A girl’s first period, or menarche, is an important transition in her life. It marks the transition from childhood to womanhood.

Cultures around the world have had rites of passage and “coming of age” ceremonies for generations but it is a practice that sadly has gotten lost in Western culture.

While I am passionate about making this momentous occasion celebrated for the next generation once more, I am equally passionate about age appropriate body literacy so that girls start their journey in womanhood with information to keep themselves healthy.

What Is Age Appropriate Body Literacy?

Age appropriate body literacy means you can teach a girl about her body without ever bring in the scary “s” word – sex.

I challenge the notion our Western culture has that we cannot teach girls about their bodies without including sex in the conversation. It’s simply not true.

I start talking with mothers and daughters when girls are usually around 9 or 10 (depending on how early Mom started her period) about changes their body will see and how to care for those changes.

Never does sex enter the conversation at this tender age. It is purely about function, what they will notice,  how they might feel and what to look for. We discuss how to care for their changing body with food and steam.

Pelvic Steaming and Menstrual Health

Learning about the changes that are coming for their body and how to care for it normalizes menstruation from the start. 

How many of you hid your pad in your shirt sleeve and ran down the hall to the bathroom in middle school? 

We were taught to hide our periods. It creates a sense of shame that you are bleeding. This narrative needs to change – for our own health as well as the health of the next generation.

Girls self esteem starts to dip when they enter their bleeding years. Part of this phenomenon comes from lack of education and cultural shaming about being a bleeding body.

We have an amazing opportunity to “flip the script” and normalize this very normal body function.

Enter pelvic steaming. Steaming has the ability to create a healthy connection with this part of their body as well as the knowledge to care for it.

Beginning to steam once a month to normalize the process around 9 or 10 helps to ensure that the girl starts her period in an appropriate age range as well as with a healthy start. 

There are SO MANY WOMEN that I meet with now as adults that say “oh my goodness! I wish I had known this when I was younger!”

Here is your opportunity to be that change for the next generation of young women.

If I knew as a teenager what I know now…

• I wouldn’t have had cystic ovaries

• I wouldn’t have had debilitating cramps

• I wouldn’t have had irregular cycles

• I could have prevented endometriosis running my life for over a decade

• I wouldn’t have gone on birth control at 15 as a means to “control” those symptoms 

• I wouldn’t have had that decade of birth control use end in a heart attack at age 25

• I wouldn’t have chosen some of the partners I have been with because birth control changed my biochemistry

Just imagine how the health and trajectory of your daughter’s life could be changed if she had this information from the start?

How would your story have been changed?

Almost every woman I work with will sit across the table (or the Zoom camera) from me and say “Oh my word! I wish I had this information when I was a teenager! My life would have been so different!”

Exactly. That’s what we want. A better life for our children.

When Should We Come In?

Use your cycle start as a gauge to determine when we should start talking about an appointment for your child.

If you started your period at 10, we should check in and see what your child’s development looks like at age 9. 

If you didn’t start your period until you were 16, since the range for starting should be between 12-14 years old, let’s talk when your daughter is 11.

If you have any questions about determining when would be a good time to talk with your daughter – just reach out! I love questions and I want to make this as comfortable for you and your child as possible.

I have mothers and daughters who both steam and it just becomes a normal part of self care in their house like trimming your nails or shampooing your hair. 

Pre-menarche – your daughter steams once a month for 10 min. That’s it. 

Once the period starts, ideally between 12-14, she will steam after her period and before her period as a means of maintaining her health.

UTIs and yeast infections in your teens and 20s doesn’t have to be the same reality for your daughter. Cramping and irregular periods don’t have to start the journey in womanhood. These issues snowball into larger issues when you want to have your own family later on down the road.

I have a dream that we can see an entire generation of women who don’t know the pain of menstrual cramps. It is possible – one steam session at a time.

Interested in talking about your daughter’s future? Email me at adrienne@moonessence.life!