Wait! Wait! I’m not ready!

As a girl I lived next door to my grandmother. Nearly every day my brothers and I skipped across our grassy lawn, through her back door, and into the kitchen that smelled of bread dough and stale cigarettes. Not exactly a Yankee Candle-inspired scent, but it was Grandma, so it was great.

Those afternoons at Grandma’s revolved around cookies and coffee — she drank and we ate — and we’d spout off all the happenings of the day. She was a great listener because she wasn’t much of a talker. When she said something, it usually stuck.

That’s why I remember the day I ran to Grandma’s to complain about my mother. I was about 15 and Mother (ever notice how “moms” become “mothers” when we’re angry?) wouldn’t let me go out with friends. And she’d been a total grouch for weeks.

“Maybe she’s going through the change,” Grandma said.

At the time I had no idea what she meant, but her description of menopause seems to fit a different, although not unrelated, situation.

My daughter Emma is 10 and there is a lot of change going on.

There’s the uncontrollable sobbing over things like a favorite shirt in the wash, or a lost sock, or the cheese not quite melted right on her sandwich.

There are the mood swings.

“Mom, you are the best!” followed forty-five seconds later by, “Why are you trying to ruin my life?”

There’s the body issues.

“These jeans make my butt look big.” (She barely has a butt, let alone one that can be construed as “big.”)
And, (big sigh here) there’s hair under her arms.

Emma’s “change” is coming, and I’m totally unprepared. I’m not sure I’m ready to have my little girl become a young woman. Yesterday she was learning to tie her shoes. Today she’s asking about training bras.
The idea of searching for feminine hygiene products for someone who still plays with Polly Pockets seems insane.
But like menopause, puberty can’t be put off. It comes whether we want it to or not. And for my daughter’s generation, it seems to be coming earlier and earlier. There are girls in her fourth-grade class who have already started their periods.
It’s not that Emma isn’t prepared. I’ve talked to her about how her body will change. We’ve walked through what a menstrual cycle is, and planned for what to do if it happens at school. We’ve had “the talk.”
“You mean sex, right?” she said.

She’s ready; I’m trying to catch up.

I’m trying to remember what I tell her every time she frets about a new seat assignment in school, or I serve a new dish for dinner: Change can be good. It can be better than you expected.

The other day I taught Emma how to shave her armpits. We had a good laugh over the scent of the shaving cream. “Raspberry rain! Ridiculous!” she chortled. “Next time I’ll buy Melon mania.” I said and we both giggled until my husband knocked on the bathroom door.

We watched one of my favorite movies, “Pride and Prejudice,” and both cried when Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy finally embraced.

“He really loves her,” she gasped as tears welled in her eyes. “I know,” I said, dabbing my eyes while handing her a tissue.

My son walked in. “What a couple of girls,” he mocked.

“Women,” Emma corrected, smiling up at me.

I guess a little change won’t hurt me.

Kelly Frick is a writer and mother of two.