When will I get my first period?

Dear Mookychick,

Hi my name is ? and I am 13 years old. I really don’t know what to do because I am the only girl in my fourth period class without her period and I feel like such a baby. My mom and my aunt are always saying that I am going to get it soon because of my attitude and because my stomach always hurts but that has been going on for almost a year and I really don’t know what to do. If you could give me advice on how to stop everyone thinking I am a baby and stop my mom from pestering me I would love you.

Love, Anonymous Me xxx

The Mookychick answer to your problem

Char says…

Honey you are completely normal and not at all a baby, so stop thinking that right now! Ok, well basically, this is how it works.

Around about your age and sometimes younger and most of the time a bit older – infact, anywhere in the age range of about 11 and 18 – a girl will get her period. A period is where your body begins to recognise that it can create a baby via eggs produced from her ovaries. When you’re born, a girl has hundreds of eggs that mature and ripen and hope to become fertilised throughout her lifetime. When they don’t fertilise (and by that I mean, if you’re not having sex or if you are, you’re using adequate precautions) the egg is discarded which is what is known as your period.

Every girl is different which means that you’re not going to be the same as your classmates, and they’re not neccessarily going to be the same as one another. Often, girls will say they have it when they don’t because they don’t want to be singled out and ridiculed – as you seem to be experiencing. Periods are one of mother nature’s wonderful creations and with them come a little or a lot of hassle, again, depending on your own body.

Often your period will run in a 28 day cycle and in this cycle your hormones will do peculiar things. The week before you get your period you may well feel like killing someone one minute, crying over anything and everything whilst stuffing your face and lamenting over a swollen belly (water retention, sometimes you can gain up to 7lbs before your period arrives). The week you have your period you’ll feel hormonal but nowhere near how awful you can feel the week prior to it. As you’re a teenager it’s normal and natural to have moodswings especially if you’re feeling pressure from your friends, therefore this is probably what your mom and grandma are referring to when they say that they think you’re going to get your period. Take no notice, as you’re 13 and female, we’re entitled to be a bytch regardless of whether you got your period or not!

Periods can last from one day to eight days, sometimes more. They can be so light that you only get something which is known as ‘Spotting’ which is as the name suggests, spots of blood. Traditionally, a normal period goes from Light to Heavy to Light again, and sometimes you can pass clots of blood and mucus. Again, this is entirely normal.

You’ll get your period, make no doubt about that, but when your body is ready to do so and not a moment before. Tell your friends that everyone’s different and that they should know that, seeing as they know so much about periods as it is. You could tell them to stop being so obsessed with your body!! Perhaps they are inquisitive because they have their own fears about periods themselves? Relax and enjoy being period free, because before you know it, you’ll be buying expensive santiary towels / tampax and getting bloated bubbies & belly, the obligatory monthly huge spot and moodswings that seemingly appear from nowhere! Periods, oh deep joy!