Milestones

As I write this I am still reeling in the fact that Mary has reached a milestone that has me, well, reeling. At 10 years old, puberty is in full swing, Mary is more developed than I was at 14. I know the day is going to come when she gets her period, and I am not looking forward to it. I still help Mary with her basic hygiene, from teeth brushing, face washing, (as we are battling acne!), washing her hair, and getting in all the nooks and crannies while showering. Tonight I realized it was time to shave her armpits. Yes, this has got me more perplexed than the thought of her getting her period!

I know I have to let Mary learn to take care of these things herself. I have been trying to give her more freedom in taking care of her body. I believe she is getting the hair washing thing down, I am not seeing greasy hair the next morning when she has washed it herself. She does fine on her body, but for some reason spends more time cleaning her feet?? However......The thought of having her shave! Nope, I told her under no circumstances is she to touch the razor without me. I realize that 10 is a little young, and with her developmental delays, its like expecting a 6 year old to shave. Knowing that makes me feel a whole lot better about not letting her do it herself. After all, it's a sharp object!! Thankfully, her legs don't look like they are in need of a shave, nor has she asked.

So my hope, and my fear is this, I hope since we are dealing with all this at such a young age, by the time Mary is a teenager, she will be an expert at taking care of herself. My fear is, what the hell am I going to be dealing with when she is a teenager!

Growing pains

That is, I am the one experiencing the growing pains. Mary is my 3rd daughter, I have been through this puberty thing before. Oh, the obvious, chest development, hormones fluctuating and so on. However, I have been very happily oblivious to my older girls discovering certain parts of their bodies. I will not go in to detail, and it really was not that bad. Mary, at 10 is as the Dr. says, at stage 4 of puberty. I have been trying to get her to wear a bra for a while now. Being sensitive to what she is wearing, Mary has refused the bra thing. Fortunately, her posture is such that her shirts hang, so you can't see too much. So after purchasing every style out there, it seems a sports bra is the way to go. Why a sports bra? When Mary put the bra on, she pointed to her "abs" and said "look, I got these". I believe that in her mind, she sees that as sexy. I guess that's better than thinking the skimpy lacy bras are sexy. Still, I am not happy, and all my explaining on what is acceptable and appropriate, I can only hope is getting through to her.

After seeing, and realizing there are parts of her that feel good, I knew I had to have a certain talk with her. I have talked to her before about her period, knowing it's coming soon. I had to prepare her, and she seems o.k. with it. Up until now, she still believed babies were taken out of your stomach by the doctor, which I was more than happy to let her continue to believe. Last night I had to explain exactly where babies came from. At this point she was upset with herself for what she was doing, and embarrassed. I went through the whole thing about feelings, and your body ,etc. I did leave out how the baby got in there. She didn't ask and I cannot, will not, voluntarily give up that information! Her response to everything was "that's disgusting"! I hope she continues to think that until she is about 30.

I'm sad, sad that she could be oblivious to so many things, but not this. I worry about her doing things and not understanding what they mean. I worry about her being taken advantage of in so many ways. I worry about these things with all my children, but with Mary it's different. Mary has always had a thing for the boys, for some unknown disturbing reason, she likes the older ones. Teenagers, preferably with long hair. I don't know where, why or how on this one. Mary also longs to be accepted and to be like everybody else. This makes her more vulnerable. I wish I could just keep her locked up and away from the world forever, but I know that is completely insane thinking. I know things are going to happen, and I am so afraid that I will not be able to handle it. These are the times when all I can think about is how I would give up and sacrifice everything to just have her be your average little girl.

Mary started her first session of "play therapy" with a psychologist. I am hoping that this will help with her social skills. Hoping she will see that going to a group of teenage boys and flipping her hair and flirting with them is not appropriate. I need to block out all the Disney and Nickelodeon t.v. shows that she is modeling her behavior after. Most of all, I need to keep praying, for her and for myself!