Preparing for puberty with confidence, with Tara Ghosh

We’re trying something a little different this week - Tara and I have created a section of the show especially for young people. If someone in your life would like to know more about periods, breast development and what else can change from the age of about 8 to 12 years, they should listen from 46:45 onwards.

My guest this week, Tara Ghosh, is a certified women's health coach and period educator and runs workshops for young people about body changes and puberty. In this episode, she and I discuss how important puberty education is for the whole of society, and the hows and whys of periods, breast development and hormonal changes.

You can follow Tara on Instagram @_taraghosh_ or find out more on her website http://www.taraghosh.com/

My new picture book on how breastfeeding journeys end, The Story of Jessie’s Milkies, is available from Amazon here -  The Story of Jessie's Milkies. In the UK, you can also buy it from The Children’s Bookshop in Muswell Hill, London. Other book shops and libraries can source a copy from Ingram Spark publishing.

You can also get 10% off my books on supporting breastfeeding beyond six months and supporting the transition from breastfeeding at the Jessica Kingsley press website, that's uk.jkp.com using the code MMPE10 at checkout.

Follow me on Instagram  @emmapickettibclc or find out more on my website www.emmapickettbreastfeedingsupport.com 

Resources mentioned or recommended -

Books -

This Period in my Life by Saskia Bouja
Making Pink Lemonade by Sarah O'Mahoney
Menstrual Doodles by Rebecca Martin
Period by Natalie Byrne
Ruby Luna's Curious Journey by Tessa Sanderson
The Autism Friendly Guide to Periods by Robyn Steward

Website - 

https://amaze.org/us/

This podcast is presented by Emma Pickett IBCLC, and produced by Emily Crosby Media.

Transcript

This transcript is AI generated.

[00:00:00] Emma Pickett: I am Emma Pickett and I'm a lactation consultant from London. When I first started calling myself makes milk. That was my superpower at the time because I was breastfeeding my own two children, and now I'm helping families on their journey. I want your feeding journey to work for you from the very beginning to the very end, and I'm big on making sure parents get support at the end too.

Join me for conversations on how breastfeeding is amazing and also sometimes really, really hard. We'll look honestly and openly at that process of making milk, and of course, breastfeeding and chest feeding are a lot more than just making milk. Thank you very much for joining me for today's episode. I'm going to be joined today by Tara Ghosh, who is a woman's health coach from London.

She's also a breastfeeding counselor, so we've got that skill set in there as well. Tara specializes in supporting young people and women to feel good about their bodies, but was talking particularly today about the young person, young women aspect of that work. She runs period Ready workshops and also offers one-to-one support as well.

So today, Tara and I are gonna put our heads together to talk about helping young people to feel good about puberty and the changes that will happen to them as they approach becoming an adult. We're also gonna do a little section where we talk directly to young people and parents. Let's hope that works out.

And if you want to look at the show notes, you'll work out where that section is, so you can jump to that bit straight away if, if you want to share it with anybody else. And just a little note to say that we're really talking today about cis girls and young cis women, but we do acknowledge that these are conversations that are valuable for everybody.

Not least blokes who are gonna be presumably living with women in their lives and need to know this stuff as well and work live with people who have boobs and periods. And you know, if the whole world was knowledgeable about periods and breast development, we'd be in a very good place. Tara, I'm imagining, and you'd be a fan of that as well, I'm sure 

[00:02:01] Tara Ghosh: I'd be on board, totally on board with that.

[00:02:04] Emma Pickett: So obviously this is a breastfeeding podcast and let's connect the dots for anybody who isn't aware of the blindingly obvious, it's, it's my view, and I'm gonna guess that you share this as well, but I'm gonna ask you about this, that one of the reasons we're a little bit of a problem with breastfeeding rates in the UK and we struggle with breastfeeding in the UK and in lots of other question, um, lots of other countries around the west as well is because I think we haven't quite got to a good place of talking to young people about their bodies and talking to women about their breasts and their bodies.

And body confidence I think is a real problem. And lots of young people are made to feel that their bodies are not enough. That they're deficient in some way, and that's how people sell your stuff. And then suddenly when they get pregnant, we're expecting them to believe that their bodies are miraculous and wonderful and can do all these amazing things.

And we're asking them to have faith and belief in breastfeeding when actually, for for years or even decades before that, they haven't had faith in their bodies. So we get this big problem where we have perceived insufficiency of milk supply, which is much more of a realistic problem than actual actual insufficiency of milk supply.

And people end up topping up when they don't need to or, or measuring lengths of feeds or measuring breastfeeding intervals and just losing confidence in their breastfeeding, partly because of these early conversations around bodies. Is that, is that something that feels familiar to you as well? Tara, would you agree with that?

[00:03:22] Tara Ghosh: Oh my God, I totally agree, Emma. I totally agree. I think we need to, you know, collectively instill a more positive relationship with our bodies, uh, for young people. So, because when we understand how it works, we don't think we're broken. No one can sell it. People can sell less stuff to us when we think, when we know how our body works, and we can really then have the faith and the perseverance to breastfeed.

Um, so I think they're completely directly linked to Emma. I totally agree. 

[00:03:48] Emma Pickett: Yeah, I mean the, the selling stuff is even a problem in the breastfeeding world, isn't it? I mean, the whole lactation cookies and, and this particular supplement, and if by this nipple shield that measures how much your milk, your milk, your baby's gonna be getting, and this pump is the best pump.

And if you don't use this pump, you're gonna not have enough milk. You know, there's sadly, and I don't think it's coming from evil, horrible people that cackle as they sit in their boardrooms, but there is definitely a conscious or subconscious desire to have to undermine people's beliefs in, in their own ability to breastfeed.

And that starts right back with early teen messaging around bodies not being good enough. And, oh, no, you need to remove that hair and you need to do this and do that. It's, it's all tied up, isn't it? So we're not just having a jolly chat about puberty for no reason. This is connected to the world of breastfeeding and breastfeeding rates and breastfeeding success.

When you meet these sort of eight to 12 year olds who do these period ready workshops with you. I mean, I'm not asking you to speak on behalf of every young person, but, but how are they feeling about their bodies? What's the situation right now in 2025? Where, where do they get those feelings from and how are they feeling about their bodies?

[00:04:56] Tara Ghosh: So I'd say the kids who attend my period Ready workshops or who I go to, I go into schools also and do period um, uh, workshops there. The younger they are, the more curious, they are more open. They are to discussions and questions all about their bodies. 'cause they're genuinely interested, they're genuinely curious.

Perhaps they've noticed changes in their own bodies or in their friends, or people in their class have suddenly got lot taller people. People start wearing crop tops or training bras, that sort of thing. So mostly it's hugely positive and excited. Curiosity at the younger age, I'd say between seven and 10.

Brilliant age to have these kind of conversations. Now, depending on the kid's personalities. As they get older, and certainly from 12 onwards I find it's much more closed. They are just, you know, if you're in a group setting anyway, totally giggly embarrassment, frankly, they feel that one-to-one as well.

But you know, in a group setting, it's very difficult. And I think that's a lockdown to kind of social paranoia and just wanting to blend in, not wanting to stand out. But also I do think they, young people these days are sadly more set in their opinions on what makes a good body, what makes a desirable body.

And that, in my opinion, is heightened because for kids in this generation, 'cause they've got an unrealistic body image, they aren't Disc gonna trip feed to them by their weekly magazines, like Smash It and just 17 or the fortnightly Mall, just 

[00:06:16] Emma Pickett: 17. I loved, just so did I, so did I. Most people listening to this be like, what?

Just 17? What? It was a magazine made of paper. So someone squashed a tree and they put ink on the tree and we read the magazine and we went to a shop called a news agent and they sold these magazines. Yeah, it's, it's so hard, isn't it, to imagine. I remember even just 10 years ago, we were saying, oh yes, fashion magazines and billboards.

Can you imagine having a magazine, you know, in your hand that every 20 to 40 minutes it sends you a message about what a good body should look like. Just, just insane what that would do to the conditioning of the brain. Oh my God. 

[00:06:51] Tara Ghosh: I, it just, you know, it, it just breaks me about how we're changing the generation on this.

But um, you know, we were drip fed, sorry I'm aging myself in my mid forties now, but we were drip fed. Awful toxic body image, you know, from dynasty to whatever it was. But now young people have a supercomputer in their pockets, which is the, with a toxic algorithm that is sending them bonkers information about what their body should be like, products that they should use.

I know a lot of people may have seen that in the press, like kids that are seven and eight having like, you know, cleaning their face routines. I don't even know how they exact how to express it. Just all this mental stuff that's been pushed at them 

[00:07:30] Emma Pickett: buying super expensive cosmetics at 10, 11, 12 is 

[00:07:34] Tara Ghosh: totally, it's a big problem.

Really interesting. So I'm not saying that's the only reason. There's obviously a lot of things and obviously as parents, um, you know, we are able, even against the, the algorithm, we are a big influence in our children. So it's how we talk about our bodies as well. How we talk about our periods that is gonna influence them as well.

