Thursday 11th Oct 2012
Girls and Shaving – When is the Right Time?
My daughter is 9 years old. She is a dancer, and her leg hair grows in dark. I’m shaving it every other day for her because I don’t want other girls to be mean to her. What do you think?
Anonymous, in PA
Anonymous, shaving your daughter’s legs at this age might be a completely reasonable choice.
I have two questions for you:
Does your daughter WANT her legs clean-shaven?
- She is old enough to have an opinion about this! If she does, fine.
- If she doesn’t, then respect her wishes. You can gently express your concern to her that she will be made fun of, but try not to put too much of your own past experiences on this for her. If she is not interested in what the other kids say, then be proud of her! That is a strong girl you are raising.
- Teach the valuable lesson here: Self-respect is what is important about personal grooming – doing what your body needs to be healthy and comfortable, not what others need in order to “accept” you. The truth is, as you know, if there are mean girls they will find something to be mean about.
What reason do you give your daughter for doing this?
Chances are, most of her 4th grade friends are not yet shaving their legs.
- Put this in the context of cleanliness and comfort.
- Avoid talking about beauty when you’re addressing personal care of any kind. We don’t want our daughters to focus on “making” themselves beautiful, we want them to focus on:
- Believing in their own inner beauty.
- Taking good care of their bodies as a sign of self-respect.
- Avoiding “friends” that judge them based on outer beauty.
Whether or not it’s appropriate to shave your daughter’s legs is a decision for the two of you. And the conversations you have about it together are an opportunity for you to pass along the life lessons of self-respect and resilience!
At what age did your daughter start removing body hair? Or does she not?
Comments (8)
From what she describes in the letter, this was initiated by the mother, and based on the mother’s fears — not the daughter’s fears nor her reality. Were kids already being mean to her? Doesn’t sound like it.
She missed some good teaching opportunities: to be accepting of her own body, to learn how to deal with (these not-yet-encountered) mean people, and about cultural norms in different societies.
The mother has now essentially told her daughter that there is something about her body worth being insecure about. And, with this kind of example, I would bet that the daughter (only 9!!!) will grow up to have many more insecurities about her appearance.
And cleanliness, really? Are shaved legs really cleaner? Certainly not.
Most of my disagreement is with the fact that it’s the mother – NOT the 9-year-old daughter – who is initiating this practice (which is how the scenario is presented in the letter). Were she responding to the daughter’s fears and helping her work through her own insecurities, I wouldn’t see this as mother-fear-driven, and could definitely imagine how the conversations around shaving – and possibly shaving itself – could be positive for the daughter.
But it’s not.
I read this as Mom Pushing Own Insecurities Onto Very Young Daughter, and respectfully disagree with the response that was given — especially the ending. She has undermined her sense of self-respect and resilience, NOT capitalized on an opportunity to help her daughter bolster these very important pieces of a healthy emotional foundation.
Thanks Christy, both for your opinion and the time you took to share it! If you’re right – and I see why it seems that you are – then this mom is creating stress where there wasn’t any and could easily undermine her daughter’s natural confidence and positive self-image.
My 12 year old daughter recently asked me when I will let her shave. I told her when she gets underarm hair. Seems logical to me.
Was it her underarms she wanted to shave, Jen?
No. She was talking about her legs. I just figure she might as well wait to start shaving her legs until she needs to shave her underarms.
Oh! What did she think of your logic?
So far, she’s cool with it.
You know your kid! Way to go, Jen.