What You Need to Know About Modern Day Puberty, with Dr. Cara Natterson and Vanessa Kroll Bennett

Debbie:

Hey, Cara and Vanessa, welcome to the podcast.

Vanessa and Cara::

Thank you so much. We’re so happy to be here.

Debbie:

Yeah, I’m excited. I also have to just say I like talking to two people. It makes for, it’s a more challenging interview sometimes, but more fun and dynamic and double the joy. So anyway, this should be a good conversation. We’re gonna be talking about your book on puberty, which I said before I hit record, I just think is so fantastic. Also the cover design is amazing. And I’ll have a, I’ll hold this up for a little video clip. It’s so good. But I would like to know how you two came together to write this in the first place. What made you say, we have to get this out into the world?

Cara:

I see having two of us, what you’re gonna see is not only do we talk on top of each other, but we also finish each other’s sentences because we are on Zoom all day every day. We live on opposite ends of the country, but we are together all day every day. So Vanessa and I were brought together by a friend of mine from summer camp. How’s that? This is a true story. So my background is that I’m a pediatrician turned writer. I’ve written a bunch of parenting books and then a bunch of middle grade reader books about bodies. And Vanessa, I will let Vanessa tell her own story, but I will jump to the part where Vanessa became a wildly popular puberty educator. And my camp friend was in one of her early, early sessions and called me afterwards and said, you must meet this woman. She is… she is you, just younger and East Coast. And I met Vanessa and because I’m the third of four, I instantly decided I needed to tell her what she was gonna do with her life. And because she’s the third of four, she instantly said, fine, then do it with me. And now we have… podcast together and a company together and we do everything together so we sort of mutually push each other around. Vanessa, does that sound right?

Vanessa:

That sounds right. I mean, the book itself, we, as you do, Debbie, read every single book that comes out about kids, for adults, for educators. We are constantly ingesting every piece of data, research, and guidance we can. And what we noticed is there are a lot of amazing puberty books out there and books about adolescents out there. Carr has written a ton of them. But there wasn’t a modern puberty book. There wasn’t an updated book that combined up-to-date science and research, which is super important, with a lot of relatable scripting and language in terms of what to say and how to say it with kids. And so often, and I’m sure you get this question too, it’s like, but what do I say? And how do I say it? how do I say it and where should I be when I say it?

Cara:

And what should I be wearing? It’s very granular questions.

Vanessa:

I was wearing a nightgown the other night, my daughter was like, oh no, that has to go, mom, sorry. But it was like a sign to us that even though we do the podcast and even though we do with the newsletter, people want something to carry around with them and to go back to and to dip into time after time for that specific piece of information or that little piece of guidance and just feel comforted that we’re kind of along with them for the ride.

Debbie:

Yeah, that’s great. And it feels that way. And as you guys were introducing yourself, Kara, I’m remembering that you was an American girl, the care and keeping of you, right? So I mean, that book, I remember it so well. I used to write books for teen and tween girls back before I started tilt parenting. And before I knew I was raising a neurodivergent human and totally pivoted my life. But I love the American Girl books and that book in particular was just so critical and important. I’m sure it’s still doing so well today. Yeah.

Cara:

It just turned 25. I know and it’s celebrating its 25th birthday and I’m allowed to say now, I wasn’t allowed to say for a very long time that it’s a new edition is coming out in January so an updated and then the follow-up book which is for older kids, Caring Keeping a View 2, very creative title, is going to be it’s 10 and so it too is going to have an updated version so it’s pretty exciting.

Vanessa:

They’ve sold millions and millions of copies. Kara has written books for boys and about boys. Some under Karen Keeping of you, but not under American Girl. The other one is Decoding Boys, which is about raising teen boys. When I say she’s written many of the books that people use, she has truly written many of the books that people use.

Debbie:

That is really awesome. And the accessibility of your new book, This Is So Awkward, that’s one of the things I loved about it was it’s organized really with these recurring elements in every chapter, exactly what you’re gonna get. It’s bite-sized, it’s doable, it’s practical. Like it ticked all the boxes for me. So I think that’s why I got so excited reading it because a lot of the books that we as parents are asked to consume, they’re really heavy and overwhelming and you don’t know how to even engage with them.