You know, I'm not asking you to lie about that, you know, 'cause we all have our insecurities or challenges people have, you know, may have had very bad painful periods. There'll be different, there'll be different messaging. They'll be getting. I, from what I'm seeing in the classroom, what I'm seeing in my workshops, the younger, they are really open and curious and then suddenly there is a bit of a closed window, I'd say from 12 plus to maybe about 14, 15.

And then from 15 onwards, they really wanna talk about it again. 'cause they're like, I've had my period for a bit, I've had these boobs for a bit, and I don't really know what to do with them. And they want a space to talk about it. But I, that's what I've seen. 

[00:08:25] Emma Pickett: Okay. Yeah, I mean, I'm guessing, I don't know. I mean, I feel like if you went back to 1997.

At 12 people may be naturally closed down a bit. Oh yeah. Anyway. Yes, yes. I, I'm not sure it's really hard, isn't it, to unpick how much of this is the modern era and how much of this is what always happened. Mm-hmm. I mean, I, there's lots of national conversation at the moment around phones and social media, and I'm always really careful about demonizing screen time.

I think it's, I think that's not necessarily a healthy conversation either. And, and with my own kids, we, they probably had more screen time than average, but lots of conversation around it and talking about what is an algorithm. And anybody that's on Instagram should understand the concept of an algorithm.

And if you, if you can't explain that to your child and they can't get it, they're not ready for Instagram. And, and talking about curating it and how you shift it and change it and, and making sure they understand why someone is sending them a particular image. And, and if they don't understand how they can control that, they're not ready for it.

I mean, what do you feel about phones? Have you had any conversations with parents around when people get a phone? I mean, how do you su support parents to get the balance right? 

[00:09:30] Tara Ghosh: Oh, that's a great question. So yeah, so I help families with digital wellness for every member of the family, from young to old.

And I think like many topics we have to approach this one with just a place of compassion and kindness. You know, first we adults collectively need to acknowledge that we are all addicted to our phones. And that's not because we're weak, not 'cause of anything else. It's because of these fantastically uh, designed equipment that has been, um, you know, phone and app companies pay very clever people, lot of money to make these things addictive.

So it's not us, it's not our problem. It is the system that we are rolling in and we can't be saying to our kids, you know, get off your device or you can't have a phone when we just glued to our own. So I think we all need to gently. Assess our own relationships with our phones and see how we can improve that.

And then when it comes to kids, I, I'm a big advocate for delaying, if you can, delaying smartphones until your kid is about 14 social media, till 16. I know that's not always possible and you absolutely cannot do that alone. Emma, this is you. You know, no one's an island. We all parent in a community. You know, if you can, you need to foster the culture close to your kid, whether that's their best mates, their classmates, their year group, that you can agree to similar boundaries.

Now you're not gonna get everyone to agree. There's many reasons why kids have phones from very young ages and different for different reasons, whether it's a two household family, older siblings, lots of different reasons. But we need to start those difficult conversations about phones, about devices, about all of that as soon as possible.

Really, really, when your kid is like six or seven, I reckon that should be the start of the chat of the school gates, all of that. It's hard. I'm not gonna say it's easy, it's hard. There's, um, some great movements. The delay smartphone movement, the smartphone free childhood. They have conversation starters and things like that if you wanted help with that.

Now, if you're listening to them as, and you are like me, and you've got older kids and that ship has sailed, they've got their own phone, they're on social media, like there's still things we can do to bring in boundaries. You know, the most important of which is no devices in the bedroom at nighttime.

That applies to everyone. That applies to mom and dad. That applies to everybody in the house. There should be no phones in the bedroom. You can also use third party apps like OurPact that limit the time that your kids can spend on certain apps, whether it's Snapchat, TikTok, whatever it is. And then ideally, we should be sitting down, oh.

Every week, every month with our kid and go through what their TikTok feed is, kind of just help them curate it. If your kid is following the Kardashians, you can imagine the stuff the algorithm is gonna send to them. So we need to help support them to have a few positive role models in there that will like push the algorithm in that direction.

They're the kind of ideas that I would give, and there's no judgment on it because it's hard and we, we as parents are overwhelmed and the phone is a fabulous distraction for us. It's a great pacifier for our kids. You know, we have to have a lot of love and compassion when we talk about this topic. 

[00:12:19] Emma Pickett: Yeah.

Yeah. I mean that dopamine addiction problem. There's something that so many parents suffer from. Yeah. And really, let's be honest, you can't say to your 13-year-old, no, my love, you can't get social media while you sit there in the evening on the sofa flicking through your phone. That's just simply not fair on a very basic human level.

I mean, you have to model what you want your child to achieve as well. I mean, I, I've got some interesting views about the delay phone thing. I'm not sure whether you'd necessarily agree with me. Okay. I don't think that 14 or 15 or 16 is necessarily a safer time. Mm-hmm. Interesting. I think that that can be a time where peer conversations are maybe more significant than they would be at other times.

And you know, you are going through GCSE stress and exam stress and introducing that world at some very stressful times in their education. I'm not sure is great. I'm gonna throw out an idea and you come back at me. Yeah. I would. I think as a parent you sit down with your 13-year-old and say, let's together.

Look at some fun memes. Mm. Let's sit down. You look, let's have, so my Instagram count is for you as well. Yeah. We're gonna sit together, we're gonna enjoy some videos. Let's find that cat video that your mate was talking about. You know, let's look at the stuff together. So our algorithm is almost our joint algorithm that we are gonna look at together.

Mm. And that's an activity that we do together. So, so social media isn't something we do in isolation. It's not something we, as you say, we do in our bedroom. Yeah. It's something we talk about. And so they know, you know, what's trendy and what's being discussed and the jokes and the, you know, the conversations around their favorite TV shows.

But it's, it's with you in the same way. You might read a book to a 5-year-old. Yeah. You sit with your 12-year-old and you spend 20 minutes. Let's have some, let's have look at some Instagram videos together and let's save some of them to the, to the saved section. So, so when we want to get our little dopamine rush of our favorite cat videos, we'll find them in the dopa, you know, in that saved section.

But we do it together. Um, rather than it being something in isolation, and I'm just a bit worried about, you know, you're 15 or 16, here's his social media. Yeah. When it's a really tough time in someone's life anyway. Mm mm Um, anyway, that's, that's my feeling. Oh, 

[00:14:24] Tara Ghosh: no, I, I, I really like, I love you sharing that, Emma.

Thank you. I do like, that's such an unusual approach for any of us to think about social media as a joint effort. Like, it very much is a solo game, you know what I mean? We're sitting there by ourselves doing that. Sorry, I'm, for people listening. I'm holding my hand up and we scroll. I'm pretending to scroll that.

Yeah. I love the idea that you would sit and laugh at a few things together and see it, or, you know, when you are looking for recipes, oh, let's look up, you know, you know, I was looking for breakfast ideas and there's just tons on Instagram for different things, and so my, my, the algorithm is sending me lots of breakfast ideas, so I do love that we could share that together.

It's a really good point, Emma, like when is a good time? A lot of people do have the same thing, like, actually we should give the kids. 11, but it should be like a dumb phone. It should be a smartphone. But you remove safari and like internet access. So they get used to having it. It's not a novelty. They don't wanna be on it the whole time.

I think it's a real, it's something you have to n navigate as a family. You know, every child is different. I know some, uh, families I've supported, you've got a very addictive elder child and the younger kid couldn't give two to hoots. They like the kid, the, the phones in the, in the drawer. They, they keep forgetting to bring to school with them and the mom can't get hold of them.

You know what I mean? So you've got, you have to meet your kid where it's at and find what feels comfortable for you. But I would just encourage parents to be a bit braver on this because I think for a lot of parents they feel that, oh, there's nothing I can do. This is just what happens to kids right now.

[00:15:44] Emma Pickett: Yes. Yeah. 

[00:15:45] Tara Ghosh: And I think there's so much more we can do individually in our home. We can set our own boundaries. Or to have those uncomfortable conversations with people. 'cause the other parent is as worried as you are. But we all let them do stuff because we think that other parent doesn't care. You know, where I think we need to be a 

[00:16:00] Emma Pickett: bit braver about the topic.

Yeah. Braver is a good word. I think that's, that's really important. And I, and I also think it's, no, you can't go on your phone right now. No. Your phone has to be kept in this room. You've already done it for two hours. No, stop. That's the very end of the conversation. I mean, that's the last, you know, the, the last floodgate as it were.

I mean, it's, you know, if you've, if that's not phone safety in the home, that's not talking to your child about phones. Um, you know, if you've got to that point, all the stuff that should have happened before hasn't been happening. Um, and if you, and if that's where you are, okay, let's acknowledge that.

That's okay. Don't feel, you know, that's, as you say that it's that we're busy, we work. That's what happens. But you have to, I think you have to have much more overt conversations. You must talk about why you are worried. You must talk, as I said about the algorithms thing and the body image stuff, and just be really explicit about what the problem is.

Mm, yeah. Um, if you're worried about bullying, you talk about that. If you're, you know, if you're worried about sexual content, you talk about that and you explain what the problems are. Yeah. But it can't simply be, phones are bad, screens are bad. They, therefore, we don't want them, they're not healthy. We don't use them because that's where their friends are.

