is hyper-paranoid about touch to begin with. When girls develop secondary sex characteristics, such as breasts, it takes all those neurotic anxieties and turns their intensity up several fold.

Girls who mature early are treated differently than other girls, and they feel it. Some adults begin acting as though their very existence is offensive, whereas most just pull back on affection and suddenly act as though they have some touch-transmittable disease, which is every bit as hurtful. Just because a 7-year-old has breast buds doesn’t mean she suddenly loses her desire to cuddle or lacks the strong need all children have for physical affection.

You can’t change society, but you also don’t have to feed into this cycle yourself. Sadly, most parents do. The second grader who loved to envelop herself in her father’s arms is pushed away because Daddy feels self-conscious about his arms or hands touching her chest now that she has breast buds. The mother who wouldn’t think anything about a prepubescent child wrestling or roughhousing with someone else now looks upon such body contact as “inappropriate.” A father suddenly becomes wary of his daughter hanging out and playing with boys. These neurotic anxieties do more to force girls to grow up too soon than any of the physical changes do.

Do your best to set aside your own sexual neurosis, and treat her just the same as you would any other 7- or 8-year-old. Don’t become all neurotic about physical contact. (Touch isn’t dangerous, contrary to what you’ve been led to believe. Even overtly sexual touching can only cause damage when we promote neurotic beliefs about it, and inadvertent contact certainly isn’t going to do any harm.) Let her play in the dirt, climb on laps, and still be a child. If you don’t want your girl to grow up too soon, don’t force her to because of your own sexual hang-ups.

Make sure girls have accurate information about what comes next
Breast growth is just the beginning. Your daughter may get her period anywhere from 6 months to several years from now. (There’s usually a longer delay between first signs of puberty and a girl’s first period in girls who mature early, but not always.) So have a talk or two and make sure she knows what comes next. You might want to give her a sanitary pad to (discretely) carry inside her backpack in case she suddenly gets her period at school, and tell her you’ll come pick her up if this happens.

Limit teasing to the extent you can
Do your best to keep siblings from teasing or making fun of her development, which will make her more self-conscious.

Help girls understand the nature of teasing
The reality is that all girls who start maturing before their peers are going to be teased about it to some extent. This can’t be helped. But you can help her better understand the nature of this teasing and what it’s really about. Explain that boys may tease them as a way of deflecting sexual tension. It’s not about them disliking you; quite the contrary. They may be intrigued, and boys often tease the girls they like.

As for the teasing that might come from girls, this often happens because the other girls are jealous. So try not to take it personally, and see it for what it really is.

Embrace it, don’t run from it
Try to turn your girl’s early maturation into a positive thing: “You’ve always been ahead of your peers.” “All the boys are going to be smitten with you.” Give compliments about how beautiful her body looks or how cute her breast buds are. The thing that makes puberty so difficult (at any age) is that we run from it, make children feel ashamed and embarrassed, and offer precious little affirmation over their sexual characteristics.

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