I've got some questions for you to consider. As always, handle any or all of them however you like. The object is not to make you feel like Loser Mom-which you SO are not-but to help you discover where any misgivings you have might've come from.

How are you about your periods, your breasts, your hairy armpits? Is it all a royal pain? A necessary annoyance? A continuing source of amazement? Something in between?

Have you had experiences that have shaped your body 'tude? The way your mom handled your puberty? Your sexual history? Childbearing?

What would you change or replicate about the way you "came of age" (learned about periods, got your first one, discovered how babies came to be)?

Going for It

It's really pretty instinctive when you think about it. I'm saying that the best way to guide your tween daughter through puberty is to talk with her. And, for heaven's sake, what do we women do better than talk?

So, we need to talk to our daughters. We can totally do that. The question is how, especially when it comes to this hotbed of discussion topics. I'm offering a few principles for you, some of which can be applied to any mother-daughter dialogue and some of which pertain to particular topics. All of them should be passed through the filter of your own personality, and your daughter's. Using something in a way that feels forced to you will send both of you running back to hide under your respective covers.

If your daughter comes to you with a question related to womanhood, make sure you know what she's really asking you.

We've talked about this before so I'll just touch on it briefly. Most tween girls don't inquire about what's going to happen in the future much beyond this week. They want to know what's going to affect them now. If your daughter asks if it's okay to "go out with a boy," she probably doesn't want to know when she can actually date, get engaged, and plan a wedding. If you think about her life this very minute, you can relax because she more than likely just wants to know if she can call some eleven-year-old her boyfriend. To be sure, start with, "Define 'going out.'"

By the same token, if she does express interest in a topic that is way beyond her realm of experience-does it really hurt that much to have a baby, for instance-she's not hinting that she or any of her BFFs is currently pregnant. She's curious in a detached kind of way about something that may or may not happen to her someday. A simple "Yes," or "It hurts some, but you forget about it as soon as you hold your baby in your arms" is probably sufficient. She's not really asking for a full rendition of your labor and delivery experience.

If her question is specific, borders on the bizarre, or seems to come out of nowhere-Can you get a disease from kissing somebody? Can a boy really tell you're having your period by the way your breath smells? If I got pregnant before I got married would I go to hell?-you can bet that came out of something she heard somewhere that didn't ring true, and you can thank the Lord she came to you for clarification. Which, by the way, is all she really wants. Again, she's not necessarily indicating that she's already kissed some boy and is now worried about her health.

In any of those cases, I think it's best to say, "Interesting question, Kate. Why do you ask?" She's far too young to be good at dissembling. If she says, "Just curious," that's what she means. It will either save you from a long dissertation she's not even asking for, or give you time to form an answer you hadn't expected to give just yet.

This is key: If she asks a question, always give her an honest answer to what she really wants to know. "You're too young to be asking that yet" or "We don't talk about things like that in this house" are going to close a door you'll be hard-pressed to pry open again. You get to decide how much you're going to explain, but explain you must.

Stay aware of what's going on with her physically, without invading her privacy.

That's often just a matter of noticing that breast buds are nosing at that T-shirt she's almost grown out of, or keeping general track of her mood swings to see if there's a pattern, or realizing she could braid the hair on her legs right now. We'll discuss what to actually do about that in the next chapter. For now you're just noticing, without commenting, unless she brings it up. "Sara, you stink, girl! Go use some of my deodorant" is not "noticing," and it's definitely not the kind of "talking" I'm describing here. More on that in a moment.

The more difficult thing is to be aware of changes such as vaginal discharge and pubic hair. Since there are so many other visible signs, you don't technically have to know about the more private ones. By not asking you are actually showing her respect and allowing her to make some basic decisions on what she shares about her body. One of the most disturbing emails I've received recently was from a girl of almost twelve who hadn't had her period yet and all the other females in the family had started by age ten. She said every time she came out of the bathroom her mother asked her if she'd started yet. I suspect that when she does, she's going to be reluctant to tell her.

If you stay in the loop and respect your daughter's privacy, she will come to you with changes she's concerned about. If you drill her with a puberty checklist in hand, you'll send her the message that her body is not her own.