Cara:

You know, I so appreciate you noticing that. It’s how our brains work, right? We, Vanessa and I are planners and we like predictability. And so every single chapter in this book starts with the science of what, so it’s every topic related to puberty, right? From body stuff to brain stuff, to relationships, emotional stuff, and it starts with the science. And then the second section is what has changed. over the past couple of generations, which is a very important piece to all this because we think we’re bringing our puberty history to the table in order to get our kids through this or the kids in our lives through this. And the truth is that a lot has changed. And then comes the section that was never going to exist in this book without Vanessa. And that section is how to talk about it because this woman is genius. at the scripting of conversation and really framing one topic in 25 different ways so that people, because it’s not a one size fits all approach, right? And the issues shift and change over time. And then the best part of every chapter is the very end, which is called, what is it, from Kids just Out the Other Side. And these are written essays written by 18 to 22 year olds with advice to the adults, like, this is what works when you talk about acne, and this is not helpful. And it’s storytelling and it’s profound, and it’s a reminder that they’ve just been through it. You haven’t.

Debbie:

Yeah, yeah, I love that section as well. And just that reminder too, and you, I know we’re kind of talking around things listeners, we are gonna get into some of the nitty gritty, but just that reminder that it’s just a very different experience our kids are having. Like, you know, I still kind of can hear my husband, you know, having a conversation with my now 19 year old. Well, I remember when I was your age, I’m like, no. Don’t, do not go there!

Vanessa:

Jumping on the grenade, Debbie!

Debbie:

Exactly, so centering the voices of young people who are just through it, or maybe still be going through some of these things, I think is so important. I wanna even just touch upon this. modern, you know, the subtitle is a modern puberty explained. That implies again, that it is different from the puberty that we all went through. And so you touch upon that within every chapter, what’s changed in the past 20, 30 years, but are there some kind of general things that you could share with us of why this isn’t your, the puberty that we have any kind of context for?

Vanessa:

Yeah, so Cara can explain the medical and biological evolution, and then we can talk about how that actually impacts day-to-day lives.

Cara:

Yeah, I mean, the quick answer on the science-y side is the data we had about when puberty began comes from the 1940s, 50s and 60s. And that data showed that kids entered puberty if you’re genetically female around age 11 and if you’re genetically male around age 11 and a half. And the data that was collected starting in the late 1990s through 2010 showed that time was marching backwards. So we have known since 2010 that the average girl in this country enters puberty between eight and nine. And we have known since 2012 that the average boy in this country enters puberty between nine and 10.

Debbie:

Wow, okay,

Cara:

And Vanessa, you want to pick up sort of where that, what that leaves us with as a result?

Vanessa:

Yeah, so Debbie, and this is an even more complex issue for the population that your podcast addresses, but the disconnect between the way a child looks, how they present an appearance to the world versus where they are developmentally and where their brain is on the spectrum of development in this age range can be very, very different. I mean, you can have a kid who looks 16 who is 12 years old, or you can have a 10-year-old who looks 14. And so one of the things that we really emphasize in the book is that you have to understand where a kid is in their development and in their being rather than looking at them and assuming from the outside, you know exactly who they are and how old they are and how to speak to them and how to treat them. there’s a huge disconnect between those two things in the current reality.

Debbie:

Yeah. Yeah, I mean, we talk a lot about asynchronous development, just in terms of like, it could be the cognitive development versus social emotional could be at different places. But now we throw in the physical with that. And it’s very complicated.

Vanessa:

Yes, exactly.

Cara:

Yeah, and the physical is driven by hormones and the hormones circulate around the brain and they have a direct impact on moods and emotions. And so now it gets mixed up in a muddy mess.

Vanessa:

And we hear from parents, Debbie, who are like, why is my 10-year-old acting like a teenager? And because they have the hormones that you might have expected a teenager to have, right? If you have a 10-year-old who’s really in puberty, they might be behaving in the way you expected them to behave when they were 14, except because puberty starts earlier, those behaviors, those hormonal shifts, those mood swings will start to present earlier. And The funny thing, funny and not ha-ha but interesting, is that puberty is not happening faster. In fact, it’s happening slower for many kids. It’s now almost a decade as opposed to the three or four awkward years that we think of when we were going through puberty. Oh, it’s like middle school and then it’s over. Uh-uh. It is a long, long journey as they say in history of the world. And that means that people are having many, many more conversations with the kids under their roofs and in their classrooms because all of a sudden a decade involves a whole variety of topics that people assume they didn’t need to cover under the umbrella of puberty.