That's literally where they're, what's happening to work out what they're doing on the weekend. Yeah. So it, when we demonize it, it just literally doesn't make sense to them. We, we, we we're lying. This is not a bad thing. I, this is how I learn about my cool hobby, you know, when I, and so how can you tell me this is evil?

[00:17:24] Tara Ghosh: Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

[00:17:24] Emma Pickett: Any blanket message I think is dangerous. I think we have to be more sophisticated about it. But I definitely agree with you. It's gotta start with modeling. I mean, the messaging we are giving 3, 4, 5 year olds when we're on our phones sitting in the park. We're all stressed, we're all tired.

But if you're using your phone to, to chill, you need to reflect on what messaging that's giving to your child. And, and you know, being able to put your phone down I think is such a powerful thing to do when you're with your child. 

[00:17:51] Tara Ghosh: Yeah. And it, it can't be that every time you go to the park you bring your phone 'cause you wanna get a photo of your kid.

Like, we have to think how many photos on the swings do we need? You know, you can literally just leave your phone just one time, leave it in a drawer. You will feel naked a little bit as you go to the park, but actually your spiels can be a bit freeing. And then going for the older kids, one thing that I would encourage, again, I love the thing you're talking about, the all the conversations, A great conversation starter is watching a lot of those programs.

Obviously many people may have watched adolescence. There's swipes is a Channel four documentary and then, oh, it's gone out my head now. The Netflix documentary that was done, that was, that's a little bit older now, maybe about five years old. It'll come back to me in a minute. But those kind of things that you can watch with your team.

I'd say depending where your kid is at, like 13, 14 upwards, you can watch those things with them and it gets a great conversation starter to be like, okay, what happened there? This is how the algorithm works. This is what's getting pushed to you. So yeah, I think it's all about the having those conversations and being open to them as well.

[00:18:49] Emma Pickett: I want to tell you about my brand new book called The Story of Jesse's Milky. It's a picture book for two to six year olds, and I wanted to write a book that was about weaning, but also not about weaning, because breastfeeding journeys end in all sorts of different ways. So Jesse's story is presented as having three possible endings.

In one ending, his mom is pregnant and Jesse's going to share his milk with a new baby. In the second, his mom is getting really tired and it's time for some mother led weaning. And in the third, we see a self weaning journey as Jesse's attachment to breastfeeding gradually fades. There are beautiful illustrations by the very talented Jojo Ford, and the feedback from parents so far has been so lovely and touching and I'm really excited to share the book with you.

If you're interested in my other books for Older Children, I have the Breast book, which is a guide for nine to 14 year olds, and it's a puberty book that puts the emphasis on breasts, which I think is very much needed. And I also have two books about supporting breastfeeding beyond six months and supporting the transition from breastfeeding for a 10% discount on the last two.

Go to Jessica Kingsley Press. That's uk.jkp.com and use the code. Mm PE 10 Makes milk picket Emma 10. Okay, let's talk about periods. Yes. So I know in your period ready workshop you are talking to children as young as eight and I've, it's interesting how some parents are like eight Really isn't that young?

No. Um, you know, I was a year six teacher and we'd had lots of children who'd had their periods for a while in year six. Mm-hmm. It's not an unusual age for periods to start, and I think some parents are a bit shocked to hear that. We know that periods are starting younger for in this generation. Do we know why that's happening?

[00:20:36] Tara Ghosh: Like anything related to women's health, we don't know. There's not enough research, so we dunno exactly why, but I can share some of the factors that we believe is, um, linked to that. There is theories about the rising obesity levels and also environmental influences, um, endocrine disrupting chemicals.

And also psychological stress. So I can kind of talk about the kind of different factors and how they work. 

[00:20:58] Emma Pickett: Gosh, that stress bit's hard. So, so when you're talking about obesity levels, when we've got more fat on our bodies, fat produces estrogen. Correct. And that's what triggers the, the process. 

[00:21:08] Tara Ghosh: It is that, but it's also, um, I, I listen to fantastic podcast.

The theory is that our body just thinks, oh, she must be 15, she's at this much food. She's had enough nourishment that she must be this age basically is a summary of it because it would be that we would generally not have had as highly processed food. And it was, you know, I think a hundred years ago that we were getting our periods about the age 15, 16.

Um, and now we know that's down. I think, well, about 20 years ago it was about 12 and a half, and now it's just under 12, like 11 years, nine months or something like that is the statistics is the average age of getting your period. And so the theory is that you have had enough calories that your pituitary gland says, oh, this, this person is nourished enough.

They should be able to have a baby, basically. Which I know is completely bonkers when we're talking about an 8-year-old, 9-year-old, 10-year-old getting their period, or even frankly like a 15-year-old getting a period as well. But also, you are absolutely right. Your fat cells produce estrogen and so that's another indicator of your body producing enough to think, okay, yeah, there's estro in my system, right, that's gonna prepare the line in my womb and therefore I can have a period.

We also know that during COVID, that there was a study that came out of Italy that showed with decreased physical activity and also increased stress and screen time that girls were getting their periods much earlier. So we know that's kind of a psychological stress element to that. We know that often girls of color and also at lower income, uh, families get their periods sooner as well.

And that is a, a, a possible link to also that psychological stress that could be there 

[00:22:51] Emma Pickett: from sort of Mike Microaggressions. Microaggressions. And yeah. Gosh, that's, that's really tough for a family to hear, isn't it? It's a 

[00:22:57] Tara Ghosh: social justice issue. Right. And actually, apologies, I should have started when you asked me that question.

That we need to have. Again, there's nothing we've done wrong. If your daughter got her period at eight, there's nothing you did wrong. If your, if your daughter got a period at 10, like there is nothing, there's nothing good or bad. Yeah. 

[00:23:12] Emma Pickett: That's, that's helpful to say. 'cause I think some people are like, oh my God, my daughter's got my period at eight.

Does that mean Yeah. Does that mean we had a stressful home environment? Does that mean they they weren't, weren't, I mean, I happen to know a little person who did get their period at eight Yeah. And wasn't overweight and didn't have particular stress in their lives. And so there's, there's so many factors that are going on there.

There are so many 

[00:23:30] Tara Ghosh: factors and so what I've described there, the obesity, the stress, and the endocrine disrupting. That doesn't mean that's why your child had that. And that also isn't, is not, this isn't an individual thing. This is actually more of a collective issue, especially when we're talking about endocrine disrupting chemicals.

This isn't something you did, it's something that is happening in the world generally, and we are all genetically individual. Like something that affects you and affects me are gonna affect us differently. So we are all very different. And it also, so like to refer to genetics, it, it. Can be led to where your mother's line got their period.

Well, it could be like, well your mom also got her period at eight or the grandmother did. So it can be, there's a disposition there to get the periods earlier, but they can be those factors as well that I discussed. But we don't have enough studies into it. And does it matter if you get your period earlier?

Well, there's a couple of things the most practically, and I wondered as a teacher how you found this as well, Emma is they're not generally emotionally and practically prepared for what dealing with a period is just like man remembering to change their products or that that involves can just be a bit too much for a kid that age.

They should be not worrying about those sort of things. I know as well the products are often if they're, uh, quite. Small children, the products are usually quite big for their underwear. Like that's just practically uncomfortable as well. And then on kind of a more serious note, and again, I don't mean to alarm people, but there is an increased risk of breast cancer in relation to when you get your period.

It isn't that large. It's not, I'm not saying it's a huge increase, but that there is a factor as well. And that's just because we have estrogen in our body for longer. You know what I mean? So, yeah. You've, you've had it start at eight rather than starting at 12. 

[00:25:06] Emma Pickett: Okay. In the same way that breastfeeding reduces your risk.

Yeah. Because estrogen is removed from your body for longer. Yes. Yeah, so I used to teach year six in central London. Mm-hmm. And we had girls who didn't know anything about periods when their periods began. 

[00:25:19] Tara Ghosh: I was about to say that as well. I think this started something like a quarter of girls get their period without knowing what a period is still.

I mean, 

[00:25:25] Emma Pickett: I'm, I'm not sure that would happen necessarily today as much, but this is, you know, this is, I was, you know, started teaching, you know, 25 odd years ago and it was not uncommon for a little girl to suddenly be very, very, very sad in the middle of the day and for me to not know what was going on, but to have a guess.

And, um, yeah, I mean, I have one particular little person in my head who was incredibly scared and distressed. Mm-hmm. Um, so yeah, we need to have these conversations and we need to have 'em sooner than we might expect. Yeah. Because that's a trauma that never leaves somebody, um, thinking I am dying. Um, it's not of anything you want in a fire, eight, nine, 10-year-old to experience.

I mean, what conversations would you love families to be having about periods even before the age of eight? Let's put your workshops aside in a minute. I'll ask you a bit more about those in a second. But just in a home environment, what would you like parents to be talking to their children about? When it comes to periods, 

[00:26:17] Tara Ghosh: and that's the thing, we often don't want to have those conversations, first of all.

So we also kind of just reflect inwards, you know, that's okay to feel uncomfortable talking about this 'cause we haven't had this model to us, Emma. This is new. This is, we're breaking new ground by doing this, so it's okay for it to feel a little bit like, oh, what do I say? What do I do? The best thing to remember is it's not just one big talk.

