NPR: Girls Going Through “New Puberty”

NPR published a fascinating article this past week about how girls aren’t just going through physical changes during puberty (growing breasts, starting their periods, etc.), but how they’re also having to deal with many emotional, mental, and environmental changes as well.

One of the most interesting quotes on the matter in our opinion? Right here:

I think we do want to make sure we do separate puberty and sexuality. For these kids, they’re used to their bodies changing: they’re losing teeth, they have to get new shoes every six months because their feet are growing, so for them, if the adults in their lives don’t put it into a sexual context, it’s just sort of a different change that can be happening in their body. We have to be careful to [not] immediately leap to sexualizing 7-year-old girls.

Check out the article and let us know what you think!

By Lily Herman on December 15, 2014
Lily is the Managing Editor at HelloFlo, where she oversees all editorial and social media operations for the brand. In addition to her work at HF, she's co-founder and CEO of The Prospect, the largest student-run college access organization in the world. Her work has been featured on TIME, Forbes, Newsweek, Cosmopolitan, Elle, Mashable, USA TODAY and Lifehacker. You can perpetually find her on Twitter.