View all variations from everybody else as normal.

Because they are. The moment she complains that "everybody else" has gotten their period and she hasn't, rather than asking if she has actually taken a poll of the girls in her grade (that might work with other topics but not this one), tell her, every time it comes up, that no two girls experience puberty at the same time in their lives or in exactly the same way, and that she is exactly where she's supposed to be right now, at this moment in time. There are three things that will help you do that without losing it and saying, "How many times do I have to tell you this-you're fine! Be grateful you don't have to put up with any of that mess yet." I don't have to explain why that response would be disastrous.

To keep from going there, understand that there may be teasing going on among the girls she associates with. Such comments as, "You need a bra about as much as you need dentures" are not unheard of, and are especially hurtful when they come from a BFF.

You also need to know that these days, completing the "steps" in puberty often becomes a competition among tweens. Who's going to get their period first? Who'll get a bra ahead of everybody else? Whose mom is going to cave on letting her shave her legs before the others? As more of them get up those steps, a subtle club is formed, one she knows she can't belong to until she too is wearing a bra and a pad. She may not even be excluded from anything else among her friends, but she's aware that she's still more of a little kid than they are somehow.

Just be sure you accept that variations of the imagined "norm" are, indeed, normal. If you don't, she's going to sense it and begin to anxiously wonder. Anxiety leads to more crying out for reassurance-"Why haven't I..."-which brings out the exasperated Wicked Witch in you. If you're really concerned that your daughter is "behind," take that poll yourself among the other moms, or talk to your gynecologist. He or she will probably tell you to ask again if your daughter turns fifteen and still shows no signs.

If your tween isn't convinced by you, you might want to pick up a copy of Body Talk for the two of you to read and discuss together. Pages 12-14 and 24-25 apply specifically to this challenge.

Be especially sensitive if she's an early bloomer.

I don't hear much from tween girls who've been wearing a bra since they were nine or started their periods while they were still dressing Barbies. That isn't because they're fine with looking fifteen at age eleven. It's because their early blossoming sets them apart in a way that's so painful for them, they often don't even want to talk about it.

I see it when full-figured tween girls come to events. Too often they have their arms crossed over their chests and their shoulders curved in. If they're tall, they slump. If they weigh more than the skinny-minis around them, they hide in big shirts. Hair hangs over faces. Smiles are guarded. It's the rare physically precocious tween who breezes in looking confident that she'll fit in with the wispy-waisted girls in training bras. In her mind, how can she? She can't wear the cutesy little fashions her smaller counterparts have on. She isn't having the same dance-cheerleading-soccer experiences they're having. And she's been teased so much she would have a hard time trusting anyone who extended a welcome to her anyway.

The only thing she thinks she has going for her at an all-girl occasion is that there are no boys there. In most situations she is fair game for tween males who, bless their hearts, are freaked out by what constant exposure to this woman-look-alike does to their hormones. They feel compelled to embarrass her to hide the fact that they feel completely inadequate around her. Faced with constant ALC "humor" about her breasts, her hips, her height, and her understandable disdain for them, is it any wonder she's afraid to even try to enjoy her tween years the way she has every right to do?

This is especially troubling for a girl if she virtually blossoms overnight. Marijean was always one of the shorter, less physically developed girls in her age group until the summer she was twelve. In two months she grew to a statuesque five-foot-eight, slipped into a size ten shoe, and caught up with me in cup size. She was suddenly going through my closet for possible options and looking almost womanly in her favorite flowered shorts. She was pretty pleased with the way she looked, and it showed in her level of confidence. She informed us that she was going to make straight A's from now on and was primed for middle school. Until she was met there with "Dude, you're an Amazon!" "Hey, the breast fairy finally came!" and "You think you're better than everybody else, don't you?" Tears after school became a common occurrence, and then a certain bitterness crept into her worldview. All boys were stupid. All popular girls were worse. And she herself-the worst of all.

