Puberty

[ShelfyElfy25]

Hi. I appreciate that this post is going to make me seem very ill informed 🙈 But I am trying to rectify that!

My daughter who is 9 has started to develop a few pubic hairs. Not many - maybe 10 or so. Is this classed as the start of puberty? She seems very young? Or are a few hairs normal before puberty actually starts?

My daughter was the same at just turned 9. Her breast buds had started to develop at 8….I didn’t realise this was a thing so took her to the doctors! 😣😁 Basically the early end of normal but fine and probably because she’s tall.

Now she’s 11 and a bit more developed but no periods and nowhere near needing a bra yet. I was 12 when I started my period so guess it makes sense in our case?

There are a few previous threads worth finding. True puberty involves the full package of changes and breast bud enlargement usually comes before the rest. At her age it would be considered "precocious" (abnormally early) anyway.

Pubic hair growth can be influenced by the adrenal glands as well as puberty hormones - so you can have isolated "premature adrenarche" with this type of change only - in that case puberty hasn't actually begun.

Precocious puberty is defined periods starting before 8 (yes, that feels very young). Start of pubic hair can predate puberty by a couple of years, sometimes even longer.

Sounds similar to DD. Periods started at 10 and a half. It’s young for puberty but not out of the realms of normality.