Debbie:

Yes. Yeah, I did find that shocking when you said that earlier and longer. And that is something I think we all need to just know and kind of lean into because it is happening.

Cara:

Vanessa’s waiting for me to just say that I was desperate to name the book, puberty is stretching like taffy. And I thought it was such a great image and Vanessa and every single other human involved with this book was like, Kara, go be alone with your title, but that’s not the title of the book. But that is the image to hold in your mind is it really has stretched like taffy.

Vanessa:

It works with 20 minutes of context, but it doesn’t work just like cold. Now, Debbie, you can appreciate how meaningful that line is, but no one would have bought that book, Kara, so I’m glad we got to This is So Awkward instead.

Debbie:

Yeah, I can imagine a marketing meeting with the publishing company. Yeah.

Cara:

I have the cover in my brain. If anyone ever wants to see it, I can translate it.

Vanessa:

She kept sending images of something being stretched, Taffy being stretched. We’re like, okay, Kara, thanks.

Cara:

Yeah.

Debbie:

That’s hilarious. I wanna talk a little bit more about how you hope parents interact with the book and why you want them to, and we’ll do that right after this quick break. And now I’m hungry for a taffy, just so you know. Okay. Okay, so I’d love to know about… the audience for this book. I think with so many things, we don’t know what we don’t know. We don’t know that we need something until we realize, oh crap, I needed that five years ago. Can you talk about why it’s so important that parents have access to this information and how do we kind of encourage them to engage with it?

Cara:

Yeah, so I’m gonna hand the baton to Vanessa in one second, but I’m just gonna start with the word parents because we almost never use it in our book. Because this is a book that’s for every adult who is helping to raise or guide tweens and teens. And a lot of those adults are not parents. They might be teachers, mentors, coaches, they might be healthcare providers, they might be therapists, they might be aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents. So with that framing, I’m going to hand it to Vanessa, who’s going to give you the how to use it guide.

Vanessa:

So I mentioned earlier, we don’t want people to feel pressured to read the whole book in one sitting. We hope that it’s engaging enough and interesting enough. Kara explains really complex science in very relatable and fun ways. And Debbie, you’ve experienced that firsthand because you’ve read it already. So. But we want people to be able to dip in and dip out, right? So if they’re like, oh, you know what? My kid’s got a crop of acne on their forehead for the first time, and I’m not sure how to talk about it, let me pick up the book. Or my kid was asking me about why they’re having trouble controlling themselves in class, and they feel like all they want to do is talk to their friends, then pick up the chapter on brain development. So we want people to feel like they can use it as a sort of a guide. The Great Big Book of Puberty, that was actually a title we thought about.

Cara:

I also had a cover in mind for that.

Vanessa:

If there’s a pun involved, Cara has a cover in mind. So that’s number one. Number two is there’s nothing inappropriate about the book for any kid or adolescent to read. So some of the science and some of the language is more elevated and more complicated. But we would encourage adults who don’t actually know the answer to a kid’s question on a particular subject to sit down with a kid and look together at a particular paragraph or at a particular piece of information so that it becomes a trusted place to go. And finally, we want people to feel a sense of relief that they are gonna make mistakes and that it’s okay. and that there are many, many opportunities to cover these topics, to try different strategies, to do it in new ways, and to cut themselves a break. Like we are under so much pressure to get it right, and we just want people to feel like, okay, I messed that one up, I’m gonna try it again, and I’m gonna do it in a new way. So most of all, Debbie, I would say it’s just reassurance. It’s reassurance with information, and it’s reassurance that you’re not gonna get it perfect, but at least you’ll give it a shot. which is most important.

Debbie:

Mm hmm. Yeah, I like that in the beginning of the book, you talk about how to like, if you’ve said, I think it was, I can’t remember which one of you, maybe it was you, Vanessa, you had a conversation in the car with your child and you realize, Oh, I totally blew that. And then you went back and you revisited the conversation. And so just that permission in that example is really helpful.

Vanessa:

Yeah, I mean, we say not if you mess up, but when you mess up. Because we have blown it more times than we can count. And we do this for a living. And we don’t hold ourselves up as paradigms of perfection, but rather people in the trenches with everyone else just trying to do the best they can. And I think often people are afraid to enter into these conversations because they don’t want to mess up. And they think that’s going to scar their kid. But the messing up is great. It’s just repairing it and correcting it and circling back, that’s the most important.