I wasn't having it. I wanted to declare open season on every boy in the seventh grade, but I knew if she didn't work this through, she would continue to feel powerless. She couldn't do it alone, however. So we talked- about the fact that boys don't mature as fast as girls do and need to largely be ignored for the time being.

about the very real possibility that they and her girlfriends were intimidated by her sudden leap ahead.

about the realization that the same girls who'd teased her in elementary school (Heidi and the Heinous Ones) were trying to hold their own as the Ruling Class and not having that much success; they hadn't been put in the accelerated classes, and it was the "smart kids" (like Mj) who were taking the reins in middle school.

about the confidence she'd found, that it was hers to keep, and that she could use it to attain the things she really wanted-a place in the school chorus, membership in Shakespeare Club, closeness to some girls she'd found commonalities with during the summer.

about how to respond to teasing (which I'll go into in detail in section four).

If you have an early or overnight bloomer, let your heart go out to her. Listen to her pain. Don't discount it or try to soothe it away. Just tell her the truth, and help her deal with it. Before she finally embraces her vibrant, robust beauty, there will be times when you are the only one who can possibly understand what she's going through. Be there, not with support for wallowing, but with guidance for forming a plan, for answering the question, "So-what am I going to do about it?"

Help her prepare for her period on every level.

First, talk about what's going to happen. Whether you go through a book like Body Talk together or you have your own approach, you need to be the one who shares the details about this major development in her life. Even if she gets the news from a presentation at school or a church girls' group, you should follow with a discussion of your own. She'll then know what you want her to know, and you'll know what she knows. This is far too important to leave entirely to anyone else. Both of you will benefit from the bonding that occurs.

On this level, keep it simple. Does she really need instruction on how the hormones change during pregnancy, or what the risks are for breast cancer? Let what you say be on a need-to-know basis. Use humor if you can. This is not an upcoming trauma you're talking about, so share your funny first-time experiences. Admit to the parts that really are annoying but that can be handled with wit and a grin. Just let it be about the beauty of joining the company of women. She gets to have babies if she wants someday. She'll experience a rhythm she can depend on. She'll be cleansed month after month, allowed to start anew in a symbolic way.

"My mom's so good when it comes to the growing-up thing. She never acts like I'm younger than I really am, and she helps me with all the girl stuff-you know, respecting the fact that I hide bras under things when I'm in the store. I can't stand anyone seeing them except me!"

age 12 Next talk about what she'll need to do. Show her the pads. Discuss how she'll dispose of them, how often she'll need to change them, what she can do in case of a spillover. Offer to let her wear one to see what it feels like or to be reassured that it isn't going to show. Make a plan for what she'll do if she starts at school or home alone with Dad or in the middle of a soccer field. Shop together for supplies. Answer every question she has. But, of course, don't feel like you have to do all of this in one session. If you start soon enough, you'll have plenty of time to stretch it out.

Finally, model what a great body 'tude can be. You can give her all the right information and get her prepared for every possible period-starting scenario, but the attitude you have about "feminine hygiene" will have the most profound effect on whether her experience is rich and satisfying or just a huge pain in the neck-and not just now but perhaps for always. There are some things to consider before you begin.

One is how you name things. Do you refer to your period as "the curse" or speak of "that time of the month" like an upcoming root canal? My mother and older sister called it "falling off the roof." What the Sam Hill was that about? "My friend" is a little better, but why not dignify it with its true name, "menstrual cycle"? The rhythmic, natural sound of it implies that it is exactly that. As for breasts, I would definitely stick to that quite lovely name. "Boobies" and "tits" are used in such demeaning ways these days, I'm not sure you want your daughter applying them to herself. I know women who refer to their breasts as "the girls"; that's kind of fun-makes them sound like ever-present companions.

Be aware of your general view. Is menstrual blood disgusting to you? Do you think of the whole business as something unclean, rather than the actual cleansing process that it is? Do you think breasts ought to be kept under cover because they're ugly, rather than as a matter of personal dignity? Whether you actually say any of that to your daughter or not, it will seep into your tone if you're not aware. If someone once instilled a negative view of feminine body functions in you, this would be a great time to heal that and stop the legacy with your daughter. You have that choice.