We don't need to psych ourselves up and have the right information. 

[00:26:40] Emma Pickett: Oh yeah. Get the notebooks out. My mom drawing a picture of a, of a fallopian tube sitting on my mean, bless my mom. She's lovely. But she definitely thought the one conversation was the way you do it. And I remember, I remember it very clearly, but you're right, it's, it's the drip, drip, drip.

It's the, you know, go in the supermarket and get my, get my pads for me. Do you remember what my pads look like? Can you go and choose them from the supermarket? I mean yeah, 

[00:27:03] Tara Ghosh: it's exactly that. It's those little mini micro conversations. Exactly that I was gonna say that when you're in the supermarket together or when you hear menopause discussed on the radio, just these small things and it really relaxed just off the cuff way.

So your kid feels comfortable talking to you about periods and bodies and they know that you are not gonna squirm, that you know that you are good one. Be okay with it. And ideally we need to be talking to this, to both boys and girls. You've mentioned that at the beginning because your son is going to be involved with women in whatever lives, whether you as a mother, siblings, girlfriend, work, colleagues, you know, we all need to be talking about this just so that there is no shame attached.

You know, and one thing, inevitably, you know, and I, I'll, I'll share my own story. Before I had this language, Emma, every time my daughter would try, it just seemed like a, a magnet every time I was changing my tampon that my daughter would try and walk in and I would just like put my arm up and like, no, wait a second.

Obviously we had a very open door pos toilet policy in our house. Like people would come and go, but suddenly I was like shutting the door and I No, no, no, no, no. 'cause I just didn't have the language. So that's why I'm really passionate about sharing that language you can use so that you feel confident when they walk in.

And what I would say is it just, oh, you know, yeah, mommy's on a period. It happens every month or so. And when they come in they're like, oh, okay, what's a period? And the way that I describe it is just to say, oh, you know what? Every um, every month my body, uh, produces an egg. And just in case that egg becomes a baby, my um, my body makes a nest a little bit.

Like if you're having a sleepover and you've got all your squish meows together and all your blankets and got a really comfy area. And then when I don't have a baby, then my body has to get rid of that nest and it comes out as red liquid into my underwear. And they're usually like, alright, no problem.

And they just nick off and don't wanna talk about it again. So just having something like that in the locker to say. But also just to say if you've been in that situation, your kids asked that question before and you didn't know what to say, or you, or like me, you made up a, I dunno what I said, I just made up blah, blah, you know, cut myself or, and I didn't, I didn't know what to say, Emma.

I didn't know what to say. It's okay. You can revisit that. You can go back and say, actually I, there's something else I wanna share with you when you feel confident to, and if they ever ask you a question that you don't feel confident about, you could just say, I dunno how to answer that right now. Can we talk about that later?

Or can we talk about that tomorrow? Or, you know, people who've been in my workshop, mums will often be like, I'm not too sure the answer. I'm gonna check with Tara and then I, and then me and Tara come back to you just to give them a bit of a breath, a little bit of a space so that they can get their thoughts together.

[00:29:28] Emma Pickett: Yeah. 

[00:29:29] Tara Ghosh: And many people are worried that if they talk about periods to kids, you know, a younger age, that they have to talk about sex, that periods equals having to talk about how you make a baby. And I, I totally disagree. I think we can use that analogy. Body makes an egg every month, makes a nest, and then the nest gets cleared out and that's what happens.

[00:29:46] Emma Pickett: Yeah. And, and. Avoiding messages of disgust, I think is a really big one. It's not yuck and blah, and it's uh, you know, and everyone in the home goes down that road as well. It's not something yucky. Um, one of my most proud parenting moments, and I'm not gonna invade her privacy too much, but I'll just mention this.

When my daughter started her period, one of the very first things she said to me was. Great. That means I can have babies one, one day when I want to have babies, that means my body's working. And that was, that was really special. 'cause it meant we'd, we'd had the right conversations as we went. So, so, you know, it was a bit, a bit, wow, look mommy, I think this is happening.

This is what, you know, is this what we talked about? I think this is my first period. But then, but then the next thing was, so my body's working. Great. That's, that's great. 'cause I do want kids one day. I'm not saying every child at this age knows when they want kids, but that was lovely. Mm-hmm. What, tell me a bit more about your period workshops.

So it's, it's children and parents as well. 

[00:30:36] Tara Ghosh: Yeah, I do them in person, in and around London and then I do them online as well. I lived in Asia for 10 years and so I've had people join from all around the world that I know, um, to onto these things that can be anywhere in the world that I do them. And that we cover the same things we talk about.

Basically your anatomy, what makes a period. That bit. I always find, depending on the age of the group, can be the kind of giggly like, oh my God, she just said the word pubes. Oh my God. Oh, she's, that is, that's the kind of bit, you know, where we're talking about body odor and change your body and just what actually the mechanics of what's happening.

That is your brain that tells you ovaries to grow, the eggs, all those things. And then that's the first bit. And then the second bit we talk, talk about products. So the external products like period pants and pads and swimsuits that can catch the blood. And then internal products. So for the external products, like we have a right l we, you know, I always like to say we safely cloth.

There's a clearly, but we put pair of clean pants, non unused pants around like sit on the edge of a seat, put them, pull them up to our knees, and then practice putting a pad on. Both a washable one and then we try a reasonable one and how we'd unfold, fold that all up. And how we put that away. We obviously put a tampon in water 'cause why not?

That's funny. Or they know. Explain that that's not, that's not what that looks like, you know? But just to run, to understand like we just do the applicator and then we get a period ready kit together so they know what's have in their school bag. And then the third part of the um, session is we talk about how we're cyclical, how it's normal to have different energy, mood, hunger, sleep needs through your menstrual cycle 'cause of your natural changing hormones.

And the ways we can look after ourselves. Because really to have a healthy period is to have a healthy body. So, you know, just the real foundations of sleep pooing and you know, joy. And we talk about different things we can do to support that. And then the last part is the moms join, whether that's an online session or in person.

And then we share period stories. So just to normalize it, to talk about, you know, I share the story that, you know, I went to my kids' school. We're in a white pair of trousers for parent-teacher conference and we know where that ends. You know, I, at that point, my kid was with me, she was eight at the school where I actually came with me for that.

And then I was like, can you just stand behind me while we wait for the taxi? You know? And I just about, and then people say stories about when they went to stay at their boyfriend's house the first time and let all over the bed just things are gonna happen and we just do it in a really relaxed setting, um, so that the moms can just demystify it and they can see, oh, that happened to my mom.

Well that happened to my mom's friend, or my friend's mom. So that conversation can happen. So I think that's a really lovely way for them to feel prepared. And I have such lovely feedback. You know, I'll be completely honest, Emma, not many kids are like, oh, I want to go and hang out with a stranger and talk about my periods and puberty.

None, none of 'em are, but they get really good goody bag and uh, they know there's gonna be cake at the end of it. So, you know, got a bookend it with some bit of joy. But all of them love it. I've only had hell, 

[00:33:21] Emma Pickett: they do positive things. It's so fun. What I mean, just so amazing to be in a room with a bunch of other girls practicing, putting on pads.

What a great experience that is. I can just imagine totally how positive that is. I mean, products have really changed since, you know, when we first, first had our periods. I mean, we're not quite the belt generation, which is, uh, we're a little bit younger than that. Yeah. Um, but, but I mean, period pants are such an amazing thing, aren't they?

I mean, what do, when you talk about getting this pack for school Yeah. Let's talk about that a little bit more. Yeah. I mean, if someone's got a sort of seven, 8-year-old Yeah. That they might want to start thinking about what that pack would look like, what do you normally recommend? 

[00:33:59] Tara Ghosh: I'd say for the first, I'll talk about the first few cycles and then I'll talk about the, the pack pack because that kind of relates to it.

I, a period pants are phenomenal and I'm a massive fan of those, and I really do advocate them. And I love a brand called Nixy Body. They're just brilliant. There's many, many other, uh, brands out there, but I would suggest using pads for the first little while because it lets the kids see how much blood there is, how often they have to change it.

Often the pants, obviously you need to take them completely on and off. They kind of don't realize how often they need to change those. Yeah, that's a good point. 

[00:34:33] Emma Pickett: And they're often black as well. And you can't, literally can't see 

[00:34:35] Tara Ghosh: exactly. So I just think for the first few periods. So with that in mind, the pack that I would suggest would be some sort of water.

It can be like, um, you know, a makeup bag. It can be whatever, a waterproof bag of some sort. I say waterproof 'cause some crap is gonna get into their kids' school bag at some point. So just to keep it good. And then a pair of clean pants, some wet wipes and a pad, a couple of pads. And I always put something nice in there, like a little sweet tea or like an essential oil roller ball, something nice so that when they're, everything happens, they can have a little sweet or like smell something nice just so it makes it feel a little bit special.

And I think it's a lovely thing to prepare with your daughter. Obviously you can prepare it for them and say, look what I've done. But it, it gauges them with them and say, okay, what, what should we use this old wash bag? Okay we use, and then, you know, okay, you get a pair of knickers and we can get it all together.