Debbie:

Mm-hmm. Yeah. And I just want to say too, your book touches upon, you know, sex and porn and those topics, which are really important. We’ve talked about them on the show. We’ve done, you know, content with Amy Lang, a sex educator on that. And that has a lot of feelings for appearance, like a fear around having those conversations. But there’s so much more in your book about things that I wouldn’t have even thought are part of a puberty conversation, but it is important that we know about it. So can you talk a little bit more about that? Because I think we’re just like, do I need to even understand this stuff?

Cara:

Thank you for framing it that way. And thank you for asking that. Because when we go into classrooms and teach classes, parents are often terrified that the only thing we’re covering is sex and that we’re covering sex. And so often we’re talking about using soap in the shower. I mean, you know, we’re not, sex is a very important but very small piece of the much bigger conversation about growing up and being safe and healthy. So the path through conversations around puberty and education throughout puberty, it begins with basic tenets of hygiene and sleep and nutrition and exercise and consent in the form that has nothing to do with sex, but consent in the form of, if you want to braid my hair, please ask me. right? Or if you want a bite of my sandwich, please ask me that, you know, there’s so much sort of laying of the groundwork and foundational work that needs to be done before we can talk about what people do with sexually mature bodies. And this is not to minimize the conversation about sex. We have two very, very detailed chapters. We have two very, very detailed chapters about sex. STIs and STDs, contraception, porn, they really cover the gamut of what kids and the adults in their lives need to be talking about and thinking about, but it’s a corner of the conversation. Our goal is to take a dreaded topic and to reveal it for what it is, which is. It’s a stage of life that 100% of all people go through. And so we might as well enjoy it, engage with each other about it, flip it positive where we can, and educate each other with good factual information. There are chapters that we really debated, including. I mean, we have a chapter on youth sports over-specialization. And it’s probably the, if, it’s one of the longest chapters of the book, either that or STI’s, STD’s and contraception, take your pick. And, but part of what we’re trying to model for our audience is the way that puberty affects every aspect of a kid’s life. It’s not just, you know, growing, you know, genitals or breasts or growing bigger or gaining weight. It’s every element of their lives and that the intersection is on adults to recognize and to support in a kind of an interdisciplinary way rather than like a singular targeted way. And I think in that recognition, it Comforts kids? Because they might be like, oh, I get that I don’t fit in my pants anymore, but I don’t get what’s happening on the playground in recess that feels super different to me. We want people to feel empowered to have those multitudes of conversations with kids as opposed to just as we say, it’s not the talk. As Amy Lang says, it’s not just the talk. It’s many, many talks over time.

Debbie:

Yeah. Yeah, I love that you brought up the youth sports over specialization chapter that I’ve never seen in a book before. I’ve heard people talk about it. I’ve experienced not personally, but seen friends whose kids have, you know, it’s been complicated as part of their identity journey and all of the things. So I really appreciated that. And I think that’s one of the things I liked so much about the book is there were a lot of surprises like that. Like, oh yeah. Oh, yeah, this is also part of the experience and I and also introducing me to terms like chest knee and butt knee because I have never heard of those things before. So you have a whole chapter acne, back knee, chest knee and butt knee. Can you just say a word or two about that because I never had this conversation with my kid.

Cara:

We can say a word or two. I mean, right? Zits on the butt, butt knee, zits on the back, back knee. And kids have named these things because they deserve naming, because they exist and they exist in spades. But if we don’t name them and help people understand them and help people address them with the kids in their lives, then they become either shameful or, you know, secretive. You want to hide it. Listen, the oil glands are the oil glands and pores are pores and bacteria are bacteria. When those three things get together, they really like to have a party and they like to cause acne and it can show up on your face or on your chest or on your back or on your butt or on all of them or they can roll out at different times in different places. And it’s all part of a very… anticipated experience through adolescence.

Vanessa:

And if you don’t name it, kids default place to go is, it’s only me. I am the only one. And so being really specific about this stuff is actually super helpful. A, because developmentally, they’re better in the details and in the specificity of things. But B, because then they don’t feel alone in it. Like, oh, there are other people who get pimples on their butt? Oh, I feel so much better. I’m not the only one. Debbie, I’m curious if the term manscaper was new to you also.

Debbie:

No, I have only because I watch a lot of reality television. So I did know that term. There was another term that you said was your favorite new term in writing the book, a situationship, I think.

