Not a stealth brag... Tips on raising an exceptionally beautiful child.

[Trytrytryasimight]

I know. I'm cringing at the thread title too.

I'm absolutely average, so is her dad. She happens to have an aunt who is an outlier in their family that looks like Claudia schiffer, and seems to have inherited all of her looks from her.

She's all rosy cheeks enormous green eyes and a mass of curly blond hair that never seems disheveled. She chooses her own clothes, keeps them nicely and puts them together so she looks fabulous every time. She is that child and this is through no effort of my own - I was more of an awkward indie kid through my tweens and teens. I can see other girls want to be her friend cause she's fun and kind but then look decidedly jeolous and irritated at dds clothes, hair, general oh wow look I'm so perfect and yet so pretty unspoken general vibe.
She's 12 and we've noticed teachers, club leaders, family members do seem to give her some kind of preferential treatment and I think it's becuase she is very compliant to adults and also very pretty she is.she is also genuinely good hearted and we've never had any reason to think she is unkind to others.
I want to guide her as best I can, as having an opposite experience of my looks growing up and generally being fairly invisible, I don't really know what you to help someone not place too much worth in their looks while acknowledging it's a lovely thing to be beautiful. Any advice on how to raise a particularly good looking child??

This thread is an exercise in what your daughter will face from other women as she grows up. So many people keen to jump in with "the pretty children always turn out ugly", "she's probably not as pretty as you say she is" and other nastiness.

We are our own worst enemy sometimes. Teach your daughter to hold her head high, and rise above the petty, jealous bullshit.

My DS12 is v good looking and has started to get a lot of attention from girls. He's so embarrassed by it and doesn't know how to handle it. Is that what you are worried about OP?
I've been honest with him. Told him he's a lovely looking boy, tall and athletic and he's going to get a lot of attention but he still needs to be a nice guy. In response to ' do you fancy my mate?' (said at school) he said 'no way!' I said that wasn't kind. He doesn't have to like everyone but he needs to learn to be tactful.
He may well end up a lanky, greasy teenager but he'll always be gorgeous to me.

My daughter is very pretty and I have always been plain. I have to admit I did think about it a bit when she was younger just from the point of view of I don’t know what it’s like to be the pretty girl in the room. I can’t advise her on that!

But I don’t think it’s healthy to be in awe of your own child, especially when it’s something they have just been born with, not as a result of hard work or a good personality. The way you describe her OP, is a bit...fawning TBH. It’s lovely to be pretty but it doesn’t open that many doors really. My niece is very very pretty, her mum isn’t and she expected the prettiness would mean her daughter wouldn’t face any of the problems that she had as a teenager. She was very wrong, and now as an early 20 something DN has really stuffed up her life with drugs, alcohol and bad choices in men. I feel like a bit more focus on effort at school and being a good person and a few less modelling courses and obsession with popularity might have helped.

The only time I’ve overtly discussed looks with my teenage DD was when she was starting secondary school and didn’t know anyone. She has a tendency to be super shy and I said you’re going to have to try to look friendly and smile because if I’d met you when I was in yr 7 I would have found you intimidating and I wouldn’t have even tried to talk to you. She came home after the first day and said mum I smiled and then someone talked to me and now I have 4 friends!

@smigg

I have seen Kate Moss at work & she just has it. She can be next too far more conventional beautiful women but you are drawn to her although I do think her face when younger was exquisite.

I remember India Knight writing that she’d seen her in passing IRL and couldn’t stop thinking about her beautiful face on the way home. Some people just have this, we have to accept it! Admittedly it’s subjective and transient. I remember Brooke Shields had a really haunting beauty when young. She’s enormously successful, intelligent, witty and seemingly well-rounded. Still beautiful, but probably not as ‘haunting’ as when young, although probably infinitely more interesting. Didn’t she also get a Harvard or Yale degree? Similarly, I would say Rachel Weisz had a real haunting beauty and has an Oxford degree (also married to James Bond, of course!) I would imagine that the latter women were taught to enjoy and cultivate their beauty, but to focus on their talents and brains. They were probably ribbed in a normal family way, to encourage a sense of humour, given outlets for creativity etc. etc. In short, all the usual things that you try to do with any DD (or DS.) You will have to have a chat about how best to deal with unwanted advances and consent but every mother has to broach that with their teen or almost teen daughter, don’t they? Confidence to speak her mind is what she needs, above all. I think I would also speak to her about the importance of really good, trustworthy friends too and how to cultivate friendships.

@korawick12345

And the bitterness and jealousy dripping from the posts on this thread is quite frankly disturbing.

Some people are exceptionally beautiful, that is a simple fact, why are so many on this thread unwilling to accept that.

because its wrong to say your child is beautiful, how dare she

Well, I'm not dripping jealousy and bitterness, as someone who's fairly plain, with a really stunning sibling (and a nephew who was child model beautiful, but not in temperament!).

I was simply trying to give the OP a response from my own experience. My entrancing nephew is a good looking young man now, but not the kind of beauty he had as a 10 year old.

People change. Our bodies and faces age, and change as they age.

For women and girls this is an issue, because for millennia, our value as humans is undermined by our "value" as beautiful objects. This isn't healthy, but it's patriarchy.

So the advice to @Trytrytryasimight to develop her daughter's sense of self-worth through means other than her looks are offering sensible kind advice.

Any "bitterness and jealousy" is projection.

Some people are exceptionally beautiful, that is a simple fact, why are so many on this thread unwilling to accept that.

Sure they are, we’ve discussed a few. But parents are generally biased when it comes to their dc looks. Maybe the op’ dc is though who knows?