Just feels like then they know they're prepared. And I would have that, we can talk a bit about what the signs are that you might get your period so that then that can gauge when people wanna start having that. 

[00:35:29] Emma Pickett: Yeah, let's talk about that in the section when we Yeah. 

[00:35:31] Tara Ghosh: When we're talking 

[00:35:32] Emma Pickett: to young 

[00:35:32] Tara Ghosh: people.

[00:35:32] Emma Pickett: Yes. Um, so there always, there'll be some clues when that, when that's imminent. Exactly. And then it, you talked about pads being often too big, so mm-hmm. I mean, guess early periods, quantities of blood are quite small, so you could get away with almost a panty liner type pad, presumably. Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:35:46] Tara Ghosh: So, you know, that's only if they're really, I'd say if the kid is getting their period at 12 onwards, the usual period pads are kind of good size for them.

But if they're getting their period more at eight, nine, and they're actually just very narrow, you know, narrow hip, often the period pads can feel a bit bigger. You can find narrow ones. Uh, but yeah, a pantyliner can usually be very helpful for that. For the first, and it should be for the first couple of periods are generally quite lightish.

Um, and then, yeah, then they can get heavier as well. 

[00:36:16] Emma Pickett: Okay. So. One thing I think that is really important to talk about is that periods that aren't just about what's happening to your womb. Yeah. Periods are also breast development as well. And, and, and you know, if your periods are happening, your breasts are changing.

You very kindly mentioned my book, the Breast Book. I know when you're doing your, your workshop, which I really appreciate or she's waving a copy of it at me. She's not lying. Um, and you know, when I wrote that book, I wrote it because so much puberty education just ignored breasts. And I saw that as a year six teacher who did a lot of sex education and puberty education with my classes.

You know, there might be two lines on and your breasts will grow and your breasts will grow. And one day you might feed a baby and you might have nipples. I mean, I mean, but, but just nothing. I mean, really, it was incredibly weird how little mention to of breasts there were. And then when the PSHE curriculum came out a few years ago, nothing about breast development.

So I, so I wrote the book to sort of fill that gap and, and link up what breasts are and what they're for and how they grow and how they development, how they develop. Because breast development is often one of the first things that girls notice. Yes. Um, when their bodies are changing. Talk us through some of those early signs of breast development.

What, what do you talk about when you're with talking to young people? 

[00:37:24] Tara Ghosh: You are absolutely right. It's one of the first signs of puberty, usually about two to about two and a half years before they get their period. There'll be some sort of development there. So, and they can really start boobs or breast buds can start anytime from the age of about eight.

Um, it often starts with a hard lump behind the nipple, and I know I've had young girls who thought they've got breast cancer because they just, oh gosh. 

[00:37:45] Emma Pickett: I had that conversation lots when I was, when I was researching the book and I talked to adults about their breasts development and interviewed people.

Quite a few people said to me that they remember having a horrifying few weeks of thinking they had breast cancer because we don't talk about breast development. The phrase breast buds is just not something that's ever mentioned. Yeah. We have lots of conversations around breast checking and, and cancer and, and lumps being cancer.

Yeah. Yeah. So, so many little 8, 9, 10 year olds think, oh my God, I've got breast cancer. When am I gonna start to tell people I'm gonna die? Yeah. So this is why. So I'm born down these conversations. Totally, 

[00:38:20] Tara Ghosh: totally. You know, and again, I didn't know this until, you know, I'd had breast buds and all of that. I didn't know this until I started getting into this space.

And obviously then supporting my two girls through it as well. You know, you have that lump behind the nipple and then the breast buds can also be tingly. They can be itchy, they can be achy, totally normal. One of the things they find if a kid used to sleep on their front, they can't do that anymore. So they find that very annoying.

So just to kind of acknowledge that, that is very annoying. Yeah. Then after you've had those breast buds, then um, your breast will start growing with more fat tissue and more milk glands, and their boobs can be slightly cone shaped as well for a little while. Then your areola, the dark area around your nipples will get bigger puffier and then eventually darker.

You know, throughout your teen years, more than any time in your life, your breast size difference is more noticeable. So as I, I think I said when we first met Emma, like I love telling young girls, but also telling the mothers that, you know, your boobs are sisters. They are not twins. Now we have this, again, this illusion from the media, because if you were to look at any bra advert or any picture of a woman, frankly, because we wear brass, which make our boobs look more symmetrical through our clothing.

We think our boobs should be the same, but they're not. They can, the nipples can be pointed different ways, all sorts of things. 

[00:39:35] Emma Pickett: Yep. Yeah. We know that from breastfeeding support we'll have different flange sizes and different levels of production and it's Yeah, absolutely. All of that. Not twins. A hundred percent.

I think lots of people don't realize how breast development happens during periods. Yes. So, you know, you get your estrogen coming along at the first half of your cycle. Yeah. You get the progesterone coming along at the second half of your cycle, and they've got different jobs to do. And the estrogen's developing your milk ducts and the progesterone's developing, you know, the ends of milk ducts and the actual milk producing glands.

And, and that tenderness is normal. And one of the, my favorite bits of feedback from a reader of the breast book mm-hmm. Was a mom who wrote to me and said, oh my God, we, we've just had this amazing thing happen at home. My daughter was playing with my, with her husband, with, sorry, with her, you know her dad?

Yeah. The husband or the person who wrote to me, they were dancing and mucking around in the kitchen. And my daughter said to my husband, actually, I'm a bit tender at the moment, dad, 'cause I've, I've got, my breast buds are a bit sore. And the dad was like, cool. No problem. Um, and the fact that the girl was able to say that was such confidence.

Yeah. And this mum was writing to me going, oh my God, if I could have done that when I was her age, you know, what a different person I might have been. And, and thank you for the breast book because of that. Um, that was, that was, that was really sweet. 

[00:40:43] Tara Ghosh: Oh, that's so sweet. Just that so sweet. That 

[00:40:45] Emma Pickett: honesty and that knowledge and that confidence.

And I know how my bodies work and I feel good about that. I mean, the thing about breast cancer and lumps, I don't know how to. Have that conversation with very young children. Mm-hmm. I mean, obviously you can get breast cancer at any age. Yeah. It's not going to be likely, uh, you know, for a 10, 11, or a year old.

Mm-hmm. Do you talk about breast checks in your sessions? 

[00:41:08] Tara Ghosh: Absolutely. We keep it really light, to be honest. Very light. Just to say, you know, we, um, I, I just say, has anyone heard of breast cancer? And they often, many have unfortunately already heard about it through a family member or different things in their community.

But we just, I just talk about checking our boobs every month to make sure that they stay healthy. You know, we look at the color, the texture of the skin. What's happened to your nipple? I draw the analogy that we, you know, we brush our teeth every day, often opposite a mirror, right? So we're seeing our face every day, but we don't really give much attention to our boobs.

So it's just that, you know, you're having a daily, 3, 6, 5 days of the year, you are checking out your skin and seeing what that looks like. But we don't really, so just given it 12 times a month, so 12 times a year, once a month, just check our boobs really isn't much effort. But I also share, which obviously gets them quite giggly depending on the age, um, is that we should also be doing the same to our vulva.

Um, and not many women know that, that, you know, you can get vulva cancer and we just need to be checking, uh, in between our legs. Um, so that's something that we, I encourage the girls to do. Check your vulva and your boobs every month. 

[00:42:09] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Great. Uh, yeah, vulva cancer is not ever getting the conversation, is it?

No, they're not vulva cancer charities that are getting the a, you know, the same amount of press that, that the breast cancer charities do. Totally. And it's much, 

[00:42:20] Tara Ghosh: it's much less common, but I think that's also, you know, we need to start looking after that area as well. 

[00:42:25] Emma Pickett: Yeah. 

[00:42:26] Tara Ghosh: And I just wanted to go back on one thing with the breast size, it is much more noticeable.

So you, you know, I was saying that their sister's not twins that. Difference between your breasts is much more significant during your teen years for whatever reason. Maybe one grows more. And I think it is, it's more common for your left boob to be smaller. I dunno why that is, but we, when we don't, yeah, 

[00:42:45] Emma Pickett: I mean, I think one theory is that your, it's to do with blood flow and where Yeah.

And positions of major arteries, who knows? But yeah, there's, there are interesting things that happen during, during, um, breastfeeding as well where we tend to be more asymmetrical. 

[00:42:59] Tara Ghosh: Oh, interesting. And just also to mention that it's really common for, um, to get stretch marks on your boobs. And I don't think we talk about that enough.

Um, I got really shamed for getting stretch marks, and I've already said to a girlfriend when I was like, 12 or 13, oh, I've got these stretch marks on my thighs. And she was like, that's disgusting. Only pregnant people get stretch marks. Oh no. And honestly, that stayed me for a long, long time. For a long time.

Just very, you know, in the back of my mind. So again, I share with girls through my workshops and in my school workshops, getting stretch marks on your boobs or on your thighs. Totally normal or in your tummy. And that's just part of life. And they often fade as you get older as well. 

[00:43:36] Emma Pickett: Thanks for sharing that.