Probably most important of all, consider how your periods affect your life. Some women seem to just breeze through their menstrual cycles. (I was fortunate enough to do that.) Others welcome it all as a rich reminder of their womanhood. (That's my daughter's MO.) Still others have to suffer through cramps and headaches and low back pain that make the cycle anything but "rich." And then there are those whose mood darkens so much they just feel lucky to get through it without committing a homicide. All are valid and understandable. Your task is to decide how much of that you're going to discuss with your daughter before you know what periods are going to be like for her. To say "Be prepared for major cramps because I always get them and you probably will too" might not be necessary if it turns out she takes after the women on her father's side and never has to touch a Midol. Whatever you choose to tell, consider doing it with a "It could be this way, but we'll find a way to make it easier" approach.

Talk about moods, rather than simply chalking them up to hormones.

If you're like me, you hate it when people-men in particular-call any emotional response other than smiling agreement "PMS." That annoys the daylights out of me not because PMS isn't real, but because it isn't at the root of every mood a woman has. The premenstrual shift in hormones may intensify those moods, but the everyday events of life cause them in the first place. (And might I add that men do their share to bring out the cranky ones?) So even though roller-coaster moods are a part of puberty for many tween girls, we really shouldn't excuse any out-of-control expression of them. In other words, your daughter shouldn't get away with shoving her brother out of her room while screaming that he's lucky she isn't pushing him out the second-story window instead, just because she's about to start her period. Otherwise, you run the risk of her taking the entire household down with her. "Our home was so peaceful," one caller told me on my radio spot, "until Emily turned nine and the hormones kicked in." I think this is another one of those opportunities to instill a true lesson in living. A few suggestions to get you started: Be sympathetic to the fact that the new intensity of her emotions is confusing and hard to control. In other words, don't tell her she's turned into a witch and she'd better just get off her broom and straighten up.

But set limits on how she expresses them. She may leave the upsetting situation and go to her room to get calmed down, but she can't slam the door when she gets there. (We had to add "No muttering under your breath on the way" for Mari-jean.) She is certainly free to cry, but she may not try to use tears to get her way (especially with Daddy). You know she gets angry so she can go ahead and vent, but name-calling, swearing, spitting, and projectile throwing are not allowed.

Suggest healthy ways to express emotions rather than taking them out on people or stuffing them away to fester. We talked about creative outlets earlier. Others might include shooting baskets, hitting a tennis ball, walking the dog, or playing a mean "Chopsticks" on the piano. Any nonviolent way to expend some of that extra emotional energy is okay.

Show her how to say what she feels in a manner that might actually change the situation for the better. If she's screaming at her sister for wearing her fave T-shirt without asking and spilling grape Kool-Aid on it, call her on her inappropriate shrieking, but also give her an alternative approach with her sister: "Here's what you did that ticked me off and here's what I'm asking you to do about it." (You'll of course deal with the sister and her issues as well...pure joy this motherhood thing, huh?) The goal is to help your tween gain personal power over her emotions without denying them. If you explain that PMS is a sign that her cycle is moving, it also makes sense to tell her to treat herself to a little TLC. Curl up with your favorite book, you might suggest. Make yourself a smoothie. Ask for a hug. That will go a long way toward heading off the moods before they even start. (And never underestimate the power of chocolate.)

Let the boy-thing be the boy-thing.

I think we're already established that, like it or not, boys are going to be part of the picture at some point, and refusing to let your daughter talk about them or telling her it's wrong for her to be giving them a thought is probably a mistake. If you won't discuss boy stuff with her, she'll find someone else to talk to, somebody who's likely to give her misinformation-you know, like her BFF, who knows even less about the male gender than she does. If you tell her she shouldn't even be thinking about boys yet, she won't stop thinking about them. She'll just feel guilty for thinking about them, and become secretive. All that boy stuff may grow far bigger in her mind than it would have if you'd just said, "Of course you're noticing boys. You're growing up. So-tell me about it."

