If over the counter cleansers and acne treatments don t help, a talk with the child s pediatrician can give welcome relief to an embarrassing problem for the girl. As the oil glands increase production, so do the sweat glands. Parents will often be more aware of a girl s sweat because it will now start to have an odor. This will be the time to really enforce the daily shower or bath rule as well as a time to start allowing the girl to use deodorant. When these body changes are seen, it is time for parents to start instruction about the facts of life.
Some mothers find openness about their own periods to be the best way.
This openness can be something as simple as having the pads or tampons where the girl can come across them and ask questions. Other mothers may find this an unheard of and totally abhorrent suggestion. A trip to the pediatrician for pamphlets or a visit to a feminine hygiene web site may be their best course of action. These information pamphlets can then be left in an area the girl can find and then read them in privacy. Regardless of how the information is delivered to the girl, it is important that she gets the facts straight and not believes the myths that are propagated between the uneducated in locker rooms.