I think, um, I think one thing that we have to kind of acknowledge is that when people get their breasts it is, it's a bit scary. Yeah. We're kind of entering the world of sexiness. Mm-hmm. And that's frightening. I mean, that's super frightening if you are young. But it's frightening at any age really in some ways.

I mean, it's, I guess frightening is a weird word 'cause it should be wonderful and super and empowering and yay, I'm enter entering the world of being attractive. But sadly, we live in a world where the male gaze is not always comfortable and people are seeing you differently and perceiving you differently.

But then we also have this kind of, uh, are you there? God, it's me, Margaret Vibe. And this is a book which I think is still being read today. And there was a film out not so long ago of wanting breasts to come. And it seems like there's these polls of, oh no, I don't really want breasts. And I, I did do a workshop when I was first putting out the breast book.

I remember one girl in the workshop saying, oh, I don't want my breasts to come. I don't want them to change. And her mom looking at her like, oh my god. Really? Kind of frightened of Oh my God, how do I have this conversation? I dunno how to have this conversation. Um, but then we've also got the people going, oh God, where am I?

Everyone else has got theirs. Where am I? Yes, yes. Where are the girls that you talk to on that kind of spectrum? 

[00:44:43] Tara Ghosh: Yeah, that's such a great question and really as varied as you described. You know, it's such a mix. Some cannot wait to have boobs, you know, they, um, but wear crop tops already when they have absolutely nothing.

They don't really have breast buzz, whereas others don't want 'em to arrive at all, you know, and we need to give a lot of love to both sides of that because there's anxiety can, can appear and really we are all so individual, you know, breast development can start any time between the age of eight and 13.

So that's a huge amount of time where you might have one friend who has. Massive boobs and you've got nothing still. And that can be hard. You know, some want bigger boobs than they've got. Want someone want smaller boobs. We know that if we just ask our girlfriends how they feel about their boobs, right?

So there is a huge variations. It depends where they're at. And mostly like anything you want, what you don't have. 

[00:45:36] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Yep. That sounds familiar. And, and, and I guess the same person can feel differently week by week. You know, the same person one day can feel super sexy and let's get my crop top out and the next, next week they're like, oh no, I don't want to be looked at this week.

Yeah. You know, can fluctuate from one to the other. Um, yeah. We're complex people, aren't we? We're complex people. Okay. Let's do a little bit now where we're gonna talk directly to young people. So if I could write some theme music for this bit, I would. So my plan is if you're a parent listening to this and you've got a child who's in this age bracket, the sort of 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, you know, into early teens.

You might say, listen, I've got this really cheesy thing for you to listen to. I'm not gonna stay with you while I play it. Just have a listen to this bit of this podcast. See what you think these two women are talking about, body changes. Maybe that will spark further conversation. Um, you know, you might say to them if you've got any other further questions.

Um, so this little bit of the podcast now, and we'll put in the show notes when this time starts, is us talking directly to young people. Are you ready? We don't have to put voices on. We go let, let's do it.

So, if you are a young person and your mom or parent slash carer has suggested you listen to this bit of the podcast, thank you very much for joining us. Mm-hmm. We're just gonna take a few minutes of your time. We've got me, my name's Emma. I help families with breastfeeding and I've written a book about breasts.

And breast development. And Tara, do you want to introduce yourself? 

[00:47:08] Tara Ghosh: Yeah. Hi, my name's Tara. I'm a woman's hormone health coach, and I'm really passionate about supporting young people, understand their bodies and feel confident about their periods right from the get go. 

[00:47:18] Emma Pickett: Yep. So we're just gonna take a few minutes to talk about some of the body changes that happen as people get older and answer some questions that we often get from young people at this point.

So let's start with question number one. I'm gonna ask you to do this one first. Tara, what's the best thing about puberty and your body changing? I think the best 

[00:47:37] Tara Ghosh: thing is just that all the exciting things can happen as you get older. When you look at pictures of yourself as a baby and you look at, look at yourself now in the mirror, like, isn't it fantastic?

All the great things you've experienced during that time? And then if you look at your mom or the other caregivers in your, uh, life, you know, you're gonna kind of grow up to be kind of their size and just how everything keeps on changing and that you can share that with a lot of people as well. That that isn't just you.

This is like something that all of humanity is going through. All these different changes that are happening to you. 

[00:48:06] Emma Pickett: Yep. That's a good way of saying it. You are entering the world of, of exciting opportunities and, and relationships one day and connections to other people. And you might want to have a family yourself one day and, and your body getting ready for all those adult things is, is exciting.

Doesn't mean it's not scary to, and there are some things that people get a little bit nervous about. What are some of the things that the people you took to. Tara feeling a little bit more nervous about. 

[00:48:32] Tara Ghosh: I think it's the unknown. The young people I work with say, I'm totally fine with all this, but if I could just have a little calendar when I know it'll start and stop, then I'm totally on board.

But the unknown ness, like when exactly will my boobs stop growing, start growing, and stop growing? When exactly will my start? You know, all of those things can just feel just a little bit out of your control. And so I hope what we can share today can make you feel you have more control and, uh, a little bit less anxious about these things.

[00:49:01] Emma Pickett: Yeah. Wouldn't it be great if a timer went off that said, today you're gonna have your first period. Yeah. It's gonna be about 10 o'clock in the morning, so nip out to the toilet and that'll be, you'll all be sorted. That would be nice and easy. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Good news is as time goes on, you do actually start to know mm-hmm.

When your period is gonna happen. And adult women do know, oh, Saturday's probably when I'll expect my period. You actually can't get to that point. Yeah. But, but the first one is a little bit mysterious and, and then there's a bit scary. How do you know when you're going to get your period for the first time?

Are there any clues that will tell you your, your period's going to come? Yeah, so our body 

[00:49:34] Tara Ghosh: does give us clues, Emma, and there's a little rhyme that we use, which is boobs, pubes, grow and flow. So really your boob development is, uh, one of the first signs of puberty, starts about two to two and a half years before you get your period.

Uh, and then you have hair growth that often starts with hair on your, uh, arms and legs getting thicker and darker. And then you may notice hair in your pubic area and underarms. This hair is fine at first and then goes thicker and coarser really normal for the hair to go down your thighs really normal at all.

Um, and then a growth spurt. So often one's two years before you get your period, you will have a very large growth spurt. Say you'll grow about four. You mean getting 

[00:50:13] Emma Pickett: taller? 

[00:50:13] Tara Ghosh: Correct. Getting okay. Yeah. So about growing about four inches or about 10 centimeters often that one year or two years before you get your period.

Um, you also build up more fat, particularly in your breasts, around your hips and thigh. Totally healthy, very normal to get stretch marks as well as your body is growing again, totally normal and healthy. And then often then your period will arrive. Okay? But like we have mentioned, you dunno exactly when that will happen.

One of the things that can happen also, so you have that rhyme, boobs, pubes, grow and flow. Uh, but other things that can be an indicator is often your hair and skin become oilier and maybe you have small breakouts and then cervical fluid. This is the, um, you know, we're all know that we might get a red liquid in our underwear sometime called our period, but we often get this kind of white or yellow stains in our underwear that's called cervical fluid.

It's basically your vagina cleaning itself, totally normal. And those can start about six months to two years before you get your period. And often in the weeks leading up to your first period, you might notice that there's more of it. So that's also something to have a look on. 

[00:51:13] Emma Pickett: So moisture in your pants.

Yeah. Super normal. Yeah. And you talk about cervical fluids. Yeah. So the cervix is obviously right at the top of your vagina and, and that's where the fluid is, is happening. But it will come down through your vagina, onto your pants and very, very normal to have that as an adult woman. You have that throughout your, your life.

Potentially it might be times in your life when it happens less. Mm-hmm. So if somebody has no breast development at all. And no pubes at all. Yeah. They shouldn't go around worrying about their first period, about to arrive any second now. Absolutely. It's not gonna, it's not gonna happen that way. It can't happen.

[00:51:46] Tara Ghosh: It literally can't happen. Yeah. 

[00:51:47] Emma Pickett: So you've got a little bit of breathing space and, and, and as you say, when you do start, um, noticing your body changing, that's when it's time to kind of talk to people about, you know, what you might choose to use. And we'll talk a bit more about that maybe in a minute. So what does it feel like when you have 

[00:52:01] Tara Ghosh: your period?

This is my description, and having talked to hundreds of womens about it, they also great. It feels a little bit like you've wet yourself. I'll be completely honest. It just feels a bit wet in your underwear. So that is just really the thing that you'll realize. You're like, oh, feels a little bit wet in between my legs.

Why am I go to the toilet and see what's happened there? Then there usually is some specks of blood on your underwear. So that is kind of how it feels. Some people find some tightness 'cause basically your, your womb where the blood will be is just having to squeeze to get the blood come out of your body and to come into your underwear.

So sometimes there can be a bit of cramping or tightness, just a kind of between your belly button and your pub bone or sometimes and your lower back. But that's kind of how you feel. You have your period. Would you agree, Emma? Is that how you feel when you got your period? Yeah. No, 

[00:52:46] Emma Pickett: I think that sounds good.

