Did your parents talk to you about what was happening or going to happen? Do you remember how you found out? Did your parents talk to you at all before, during or after about what was going on?
No matter your personality, or how you are feeling about your child growing up, it’s really important to have open, honest and accurate conversations about puberty. This will not only help your child to be personally prepared for changes, it will also help them to feel normal and respectful of their peers. So where do you start? …perhaps by talking about your experiences going through puberty? What happened to you? How old were you? What do you remember about the physical and emotional changes? For example, do you remember getting pimples, getting hairier, your first shave, your first period, your first crush, fluctuating moods and insecurities? Were these changes easy to adjust to – ha ha! How did you cope?
At the age of ten in Year 4 I got my periods. I got the shock of my life because I wasn’t ready for this. Back in the day, parents were not always as open as they sometimes are today and as a result, I felt totally embarrassed, scared, freaked out, thinking I was bleeding to death, lonely and I had no one to talk to. I stole pads out of my mum’s drawer until she found out. It breaks my heart to write this, because it did not need to be this way. Why not talk to your child about the positive and negative experiences that you had during puberty. It’s a great place to start and it makes you an approachable parent. Not only have you experienced puberty (sometimes it’s hard for your child to realise this), you can empower your child to be prepared, resilient and empathetic when you share your own experiences and vulnerabilities with them. So how did you find out about puberty? Do you want to be a parent that talks to your child?
Well you can! How? By chatting about your own experiences.