The most beautiful woman I knew (around university age) was also one of the most resilient. She had come from a home where both parents had had severe health problems and lost jobs - she herself had done everything from paper rounds to avon before she was 18, as well as 'held up' her parents at times.
She did use the looks to manipulate a little bit but frankly could have pushed that door much wider. What she was, by 20, was really single minded and she owned herself and her skills. She always seemed very uncynical but must have had a savvy core given her teenage years. She went through a long process to be recruited to a really good graduate job (took about a year and many rounds of 'sifting') while she worked in a bar and hoped it would come good. I wasn't up for waiting 'that long' - boy do I regret it now.
She got a lot of attention but was happy to call out bs very directly. She did, I think, know the value of good and numerous friends, and all guys would think she was beautiful but at least half would realise she would not be a perfect match for them because of her values and aims (and she was very talkative as well!)

Not being a teenager or a dumbo Instagram follower, I'm not bothered by looks. They are a genetic accident not an achievement. Always so sad when a dead female is described as ' our beautiful...' which makes it sound like she was nothing apart from her face.

Help her deal with being nice because there will be kids that won’t like her because she’s pretty and nice and god help her if she got the trump card of brightness 🙈 believe me this Means years of therapy to undo what done to her through school .

This had to be a wind up, I refuse to believe this is a real post.

I think she sounds just about lovely as she is, as long as she isn't mean or nasty with it, which she obviously isn't, otherwise l, and I know it's not your intention, it's almost like punishing her for other people's actions xx

Don't worry. She'll stop being quite so perfect when the teens arrive.

Sounds like you’re already doing a good job to me if what you say is true so why change anything?

I think this a very good question and it's a shame that so many people are just rolling their eyes at it or condescending to you, OP. Children (especially girls) who are taught to value their beauty above all else can become very insecure about their worth as a person. So I would be careful not to praise her for her natural looks and to try to praise her for having her own style, her meticulous care for her clothes and all the other wonderful things about her that aren't just being pretty. Don't be negative about it, obviously, but just focus on the things other than beauty, things that she actively does rather than the passive trait of a pretty face. She needs to value other things about herself besides just her looks. The rest of the world will give her the opposite message.

Wow

I can think of 2 friends from the last 20 years who really do have it all - not material stuff but looks, academic talent, musical ability, kindness. And neither of them have had a particularly easy run overall.

If you are teaching her to look beyond other people's looks, that should help her spot the good in others and make sure she ends up with kind and thoughtful friends & future partner, not just the vain, shallow, drug using, good-looking ones.

Equally, if she becomes aware of others' comments or treatment about her looks, it's helpful if she can deflect or recognise those around her...yes thank you for the offer but X has been waiting here longer than I have; you've heard my views but can we give Y a chance to speak; I'll only let you buy me a drink if Z is included too; and so on. That kind of thing doesn't ignore her privilege, but potentially does get her thinking about using it to the good and spreading her good fortune around.

Good luck anyway, she sounds terrific so far and keep on doing a great job!

Not to be a Debbie Downer but...
One of the girls at school (I'm talking in the 80's) whom we thought was the prettiest and she was in the 'it' gang is now quite plain and hasn't aged well at all (if I stalk her FB page) all jowls and over processed hair.

Wow, I've only read the first page but you can see from this thread exactly what OP needs to worry about and that is other people's insecurities and jealousy making her daughter's life a misery.
OP she will face jealousy throughout her life, all you do is steer her to be a good person and know that people's behaviour, if unkind, is all to do with them.

I blossomed in my teens and around age 14 stopped being invited to the park with my friends, who I enjoyed having a laugh with and had lovely friendships with until then, because 'the boys would fancy me'. It was fucking horrible and girls and women can be particularly vile to those better looking / thinner than them.

@JackieWeaverFever

You'll get a lot of shit on this thread but you are without scaring you I think you are very right to be concerned.

I'm in a rush but here you go I hope it helps....

She is a child and will be vulnerable to men and teenage boys soon if not already.
Especially if she is kind and compliant.

You need to teach her a lot. Now.
about bodily autonomy...
About situational awareness. help her start identifying safe and how to handle herself in unsafe situations
Teach her the "excuse me exactly what do you think you are doing? I'm 13/1!!!" (Said in outdoor voice when creepy man trying to rub against her on the tube etc)
and work on scenarios around how to make good choices and how to identify people motives
My parents also operated a no questions asked pick up policy which was amazing as an idiot teenager. They made it clear if I was any where I was wasn't happy or just wanted out I could call them and they wpuld come no questions asked / no punishment etc any time of day or night.

I would consider self defence classes too.

This is good advice

Reward her mainly for effort, hard work, and achievements?

She sounds gorgeous! Make sure you keep her locked up and have a big stick to keep the boys away from the door

I'm surprised at all the comments about women being bitchier towards attractive women - in general, people do want to be friends with attractive people more than they do plain people.

I don't remember any pretty girls getting a hard time at school. There was anorexia, but that was probably due to home issues and peer pressure from equally popular and attractive friends?

Don't focus on it: she's too young. A girl in my year at school became a supermodel after she left at 15. The modelling thing amazed everyone, because we remembered her as spotty, thin as a rake, goofy, with weirdly widely spaced eyes. She thought it was quite amusing too. Of course, by 18 she was gorgeous. I was looking at photos of her daughter on Facebook the other day and she looks exactly the same. There is very little correlation between the way people look at 12 and the way they look at 18. I have always been average looking but I was one of the shortest in my class in the first year in secondary school and 5'9'' when I left. I had a small nose and tiny chin at 12. As an adult I have pretty oversized feature. Etc.

All children are beautiful.Mine were all different..but lovely.One was blond.one lovely auburn..and the other darkbrown.like his father.Its genetics..ALL CHILDREN ARE BEAUTIFUL...Annoyed by that comment really.