I think it's also helpful to mention, you talked about specs of blood. Mm-hmm. I think some people worry that their first period, you know, is gonna be a gush and a flood and everyone's gonna see, and it's gonna be very dramatic. But your first period, it really is like tiny specs, you know, not even as big as a five P piece.

It's not that anyone sees coins these days, you know, tiny, really small amount. And it may not necessarily be red. Yes. Sometimes it's a little bit brown, which I think can frighten people and be a bit unexpected. So it really, really won't be very much, it's really, really unlikely that you'll have a large amount of blood in for the first couple of periods.

Is that a fair thing to say? 

[00:53:21] Tara Ghosh: That's right. And it's good. It's good to mention about the color. I was just about to talk about that. Um, I've had a lot of young girls think they've pooed themselves because they can see kind of a brown smudge in their underwear. So again, that's really normal for it to be kind of dark red or brown, or it could be light pink.

It could be lots of different kind of variations on that kind of red color. So any of that is very normal. 

[00:53:40] Emma Pickett: Yeah. What are some of the different ways that people catch the blood? What are some of the methods that you would recommend young people 

[00:53:47] Tara Ghosh: think about? I really recommend for young people to start with pads 'cause it's just an easier way, disposable ones, uh, that they stick to your underwear or you can use washable ones that you use like a little popper and it can clip into your undies to catch the blood.

Um, and the reason I suggest PAs is it's just an easy way to monitor how much blood flow you have for the first couple of periods. I also really love period pants again. That's just a pair of pants that has, um, a reinforced gusset so that that all sort gusset's 

[00:54:14] Emma Pickett: a good word. What's a, what's a, what's a gusset, sorry.

That 

[00:54:16] Tara Ghosh: is a fantastic word. I love that word gusset. Gusset is the. The bit of the undies that touches your vulva, so is in between your legs and would, uh, would catch the blood basically. And with both period pants and period pads that are washable, all you have to do is soak them in a bit of water and kind of ring, rinse out the, uh, period blood, and then you can put 'em in the washing machine with your brother's sport kit, your dad's shirt, or your, your school uniform.

It can be washed with everything as normal. Yeah, so it's really a good way of doing it, but not tumble dried most period pants 

[00:54:49] Emma Pickett: don't wanna go in the tumble dry. They 

[00:54:50] Tara Ghosh: do not to fix your absorbency. A good tip as well is when you've got used to having your period after a couple of months, a really good way is to wear period pants to school when you think your period might be coming so that you know you've got that security.

I've got period pants on today and they're really comfy and they look like regular pants, so no one would know any different when you get changed for sports and stuff. And then when you have your period in the morning when you leave school, you can put a pad, a disposable pad, or wash one onto your pants as you go to school.

Then at break time or lunchtime, you can just take that pad off and then you can wear the pants for the rest of the day. That's a great tip. Yeah, it's just an easier way than having to change and bring lots of products with you to school. 

[00:55:27] Emma Pickett: Yeah, that's a really good tip. 'cause period pants can actually absorb quite a lot of blood.

I mean, some grownup women that use period pants. Yeah, that's all they're using. They're not using pads at all. But changing pants in the day is a bit of a faff and you've got to work, you know, get back to your school bag to put the old ones in. So starting in the morning with the pad, taking the pad out halfway through, wearing period pants the rest of the day is a great tip.

And you mentioned about how, if you think your period will come, how often are people gonna get get their periods? 

[00:55:54] Tara Ghosh: Yeah. 

[00:55:54] Emma Pickett: So 

[00:55:55] Tara Ghosh: in those first couple of years, when you get your period, they can come any time between 21 to 45 days. So that's every three to six weeks. So that means the start of one period to the start of the next can be quite unpredictable for the first few years.

So I'd love to give you a little tip to know when your period might come. When you get your period is dictated to when you ovulate. So you ovulate and about two-ish weeks later you get your period. So our body gives us clues about when we ovulate. Um, and the biggest clue is having this stretchy liquid that comes out into our underwear, that discharge or that cervical fluid I mentioned earlier.

Um, and it looks a bit like egg whites or alleve at gel. So when we notice that when either in our undies or when we wipe ourselves when we go to the toilet, we can tell ourselves, ah, does that, does that mean I'm ovulating? Okay. Right. Let me write that on my calendar in about two-ish weeks I'm gonna get my period.

[00:56:45] Emma Pickett: Okay. Wow. That's, that's a good tip. Okay, so you wipe and it feels a little bit, almost kinda stretchy or slimy, correct. It feels, it just feels like you've got a bit more fluid. Yeah. And, and then when you touch it with your fingers, it's sort of sticky and, and stretchy and, and you say egg. Not everyone's got egg whites or uses egg whites, but I would break an egg and have a look at some egg white.

'cause that's actually quite helpful to see how it behaves. Yes. So when you see that in your pants. To roughly two weeks later is when your period may happen. So that's, that's a good tip. 

[00:57:12] Tara Ghosh: And you can start wearing your period pants at school, you know, or if you swim, you can, uh, start wearing, uh, period swimsuits as well.

So again, it looks, it's completely like a normal swimsuit, so you can just have that confidence that when you are swimming that you'd have that, um, protection. 

[00:57:26] Emma Pickett: So, period swimsuits have the absorbency thing in the gutter again. They do. And you can swim and the blood doesn't leak out all over the swimming pool.

Yeah. It stays in your swimming costume. 

[00:57:35] Tara Ghosh: This is a real, you know, a lot of people will be worried about swimming when it comes to their period, and especially 'cause it's so irregular, not knowing exactly when it's gonna come in those first few years. So, um, when you're actually in the water, the pressure of the water in your body means your blood will never come out.

It's actually when you step out of the water, whether it's the sea, the bath, or your swimming pool, that pressure is removed and therefore the blood will come out now with a period swimsuit that will catch the blood. Now it's ideally not for when you, at the start of your period, ideally for kind of lighter few days.

But what it can do is when you haven't got a period and you dunno when it's gonna come by wearing that period swimsuit, it gives you a bit more confidence that when you step out of the pool, that if you had spontaneously got your period whilst you were swimming, that it would be able to catch that blood.

Does that make sense? 

[00:58:21] Emma Pickett: Yeah, no, that makes good sense. And if you're somebody who's gonna do a lot of swimming and you're a bit older and you maybe have a heavier flow, which means more blood is coming out, there are internal things that you can put inside your vagina, which will catch blood. Yeah. That maybe we, we don't want to go into too much detail about today 'cause that's a whole other hour.

But there are ways to catch the blood inside your body that no one knows you're using and, and you know, tampons are one option or there are little cups that can catch blood as well, but you don't have to worry about those at the beginning 'cause you're not gonna be producing as much blood as that in the beginning.

Let's talk a bit about breasts. Yeah. How long does it take for breasts to grow 

[00:58:57] Tara Ghosh: breasts Start developing somewhere between the age of eight and 13. And it will can take around about three to five years for your breast to be fully developed, but for other people it can take up to 10 years. Most people's breast development stops around the age of 18, but I have many clients who said their breasts continue growing into their early twenties, and obviously your boobs will change during your lifetime too, whether you put on weight and also through pregnancy.

Uh, where your boobs may get bigger and they may stay bigger or they may get, like me, get smaller again. Postpartum and your boobs are sisters, they are not twins. Uh, it's really, really common for you to have a different size breasts and often for your left boob to be a bit smaller 

[00:59:36] Emma Pickett: or, or even sometimes you Right.

Boob a bit smaller as well. It can go, you can be asymmetrical in lots of different ways. Yes. And, and when your boobs are coming really common for them not to grow at the same rate. Absolutely. That doesn't mean that you'll look like that forever. Yeah. And also I think it's really common at the beginning for your nipples to stick out a bit more.

Yeah. Or the colored circle around your nipple, the areola to kind of stick out and be a kind of mound by itself. And people think, oh, that's not how grown up breasts normally look. Why, why is that bit sticking up? But it all evens out. It goes back to being part of your main, part of your breast as you get older.

Breast. There are so many different kinds of breasts in the world, so many different shapes and sizes, and the ones that you see on Instagram, those round ones, that's because someone's probably wearing a bra that has a kind of padded firm section that makes everyone's boobs look round. I promise if that person took their bra off, they would look pointy or saggy or droopy, or that one's bigger than that one.

You don't get to see breasts, um, very often in the world, so you may not know what they normally look like. Super normal for nipples to look different. Some nipples are long, some nipples stick in a little bit and are a little bit inverted, and that will change as you get older potentially. So much variety, and I think if you're ever worried about anything, find a grownup to talk to because we've all been through it.

We've all worried. We talked at the beginning about what are people are nervous about. I think one of the main things people are nervous about is, am I normal? Is this what it's supposed? Is this what my body's supposed to be doing? And the answer is 99.9% of the time, yes, you are absolutely normal. Mm-hmm.

Don't go through this alone. Yes. Find someone else to talk to. It might not be your mom, it might be your auntie. It might be, you know, a friend. It might be, you know, someone else, but find someone to talk to. So let's talk about acne and skin stuff. 'cause I know that's something people are often quite stressed about.

Why does our skin change as we get older and what is acne? 