Vanessa:

That was from our interns. We did an episode on the Puberty Podcast with a group of our interns who are, many of them wrote these essays in the book as well. And they introduced us to the term situationship because the current mores around sexual relationships, romantic relationships, hookup culture are so amorphous and confusing almost impossible to define, not just for adults, but for the kids themselves, that they now have this term, which is like a term about not being a term. A situationship could mean any number of things. And even the kids themselves couldn’t really agree on how to define it in any, you know, it’s all contextual. It all depends on what other factors are. And that’s really important to understand about what’s going on for kids these days in terms of their relationships. We think we don’t understand it, but also they will admit to not being totally clear on it themselves.

Cara:

It’s, I don’t mean to frame it this way, but it’s kind of a power play with your kids when you can drop a word like situationship. When I first started using that term with my kids, they were like, oh, mom, how’d you know about that word? Oh, let’s talk about it now. You know, it opens up a conversation or they roll their eyes deeply and then, you know, you’re in, you know, you’re in. But situationship is a great one because it defines the new generation of dating there is almost no chance that the primary adult audience of this book lived an adolescence that involved situationship. It may have involved some version of a situationship, but they didn’t use that language.

Debbie:

Yeah, I’m gonna be dropping that one on my kid. Cause I also like to misuse their terms, but anyway. Okay. So I just want to go back to something you said earlier, that if we’re not talking about it, that, and we’re not naming it, that we can, our kids might feel they’re the only ones. I think there also can be a lot of shame surrounding things. And that resonated so deeply because, especially within the neurodivergent space, like that is something my work has been really focused on is talking openly about all the things and not having… a disability or a neurodivergence be a good or a bad thing. It is what it is. And let’s just talk about it because there is so much shame or what’s wrong with me or I’m broken. So I really appreciate that. And I’m wondering, knowing the listeners of this show, and I’ve heard from so many parents that they are kids. have a hard time engaging in conversations about things, especially about getting older. That can be really uncomfortable for a lot of differently wired kids. It can trigger insecurities, and there’s a lot of kids who are just like shut down at the thought of having a conversation about body hair or any of those things. So just kind of generally speaking, how do you encourage parents whose kids might be really reluctant to engage in dialogue?

Vanessa:

Yeah, I mean, there’s so many different conversations to have with kids this age and over the span of years that we like to encourage people to start in a comfortable space. If your kid doesn’t want to talk about the names of their genitals and how to care for them in the shower, OK, so don’t start there. Start with stinky feet or start with washing faces or start with friendships or start with how their brain is developing over time. Go with the things that feel comfortable to that kid because what you’re doing is you’re building trust with them and you’re building the skill of having conversations about trickier or less comfortable topics so that by the time you get to the harder ones, the ones that they’re really shying away from or covering their ears or leaving the room when you want to have them, Then you’ve kind of been like, hey, remember when we talked about washing your feet? Well, this is a similar conversation and that didn’t go so badly, right? So like, I think we can spend a couple of minutes on this. The kids who are resistant and we hear from this, we hear about this from all parents that they really struggle about the way in, they feel like their kids don’t want to talk about X, Y, or Z, and they just feel like their kids are really shut down. And some of that can be hormonal, right? Some of that, the silence, the distance, can be hormonal. And as Wendy Mogul said when we had her on the podcast, she wrote Blessings of a Skinny and is just really a guru in the parenting space. She said, be enchanted with their enchantment. So if they want to talk about. Fortnite or Roblox or sports statistics. Talk to them about that stuff. Sit and be with them in that stuff. And then there will be opportunities, little moments to find a way into smaller conversations about big important topics.

Cara:

I would just add that if you can normalize some basic anatomical language, then having conversations that involve basic anatomical language become easier. So the first few times you start to use the word vagina instead of the jj or hoo-ha, right? It’s awkward. It’s awkward for the person who’s using the word. It’s awkward for the person who’s receiving the word. And then if you just keep doing it. it becomes a matter of course. And you’ve proven by doing, instead of saying what you’re gonna do, you’ve just done it. And you’ve essentially just kicked open the door an inch. And if you can keep doing that, then slowly but surely the conversations that are truly terrifying to some kids and some adults, those conversations become more benign because the language… is not presenting such an obstacle.

