Advice: The big "talk"

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-18-2005
Advice: The big "talk"
1221
Sun, 02-18-2007 - 7:28am

Okay, I need advice on when people started or will start to have the big "talk" with their kids.

My oldest is going to be 9 next week. I have some friends telling me they already had this talk with their children at this age. She just seems so young to me. She still plays house, school and dolls with her little sister. IMO, telling her about sex is going to take some innocence away from her. But, am I sheltering her too much?

She knows about periods and body hair development. She already has little breats "bumps" (as she likes to call "em).

Agghhh..I really thought I had until she was 12 to have this talk like my mother did.

What is everyone's opinion?

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iVillage Member
Registered: 12-29-2004
Wed, 02-28-2007 - 2:58pm
There's being out in public and visible, and there's the consciousness of one's appearance being observed, compared and evaluated anywhere and everywhere. That's a burden women bear much more often than men, and it's not a burden any child should have to bear at all.
iVillage Member
Registered: 12-06-2004
Wed, 02-28-2007 - 2:58pm
Again, you guys are putting way to much emphasis on 2 tiny dots of kids rouge on my cheeks.

iVillage Member
Registered: 06-27-1998
Wed, 02-28-2007 - 3:01pm

You didn't answer the question.

PumpkinAngel

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
Wed, 02-28-2007 - 3:05pm
I think "you're fine the way you are" is completely sincere at any age. But my post wasn't attacking the sincerity of the message. I assume it is heartfelt by the parents at all times. My post was attacking the subtext that if you are fine the way you are, any attempt to deviate from the way you naturally look is frowned on. At one end of the spectrum you have the Amish and at the other end you have Jon Benet Ramsey. Right smack in the middle is the idea that you are fine both with and without adornment. And sometimes "you're fine the way you are" is landing in that middle. But if it's said in reaction to a little kid's attempts at adornment, the subtext is there that if you are fine the way you are, you cease being fine if you attempt to look different in any way. That's not a message I sent to dd when she was a toddler scribbling on her arms with marker. It's not a message I send now when she puts on nail polish as a 6yo. I'll put on the brakes if she veers into the overtly sexual, but the mere application of makeup isn't that to me.
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Wed, 02-28-2007 - 3:05pm
No.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 12-29-2004
Wed, 02-28-2007 - 3:06pm
If you don't believe little gestures add up to huge lessons, try not buckling your seatbelt once or twice, or throwing your coffee cup out the car window. Kids pick up on what we do and on what we don't do. A parent who puts makeup on a child's face might very well be a great mom, but that doesn't necessarily mean she isn't doing her child a disservice. And you didn't answer PA's question.
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Wed, 02-28-2007 - 3:06pm
A geisha, as in stark white pancake makeup?

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iVillage Member
Registered: 02-06-2006
Wed, 02-28-2007 - 3:07pm

My mom rolled her eyes so much when I was about 11-15 Im surprised she didn't do them damage!

Ripped up old bell bottoms, converse all-stars in every color with drawings all over them, flannel shirts stolen out of my dad's closet, decreipt old concert tshirts that I unearthed from various thrift shops, really bad bowling shirts, short jean skirts with ripped tights underneath....

The rules came in because I could wear all that without comment to school or parties or friends' houses, but not to thing like Christmas dinner at my grandparents' house or church on Sunday.

I always thought it was fair. And really...kind've realistic. You can have a wild style as a kid or as an adult, but sometimes out it's appropriate and respectful to tone it down a bit.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
Wed, 02-28-2007 - 3:11pm
Pale was very "in" during the early 90's. Coupled with extreme thinness and a slouchy posture when done by professional models, it was attacked as "heroin chic". It may have been a reaction to the fake bake look of tanning salons.
iVillage Member
Registered: 12-29-2004
Wed, 02-28-2007 - 3:11pm
Do you really think good haircuts, the "right colors", well-fitting clothes, and so on, are the same as daily makeup and the constant focus of some women on their facial appearance? Because I really don't.

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