I get why you're reluctant, I really do. If you admit that she's starting to be interested in the opposite sex, you have to admit that she isn't totally a little girl anymore. It's a loss for you. And you're afraid she's going to grow up too fast. If she "likes" a boy now, at eleven, does that mean she's going to want to date at twelve, have sex at thirteen? If she starts her "romantic" life as a tween, how can you be assured that she'll remain pure until she's married? It seems like the general acceptance that teens have sex is more widespread than ever, and you just don't want her to buy into that. Keeping her away from boys, convincing her that thoughts of them will only lead her away from God-that seems like the only way to protect her. Besides, you just don't need the drama.

The inclination to stifle the whole thing is especially strong if your daughter shows signs of being "boy crazy," babbling nonstop about the boys in her class, wanting to call them, text them, email them, chase them around the church parking lot. If you engage in that for even a moment, won't that encourage her to go completely out of control? Your concern is very real-you're afraid all her decisions are going to be made on the basis of what will impress a guy. All the more reason then to hear what she's saying. Only then can you guide her toward a more balanced perspective.

When a tween girl is nuts over anything in a ball cap, there's usually something going on with her. Not enough attention from Dad? Lack of confidence in any ability aside from her talent for flirting? A recent loss that's made her want to grab for something new to fill the hole? The only way you're going to find out is to talk until you discover it. Telling her she's "sinning" by craving male attention won't bring you closer to that. Teaching her to respect herself will.

Yet again, find out what she's really talking about when she brings up the subject of boys. As she's discovering that those Absurd Little Creeps may not be so creepy after all, she may just be interested in one as a friend. At this age, a buddy relationship really is completely platonic. Many things about the way boys think can be explained to her by this reliable source while they're climbing trees or shooting baskets together. If you deny her all contact with boys, they become mysterious creatures she won't know how to deal with at all when the time comes.

Don't approach "the talk" with dread-but by all means approach it.

The obvious first question is when to tell your daughter about sex. My feeling on that is-tell her when she asks either outright or with a hint. Her asking, "When did your mom tell you about babies and stuff?" might be one indicator that she's ready. Asking you to explain a joke she's heard is another. As always, be sure you know that's what she's really asking you. Then-talk.

How do you do that? You do it in whatever way you've prepared beforehand, because that's the first thing you need to do. I don't mean type up a script and whip it out when she shows a spark of interest. I'm just saying think through what you want her to know, and what feeling about the beauty and wonder of a committed, marital sexual relationship you want her to come away with. Imagine yourself sharing that with her.

I think we've all envisioned walking through a field of flowers and butterflies as we impart our wisdom with our daughters, or talking over hot chocolate by a fire, or strolling along a beach with her at dawn, but really, it doesn't usually happen that way. You may be thinking that on her thirteenth birthday you'll pack everybody else off for the day and have a tea party for the two of you at which you'll give your well-prayed-over "talk." That is a beautiful thing and if that truly works for you and your daughter, that's the way it should be. If you're more inclined toward talking when the topic arises, even if you have to bring it up as you sense she wants to, that's perfectly fine too. The thing has the potential to be awkward enough without you suddenly behaving like somebody else!

What do you say? What truly is in your heart-not what comes from fear or shame or a set of rules. God created sex for our joy and for procreation, in the context of a committed marital relationship. It is only its misuse by human beings that can twist it into anything ugly or wrong. If you use that beauty as your foundation, then whatever information and guidance you want to give will come from the love in your soul. Anything you say to scare her or guilt her away from what lies within her will deny her joy, even if she remains a virgin until her wedding day.

If you're concerned about other influences besides yours, continue to do the things you're already doing. Be vigilant about the media she's exposed to. Limit and monitor television viewing. Preview movies she wants to see. Listen to her music (if you can stomach it!). Point out the sexual fallacies you see in advertising.

Doing this now, and telling her why you're doing it, and gradually giving her more options will not only protect her from damaging sexual images, but it will insure that she'll be able to make those determinations for herself when she's a teenager.

With all this talking, eyes may begin to glaze over (yours as well as your daughter's!). That's the time to bring in the fun stuff. Who said this whole puberty thing has to be a completely serious business? Here are a few suggestions of things to do to reinforce all of the above.