Vanessa:

And Debbie, I just want to make one point piggybacking on Kara talking about anatomically correct language. We know that the research tells us that kids who know the correct terminology for their body parts are less likely to be victims of sexual predators because it says to a sexual predator, oh, someone is talking to their kid, someone is talking to this kid about their body and their body parts and how they work and… this isn’t a good kid to consider grooming. And we don’t like to be fear-based and we don’t like to spend a lot of time in this area because it’s frightening for people and we like to stay constructive and positive and optimistic. But this is a really important point, particularly for this population because they are at higher risk. And so making sure that kids have ways to communicate their knowledge of their… genitals and knowledge of their body parts is really protective and really helpful, not just in the doctor’s office, but out in the wider world when they are encountering people who are not their trusted adults.

Debbie:

Mm hmm. Thank you for that. And as you’re saying that I’m taking a deep breath and you do have a lot of reminders about how we can regulate ourselves to have these conversations. Can you talk about that?

Cara:

I mean, there’s some great strategies that help your brain simply quiet and reset. We all know that, you know, when the temperature is high, Tina Payne Bryson talks about this a lot. You know, decision making becomes faulty when the temperature is high. So how do you cool the situation? How do you cool yourself? And they’re very simple strategies. Breathing. is probably the simplest and most accessible to everyone. So everyone is capable of counting to 10 and taking a couple of slow breaths. And there is very clear science that instantly rewires the brain in the moment and allows you to proceed through a conversation or a situation in a different way. So I’ve done it for years now. And occasionally my kids will send me to take a couple of breaths and go to den because it’s so effective and I’ll do the same for them. But that’s just one little example.

Vanessa:

And I mean, also, and this is, Kara can only do it in her special Kara voice, but if you wanna buy yourself some time, if you’re shocked by a kid’s question or comment, or you’re super angry by something a kid says, Cara…

Cara:

You want me to do it?

Vanessa:

Yeah, you do it.

Cara:

That was so interesting. What made you think of that? Or, that is so interesting. What made you say that? It’s what Vanessa calls getting curious, and it is a great way in to narrow the scope of what’s being asked or flung at you at any given moment.

Vanessa:

And it’s like totally fake chill. Like yes. Oh, that question about 69 is so interesting. What made you say that? But it’s like, it’s just like you just buy yourself some time. And you also, and this is really important, is you find out where the hell that comment or question is coming from. I mean. The stuff kids come out with, like there are 20 different ways you could respond and 15 of them are totally off base. And until you figure out where the question or comment is coming from, you’re not going to be all that useful. So we do like to delay a little bit. We do like deep breathing. Um, we do sometimes like leaving the room and just like taking a break. Right. And this is something I’m sure you talk about in other contexts, Debbie. I mean, sometimes you just need to remove yourself from the situation in order to, like, do no harm and say something you’re going to end up really regretting.

Cara:

But then you need to come back. And if you press pause on a conversation, you need to come back. And it’s so tempting to just let it sit and let time pass and not revisit. But whether it’s a heated moment or not, if you have left a string hanging, go back and tie up as best you can that string. I know Vanessa…

Vanessa:

That was such a bad puberty pun.

Cara:

Really bad pun. I didn’t mean it that way, but I knew you were gonna take it there.

Vanessa:

I always go there, Debbie. That’s the most important thing to know about me. If someone’s gonna go there, it’s gonna be me.

Debbie:

That’s great. Well, I have to say I love all those tips for parents. In the moment, we’ve talked about having your bank teller voice. So I try to envision a bank teller. And I also, first of all, having that script is really helpful. And I think listeners, maybe just jot that down, hit rewind, to go back and jot that down. Because there are going to be things that come up where you could really benefit from saying that. But also giving yourself permission, you say to just say, I actually don’t know the answer to this. And so that you can, again, take a break, gather the information and then go back. So I think, you know, I can actually feel it, like thinking about certain conversations where I just, I get triggered in my body, my nervous system, like, and then in my brain, I’m like categorizing. This is an opportunity I don’t wanna screw up. I have my own like baggage of trauma around this. Like there’s so much going on. So yeah.

Cara:

Well, I was just going to say there are a couple of guaranteed 100% going to be asked questions that you should probably be prepared for, like your sexual history and your drug and alcohol use history. So give that some thought over, I don’t know, the first decade of your kid’s life, but really think about at some point they’re going to spring those on you. And you do not, as Vanessa says all the time, you do not have to share your entire past history. You do not have to download everything. There are ways and Vanessa can do a great line about how to say you’re not going to share. But don’t lie, never lie. Vanessa, you wanna do your line that you usually do?

