Читать книгу 10 Things Girls Need Most: To grow up strong and free - Steve Biddulph, Steve Biddulph - Страница 10

Foreword

THE BATTLE TO SET GIRLS FREE

You remember that moment, don’t you? Holding your baby daughter in your arms for the very first time. Her eyes wide open, gazing back into yours. Feeling so protective, so proud, so happy. A daughter!

Throughout the last hundred years, things have got better for girls. People fought hard for our daughters to have more equality and opportunity and to be less pushed into narrow boxes of what a girl, or woman, could be. But about ten years ago – it’s hard to say just when – all this started to change. Girls who had flown up in the sunshine of a century of feminism started to go into a nosedive.

Everyone has noticed this – not just psychologists and counsellors, but parents themselves. They say, ‘Fourteen is the new eighteen,’ or ‘They’re growing up too fast.’ Or they just roll their eyes and say, ‘Girls!’

As I am writing this, the Department for Education is reporting that a third of all teenage girls in the UK suffer from depression or anxiety. They are calling it ‘an important and significant trend’. The NHS says the same; they report that 20 per cent of girls are self-harming – three times as many as ten years ago. Not only that; 13 per cent of girls have symptoms of post-traumatic stress – something we associate with serious trauma or harm. Eating disorders, body-hate, having unhappy and unwanted sex: all are on the increase. It’s not all girls, but it’s enough of them to worry about.

We know the causes of this change in girlhood. It’s partly the explosion of social media and the amount of time we spend on screens, but also the pressured and competitive way we live today. The disappearance of spending time with older, wiser, kinder people in the real world, as well as time in nature, being playful in a relaxed, dreamy way that is best for growing young brains.

We know what is needed to help a girl grow up strong and free, and it’s not what television, the internet, magazines or billboards are telling her. It’s also not testing in primary school. Nor it is looks, being hot, being cool, pleasing boys or fitting in to tidy models of corporate success (unless that’s really what she wants!).

So here, from the front line of working with girls and their parents, are the ten things that girls need most. This book works by building self-awareness, clarity and purpose. By enlivening your own parenting instincts. By giving you the best information, then letting YOU choose what to do for YOUR girl, and her friends, and your nieces, granddaughters or students.

It’s a mighty kit bag of tools for liberating your girl. You might even free yourself along the way. After all, we could all do with some liberation.

10 Things Girls Need Most is an interactive book. So here is your first go – what is your gut reaction right now?

(Tick which statement is the closest to how you feel.)

□ 1. Hell no, I don’t want to know! Hide me from all this.

□ 2. I’m nervous, but I will read on. I love my daughter and want to help her.

□ 3. I am stirred up already and want to get kicking. Let me loose!