The Birds and The Bees
Posted On: August 25th, 2010

The BIG Q: When will your child be ready to discuss the birds and the bees? Sandra Huber @Soulfulparent offers some interesting insights.

I always thought that the most challenging conversation I’d have with my tween, as she nears 9 years old would be talking about “the birds and the bees”. Well, that conversation started much earlier than I anticipated and I was feeling pretty relieved that we had talked about most of  the “sticky” topics: sex, our bodies, drugs, boys, religion and politics (as much as you can talk to an 8 year-old who thinks she knows everything already!).

Sandra Stayed Calm: She’s the Coach:)

And then, seemingly out of the blue, it happened: my daughter, who I had raised around many wonderful, powerful women, in all different colors, shapes and backgrounds told me she had been  wondering if she was pretty enough. I stayed calm and asked her to tell me more about what she meant. She shared very openly that there were some days when she wished she looked like the girls on TV and that other days, she felt beautiful just the way she was.

Our Kids Are Changing

I know that as she nears the teenage years, her brain is going through so many changes and some of them involved been concerned with her looks and with belonging to the “group”. I am truly enjoying educating myself (and her dad) about this process in the book “The Female Brain” by Louann Brizendin.

I have to be honest, my mind was racing in all different directions. In my head I was wondering what to tackle first: the fact that actresses and models on TV or magazines are NOT the real deal or the fact that she sometimes didn’t feel pretty or whether I should focus on talking about the days she did feel pretty. As I do most times, I took a deep breath and continued to listen. She rambled on about this TV star and that singer and how their clothes were so cool and how their hair was so perfect and how their skins were flawless.

Our Kids Are Beautiful

So I decided to start where she was at: talking about the reality of what she sees in magazines and TV. I immediately remembered a Dove commercial about real beauty and decided to share that with her. She was mesmerized by the transformation the girl on the video goes through, from everyday-girl-next-door to fashion supermodel along with all the “alterations” she gets with the magic of Photoshop editing software.

We talked about the fact that it was not natural to have such long legs (courtesy of software editing) and how we didn’t know anyone who didn’t have a mole, a freckle or a mark on their bodies . I reminded her that was the way we were all made. I asked her to think about anyone she knew who had perfect skin, perfect hair or the perfect outfit all the time and fortunately she couldn’t come up with anybody who looked like the “picture perfect people”  she had seen on the magazines or on TV.

While I still had her attention we talked about what it takes to “fake it out” and look like those women on the covers of magazines: a whole entourage consisting of stylists, makeup artists, hair dressers and very talented photographers. This was NOT their natural, every day look.  I also shared with her that 95% of the population is bigger in size than most models, dancers or actresses and by medical standards, many of them would be considered unhealthy.

I took another breath and waited to see if she had any questions, fearing that all I had said had gone in one ear and out the other. My daughter looked at me and said with pride: You know mama, they don’t’ even look happy!”

My eyes filled with tears. She gets it. At some level, she is willing to embrace the idea that her olive skin, her dark eyes and her beautiful shiny, dark hair are perfect just the way they are. I felt  that all the years of providing her with dolls that look like her, with books that depict beauty in all its expressions, and with people in her life she loves that look like her and people who value the way she’s different, had finally paid off.

Don’t get me wrong. The battle is not won by a long shot. We still have to tackle things like the inappropriate clothing available for her age range  or when to shave her legs and we have had to negotiate some of that. But when her daddy says to her “how, of all the girls in the world, did we end up with the smartest, sweetest and most beautiful one?” I know that she believes him. And that is good enough for me.

Sandra Huber is the “soul” and parent coach behind the Soulful Parent. Sandra’s mission is to empower moms of tweens ages 7 to 11 years old, to find their own parenting voice, recognizing that they are their child’s best expert. Having worked in Early Intervention and Special Needs, she understands that your kids, your family and your life are as individual as your fingerprints. Through seminars, blog articles, her own radio show and speaking engagements, Sandra brings humor and hope to moms all across the country, with practical solutions to solve issues ranging from defiance and disrespect, to tweens body issues. To learn more about her work with busy moms check out her website www.thesoulfulparent.com and her  Facebook Fan Page at www.facebook.com/thesoulfulparent