Vanessa:

Yeah, I mean, I like to say because my daughter, when she was 10, asked me how old I was when I lost my virginity. And I was like, dear, and headlights. Luckily, it was in a dark room and she was going to bed. But I said to her, somehow, I came up with this in my shocked moment. I said, I’m really glad you feel comfortable asking me that question. I’m actually gonna choose not to answer it right now because it’s not an appropriate thing for us to talk about at your age. But… Maybe when you’re older, if you want to ask me again, I might find the right moment to talk about it with you. And it’s that principle, Debbie, over and over of validating a question, validating curiosity, while still being allowed to set a boundary and say, yeah, I’m going to talk to you about this. I’m not going to talk to you about that. But as Kar said, do not, do not lie. I also really feel like these kinds of conversations are wonderful practice for kids understanding that you’re human and that you had a life before them, but that it’s not all an open book. And what that teaches them is actually they have a right to privacy too, because the age that our kids are growing up in, the digital age, they don’t feel so much right to privacy. And so showing them, hey, I have boundaries about what’s public and what’s private. Therefore, it’s okay for you to have those boundaries. I think it’s a really useful thing for this generation.

Debbie:

Yeah, agreed. Um, and as you were before you said that I had written down the word modeling, cause I do think it is really important for us to always be showing our kids how we do set boundaries, how we, um, how we take care of ourselves in difficult moments, like all of those things. So I love that. Um, there’s so much we could talk about. And we can’t go through every chapter. And so we’re not going to do that. I’m going to really encourage listeners to check out if you have a child who, it doesn’t even matter how young they are going to be going through puberty. And it doesn’t, you know, I’ve got a 19 year old and I still got so much out of this book. Um, so I’m going to encourage the listeners to go check out. This is so awkward. Um, I’ll have links in the show notes page, but is there anything that we didn’t touch upon like. that you would want to make sure that listeners take away from this conversation.

Cara:

You know, you do such a beautiful job of sort of circling a whole topic and then diving deep. There’s nothing you didn’t hit on, but there’s one thing I want to re-emphasize, which is, you’re gonna mess up. It’s okay. Take a do-over. Tell them you messed up. Take the do-over, whether they’re 9 or 19 or 29. It doesn’t really matter. Their brain’s not fully developed yet anyways. They need us, right, for much, the runway is longer and longer and longer than we ever anticipated. And we need them. We need open communication with them. We can’t do our job without them telling us what’s going on. So put yourself, talk about modeling. Put yourself out there and show them. that it’s okay to make yourself a little bit vulnerable to these conversations so that they’ll do the same with you.

Vanessa:

Yeah, and I would just piggyback on that to say, if you’re entering a tough conversation, a conversation that feels tough for you, you can literally narrate for a kid, I am so nervous to talk about this. My pits are sweaty. My hands are sweaty, feel a little bit nauseous, but this is so important for me to talk to you about that I’m going to do it anyways. And that does two things. It shows kids. that they’re not the only ones who get nervous. They’re not the only ones who worry about having tough conversations. And it shows them that we can move through that discomfort and that awkwardness. When something is really important, it’s totally valuable and important to move through that and to have the conversation anyways. And that shows them that they are capable of doing it as well. There’s nothing a kid… loves more. In all of our workshops, the minute we tell them that we feel nervous too, they’re like, the trust is there, the relationship has been built because when an adult admits to their own discomfort and their own nervousness, it’s like a kid’s favorite thing in the world. That and when an adult admits to making a mistake, those are their two top choices.

Debbie:

That’s great. Thank you. Thank you both of you for everything you shared today. Thanks for writing this book, listeners. Um, I’ll have links to all the places you can connect with Vanessa and Kara, including their puberty podcast. Um, are there any special places you would want to make sure that listeners check you out?

Vanessa:

Um, on Instagram and TikTok, um, I know we’re TikTok influencers. Don’t we look like TikTok influencers? We wanted to put science based reliable information out on TikTok. Um, so both on Instagram and on TikTok, they can find us get ready folks at spillingthepubertea.

Cara:

Yes, I did come up with that.

Vanessa:

Yes, that’s another favorite pun, but it has great information for adults and for adolescents and tweens to get some good info that has been vetted and is science-based.

Debbie:

Awesome. Well, thank you. Thank you again both so much for this conversation. It was so insightful and I really appreciate everything you shared.