This is more about girl stuff than about IT, but there is some IT thrown in...
My Experience:
I started my dot pretty early, so I hadn't had The Talk yet, and I was pretty surprised. (I was 9.)
It was kind of horrible, when I finally gave up on changing (and hiding) underwear that I thought I'd messed up somehow and went to my mom, she filled me in then had this big happy grin "You're a woman now!"
She decided that the best thing to do would be to take me to dinner at a nice restaurant. On the way, we stopped off at my grandparents, who hugged me and told me how great it was that I was a woman now.
We got seated, and I started worrying what the protocol was, because until a couple of hours ago, I didn't realize any of this stuff was going to happen. Now I'm bleeding from a place I didn't really know I had, and I'm at the swankiest establishment I've even been in. I thought for sure they were going to tell the waiter that I was a woman now, but apparently that was just something you told people in the family, because they didn't say anything to him. Instead, my mom and step-dad complained in whispered tones about how everything was too expensive, and how maybe this was a mistake? Thus, adding a whole new level of confusion and embarrassment to the one I was already experiencing.
I went to bed that night about the most freaked out a kid could be. In the intervening hours, between learning that what menstruation was, and then finding out after dinner it was going to KEEP HAPPENING, and also finding out that French Onion Soup, which sounded so sophisticated on the menu, is a bowl of sticky brown glop that is nearly impossible to eat without getting it everywhere, my outlook on adulthood was pretty much shattered.
My Sister's Experience:
My mom realized she'd really made the experience pretty rough for me. So, when my sister started, Mom played the whole thing pretty casual. Unfortunately, my sister remembered the trip to Grandma's and the excitement, and the fancy restaurant, and had been waiting for YEARS for her magical moment to come! So, when nothing much happened, she was crushed. Somehow, poor Mom managed to ruin it for us both!
My kids:
I'm sure I've told this story before, but it was on the old boards so here goes...
Since I never knew what it was all about, I've always been really open about everything with my own kids. I didn't want any of this stuff sneaking up on them. So, one year at the mall, I had all four kids with me (the oldest was 7 or 8, the baby in a stroller, long before Baby Bonecrusher) and we were crammed in a handicapped stall. It was the holiday season, and the bathroom was wall-to-wall with people waiting in line. I was having my monthly, so when it was my turn to sit down, my oldest explained loudly to her siblings, and everyone else in the bathroom, "Mommy's bleeding because Daddy didn't give her any sperm this month."
It got really quiet. There were still a ton of ladies when we left, sort of staring and giggling a bit. I can't help but wonder if they were thinking it was a good thing Daddy hadn't given me any sperm as I emerged from the stall with my horde of children...
