Dressed in elegant clothes that weigh her down, she drowns in a stream filled with flowers. Many confident, well-adjusted girls are transformed into sad and angry failures. In early adolescence, studies show that girls' IQ scores drop and their math and science scores plummet. They lose their resiliency and optimism and become less curious and inclined to take risks. They report great unhappiness with their own bodies.
Girls know they are losing themselves.
Girls are making choices that will preserve their true selves or install future true selves. These choices have many implications for the rest of their lives. Teenage girls need loving parents, decent values, useful information, friends, physical safety, freedom to move about independently, respect for their own uniqueness, and encouragement to grow into productive adults. Even so, they will all still feel pain and confusion. All are aware of the suffering of friends, of the pressure to be beautiful, and of the danger of being female.