8 year old starting puberty?

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Posting here for traffic, sorry.

My 8 year old daughter seems to have begun puberty, am I out of touch or this really young??

She has underarm hair, a few pimples on her face and has body odour if she doesn’t shower every day. Her hair seems to be getting greasy quickly too!
This evening she has just told me she has some pubic hair.

She is slim, always been petite for her age, and very physically active (gymnastics, dance and swimming)

She does have a book all about growing up, so she knows what to expect, but even the book says age 10 is a normal time to see the first signs!

Should I take her to to the doctors? I don’t want to embarrass her of make her feel there is something wrong. Our doctors are also notably shit so I think they would brush it off anyhow.

Anyone had experience of this so young? And what did you do, if anything? TIA

Under no circumstances should you consider puberty blockers as the side effects can be terrible. https://kffhealthnews.org/news/women-fear-drug-they-used-to-halt-puberty-led-to-health-problems/

Gosh that’s so early for people to say it’s becoming normal. I do remember a girl in my class starting her periods at 9. I was 14 and yes I did stop growing afterwards.

Under no circumstances should you consider puberty blockers as the side effects can be terrible.

Please don't post scare stories like this. There are children treated by endocrinologists for growth disorders who need things like this to give them time to reach a normal adult height. An endocrinologist will not prescribe something like this unless they think the potential benefit outweighs the risk.

Out of interest did she then have an earlier menopause?

Me too but never got any boobs. Oh well.

I started at 11 and I am 5.6. Think I grew until I was 14.

No sign of periods stopping at 45.

I don’t think it is a scare story. There are large and well-evidenced problems with this class of drugs and people should be aware of them.

It’s not ridiculous. It’s a fact. You were probably already tall when you started your period.

Perfectly normal I'm afraid. My friend started periods at 9. Was a team swimmer too so had to get used to tampons straight away...

I started mine at 8, all I will say is make sure when the time comes to talk to the school. They are much better than in the 90s but I remember being told I couldn't go to the toilet and none of the teachers believed me. They were "Adult things" I also stopped growing and am 5ft exactly. Have pcos and have been chemically put in the menopause mid 30's. Some women just have less luck.
Hopefully your daughter has a few more carefree years!

Well maybe I am naive to think several signs of puberty suddenly appearing just after her 8th birthday is unusual, but as she is my only daughter, I have no sisters and no mum to ask about early signs being hereditary, and I certainly don’t remember these things happening to me at that age.
Hence why I asked for others opinions/experiences.
I would obviously not want to make her feel anything less than normal, as I stated, quite clearly.

my DD started with BO and underarm hair very young, also first signs of pubic hair and we thought breast buds. When she was 7 we were referred to the endocrinologist and she had all sorts of tests. We were told that once she reached 8 she would be discharged regardless, as 8 and over is no longer considered early puberty 😳
anyway, we were told that it was andrenarche, which is a normal developmental stage and leads to body odour and body hair, but NOT periods. This is a separate hormone system and though it often starts around a similar time, unless there are breast buds (which don’t come and go, as the consultant told me breast development only goes one way!) then periods aren’t imminent. This was really reassuring for me, and a year later there’s been no real change, no breast growth so we know she’s not going to have to deal with periods imminently. Poor love has had to wear deodorant (a natural one) since she was 6 but she takes it in her stride and recently started asking to shave her armpits so we’re going with it (to start with she was really proud of her hair but then wanted to cut it for gymnastics/ballet/swimming). Sorry for the long reply but hope it helps!

Thank you so much for this info, very helpful and reassuring!
My daughter is the same, was proud of her underarm hair, until she realised none of her friends had any, and asked to shave it off.
I use my husbands beard trimmer so I know it won’t cut her accidentally.

All the women in my family started our periods at 10
or 11 and we didn’t stop growing ffs

My dd was diagnosed st age 8 with precocious puberty syndrome and went on puberty blockers till the age of 11. Apparently there is a difference between PPS and early but normal puberty. She had a number of tests including bone scans before they recommended the blockers. I'm glad we did it, it allowed dd to attain normal height and reduced her terrible self consciousness about her body.

I do think it's worth a trip to the GP, OP.

I started my periods when I was 9 and had pubic hair by that point so it’s completely normal.

That's interesting. DS's fiancee is very petite (4ft 11ins I think) and she started her periods at the age of nine.

I understood that the earlier you started your periods, the later you started your menopause.

It's strange that we've evolved to menstruate for early isn't it? Seems a little unfair as no-one should be having kids anywhere close to that age obviously.

I started mine at 9 and am 5ft 10!

Sorry should say "so early" above.

the concept young girls stop growing after periods start has been debunked, some do and some don't i believe it's 50/50.
early periods are linked to late menopause, late starters end sooner.
in my family the women all start late, fingers crossed my grand children also start in their teens.

Oh, so that theory isn't right then!

So in reality you can't tell anything about what height a girl will get from when her period starts. Good to know.