[01:01:30] Tara Ghosh: Often young people can experience breakouts when they get spots or pimples because their skin is basically developed as their hormones are rising, their skin develops more oil and that often can cause breakouts as well. It's really normal to have some level of that through your teen years.

Totally normal and hopefully it's, it kind of just dies away. Just as your body is kind of getting used to those new hormones and, sorry, should say, hormones are basically just chemical messengers that go from one side of the body to another side to tell it what to do. We have a lot of those during, um, a lot higher levels during puberty, um, and then they settle down after a while.

One of the things that can really help with your skin is to make sure, um, I'm gonna talk about something that might make you cringe, but make sure that pooing every day that you having a bowel movement every day can really help, uh, look after your skin. And also making sure that we have, um, a steady blood sugar.

Now blood sugar means the amount of sugar in your blood, as the name would suggest, but we can really help that by having a protein breakfast in the morning. And I know that's not often easy because we're often running, getting up late, running out the door, or having to catch the bus to school, trying as best we can, especially at the weekends to have a savory breakfast.

So, you know, in the UK that'd be some sort of, you know, like a cooked breakfast or like eggs on toast, avocado down toast, or having porridge, but having lots of seeds and nuts or a scoop of almond butter in something like that. Things that can help your blood sugar stay even because often it's the highs and lows of our blood sugar, they're actually contributing to our acne developing as well.

[01:02:58] Emma Pickett: Okay, so the pooing every day thing? 

[01:03:00] Tara Ghosh: Yes. 

[01:03:00] Emma Pickett: Because if you're not pooing every day, your body's holding onto toxins. Is that what's happening? 

[01:03:04] Tara Ghosh: That is it. And also because basically our hormones, when they've done what they need to do in our body, they are sent to our liver to be basically turned off and then they're sent to our bowels to be pooped out.

But if we are not pooping every day, those hormones get reactivated again and they can cause higher than what we would like hormone levels. So we need to make sure that we are moving through and also just getting, as you said, all the toxins out. The things that could help us to have more regular bowel movements would be drinking more water, making sure that we are eating as many veggies as we can.

Ideally this is, this is tough, but we should try and have half our plate having veggies at least once a day. That's how much fiber we need to get our bowels moving. Also, doing a nice tummy massage clockwise to try and relax our tummy as well. Not straight after a meal, but at different times during the day.

That can also help with our bowel movements. 

[01:03:50] Emma Pickett: Okay. If your skin is distressing you and you're worried about it, again, you can talk to doctors, you can, you know, talk to grownups who can help you. You don't have to, don't have to suffer on your own. There are things that can sometimes make a difference as well.

Okay. Is there anything that we haven't talked about that you think young people really would need to hear about? I mean, this is obviously not a one off. I'm hoping this will spark further reading and further conversations. Is there anything missing from that list? 

[01:04:13] Tara Ghosh: What I would say is that our body is really clever and that we need to keep on listening inwards.

Often we look outwards for our answers, but often listening into ourselves, we can often get a lot of our answers as well. And women and people with periods are cyclical. That means our energy, our mood, our motivation, sleep needs, our hunger needs all change very naturally through that monthly cycle that we have from the start of one period to the start of the next.

So you are not crazy, you are not broken. It's really normal for us to have these different moods each week of our menstrual cycle. There can be different times that are easier for us. Sometimes they're a little bit more challenging, but we need to kind of learn to like ourselves in all these different versions of ourselves through the month and through the different parts of our cycle.

[01:04:59] Emma Pickett: Yeah. I love what you said earlier about looking for that sign of ovulation. So that's when our body's making the egg that it doesn't need and will trigger the beginning of your period happening. Someone, you know, getting used to looking at their fluid that comes outta their vagina and touching that and looking at that.

If you know when your ovulation is, you're gonna get a sense of your whole month as a sort of, it's periods are not just the bit where the blood comes out. Mm-hmm. Your, your period is a whole story with the beginning and a middle and an end and, and getting used to your body and how it changes and, oh, this is a time of month where my breasts feel a little bit tender and that's really annoying.

I can't sleep on my front, but also kind of cool 'cause maybe one day I might have a baby and want to give it, give it some milk. I mean, it's kind of cool on one level and exciting as well. Where are your favorite places to send young people if they want to do some more reading about their bodies and how their bodies change?

[01:05:47] Tara Ghosh: Oh, brilliant. Well, I have some books just beside me that I really like. I love a book, uh, called This Period In My Life by a friend, a colleague of mine, Saskia Bja. I think she's brilliant. I would suggest the breast book that you, um, have. Uh, there's also a book called Celebrate Your Body, uh, which I really like and a brilliant one called The Autism Friendly Guide to Periods.

Um, I really, I think that everyone should read this book actually. It's very practical. It shows you exactly how to put a pad on and kind of how to get rid of the pad and things like that. I think it's a really's, a fabulous visual book as well. They're some of my favorite places. Brilliant. Obviously they can come to my Instagram and if they're old enough, they have an Instagram handle, they can go and see, see that with their mom or their caregiver.

It's under Tarago and I have to share information there. 

[01:06:31] Emma Pickett: Cool. We'll put all those, those book recommendations in the show notes, which is where, wherever the podcast is, underneath that information about the podcast, we'll put this, this extra information as well. Thank you very much, Tara. Okay. Jingle, jingle.

End of Musicy bit where we're talking to young people. Thank you very much.

Maybe one person will listen to that section, Tara, but even if they didn't, maybe the adult who listened to it will get some ideas from it as well. Um, f any recommended resources for adults in this space? Obviously that those books you've just mentioned are good for them to read as well. Yeah, any extra stuff to help them have their conversations with the younger people.

[01:07:07] Tara Ghosh: I would say there's a, a very good, I'm gonna turn to my left. As I look at my bookcase, I really liked, um, Sarah Awell Smith, am I saying her right name? She's got a book called Between, so I think it's a really nice book talking about how to parent your teenager, your kind of like eight to 12-year-old. I really enjoyed that book as a parent.

I think that's a good one. And the book that I, that I shared before would be helpful resources too. 

[01:07:31] Emma Pickett: So you're quite a book person, which I respect fundamentally. 'cause that means I, my books might get read any websites that are 

[01:07:37] Tara Ghosh: worth it. That's great. That's great. Well, I'd say my website has some good blogs on there as well.

I'm gonna have to come back to you on a few websites then. Sorry, I'm very much a book person. Don't worry, don't worry. I'm, I'm 

[01:07:45] Emma Pickett: respect the fact you're a book person. We'll put the, um, we'll any, if you do come up with any, we'll put 'em in the show notes. Great. And they'll be there if there's a nun there.

She couldn't think of any other ones. People, thank you so much for your time today, Tara. I just, I'm aware that we could have 10 hours talking about all this stuff 'cause it's so important. And if we get these conversations right, we will have girls and women and people going out into the world feeling good about their bodies and, and then they become parents and they feel good about their breasts and their breastfeeding journey.

And we just wanna join those dots. Um, for lots and lots of different reasons, not just about breastfeeding, obviously I'm not of complete one trick pony. Um, I want people to feel good about their bodies generally and not be frightened. Yeah. Um, yeah. And, and just speaking as a perspective of a primary school teacher, if someone works with young people, you know, you may not feel it's your right to instigate these conversations, but you need to have stuff in your resources.

You need to have period products around. You need to be comfortable having these conversations. 'cause one day you might be the person who meets the girl who's had her first period and didn't know she was gonna have it. And, um, so, you know, you need to have some supplies for you as well. Hmm. Is there anything we haven't talked about that you think we should cover?

Nope. I think we've covered 

[01:08:57] Tara Ghosh: everything. I think the, the one takeaway as well, I'd love people to share is that when. There is a period challenge, whether that is through the teenage years or later in your life as well. Painful, heavy periods, uh, irregular periods. PMS, that's off the charts. We have normalized all of those things in our society, but they are kind of red flags.

They're, they're things showing that of your body needs a little bit of attention. There's lots and lots of natural things you can do to improve your moods, to improve your periods. Um, so I just want people to know that there's lots of resources out there. I have a lot on my website, but there's lots of natural ways we can support our menstrual health.

Our period and our menstrual cycle, uh, is our fifth vital sign. So just like our temperature was so high or our, our heart was racing or our blood pressure was really low, we would think, oh, geez, I better look into that. Like, that's not good. When our period is not on track, if we, it's disrupting our moods or our periods are disrupting our daily life, that means we need to look into that as well.

We need to give the attention. We often dismiss it, but we need to give that attention. 

[01:09:59] Emma Pickett: Okay. Thank you very much for that. Thanks for your time today. 

[01:10:02] Tara Ghosh: Thank you for 

[01:10:03] Emma Pickett: having me, Emma. Great chatting.

Thank you for joining me today. You can find me on Instagram at Emma Pickett Ibclc and on Twitter at Makes milk. It would be lovely if you subscribed because that helps other people to know I exist and leaving a review would be great. As well, get in touch if you would like to join me to share your feeding or weaning journey, or if you have any ideas for topics to include in the podcast.

This podcast is produced by the lovely Emily Crosby Media.