It Suddenly Occured to Me

We were all sitting at the table the other night, having a "normal" dinner together. Me, my hus, E and T were there. As you may know, E is my nine year old daughter and T is my 4 year old son. Well, we were enjoying our usual dinner conversation, everyone competing to be the loudest and most obnoxious, I mean, interesting one. My hus made a comment on how he thought E had a crush on a boy named, I'll call him "D", and I said I thought she had a crush on J not D. We laughed, at her expense, and I said "Well, E, you are too young to have a boyfriend anyw......" and I couldn't finish my sentence because it suddenly occurred to me, I had a boyfriend in fourth grade, which was when I was nine!!!!!


Wait, this can't be right, I thought to myself, when I remember being much older in fourth grade. Wait, that doesn't make any sense. I always thought I was good at remembering what it was like being young, which I think is helpful when trying to understand my children, so how could I forget such an important thing? Denial? Wishful Thinking? My daughter is not too young to have a boyfriend, at least not the same kind of boyfriend I had when I was nine.


His first name was Alex and I don't remember his last name. We were both in 4Th grade and we were considered boyfriend and girlfriend for maybe a couple of months. I know it was 4Th grade because I also remember my sweeties from 5Th, 6Th and 7Th grade. My memory after 7Th starts to become a little fuzzy as that is when I started to smoke cigarettes, drink beer and smoke pot. I remember Alex would call me on the phone and we would talk. I have no idea what we talked about, but that and the occasional hand holding, was the extent of our relationship.

E still insists she doesn't have a crush on any boy, and only girls call her on the phone. But I guess I should be prepared for when the boys start calling.

E is also at the age where I am supposed to be talking to her about her body and the dreaded Period! I didn't think of that either until a girlfriend of mine told me that she got her period when she was nine. Uh Oh, I thought I would have a couple more years, but sadly, no. I'm a nurse so it is not hard for me to talk about bodily functions, but it is not easy for E to hear about stuff like that yet. She has always known about a Period, but never any specifics. So when I approached her, she was not immediately ready. I didn't force her to listen, I just told her that she can come to me with questions as she wishes.

Well, a few weeks after our initial talk, she did come to me. I told her what I could and as I did she got a horrified expression on her face and told me "That's all for now".

While I was shopping for Xmas gifts, I came across the book pictured below. It is a very easy to read, made for pre-pubescent girls, body book. It talks about all the body changes expected during puberty, not just periods. I read it and then gave it to E (not as an Xmas gift!) and told her she could read it if she wanted, then ask me questions.

She took the book and disappeared into her room for about 3 minutes, then came running out, slammed the book on the counter in front of me and yelled "THAT IS DISGUSTING, I WILL NEVER GET MY PERIOD!!!!" She hasn't mentioned it since, which is OK. At least she will not be shocked when she does get it. And have bitchy stuck up mean girls throw tampons on her in the girls locker room like I did, I mean Carrie did.

I have not even thought of how to approach the SEX talk. Since I was a virgin until marriage, I mean until I was 16, hopefully I have a few years to figure it out.