THE PRINCESS BITCHFACE SYNDROME

Surviving adolescent girls: Michael Carr-Gregg

Penguin 2006      ISBN -13: 978 0 14 300466 0

I was on my way to the internet shop in Port Moresby when

I stopped for a moment at the second hand books laid out on

the footpath outside the Post Office. I bought one of the books
immediately.

The Princess Bitchface Syndrome

7 Aug 2006 ... Don't be offended or put off by the title — this is an excellent

resource for parents trying to keep sane while surviving adolescent girls.
www.times.co.nz/cms/arts/book.../2006/.../art100012640.php - Cached - Similar

At the first opportunity I sat on a wall and skim read. It was

all about me. Do I really carry on like that with my daughters?

Then I recognized their behaviour too. The book was about

them too.

The overall advice in this book is that parents have to recognize

the modern pressures on young girls living in an era of internet

and mobile phones.

We fathers have to be a little more laid back and understanding

of the erratic nature of our daughters who seem to have reached

puberty much earlier than our generations did. Their emotional and

intellectual development has not developed with the same pace as

their bodies.

We do not confront them but listen and be positive in our responses.

We have knowledge that they need because we have been through

the mill too.

But we have to gently guide them. I had a very helpful talk with elder

daughter recently. I did express the view that there are times when the

more we say the worse we make the problem. At times we just shut up

and let the issue solve itself.

My daughters and I live in Papua New Guinea and there are many more

dangers for young girls out on the town. We are told in the book to refrain

from keeping them home permanently as they will never learn to handle

themselves.

Young girls have terrible bitchy problems among female school friends.

My elder daughter recently told one girl a secret and she told another
girl who went back to my daughter who had a fight with the first girl who
then had a fight with the other girl. Now three weeks later they are close
friends. I am an expert at all this having watched High School Musical
37 times in my house with two daughters.

There are powerful insights in this book:

 P.40. The reason I am not too strict with my daughter is that I had a

really strict upbringing myself and I hated my parents. I don’t want

my daughter to feel that way about me.

I have heard this sort of thing from quite a few parents. But it’s not

a good idea to try to be a cool mum or dad. It’s your job to be parent,

not a friend.

You may find it hard to believe, but your daughter is more likely to

feel resentful towards you in the long term if you fail to set limits

and simply let her have her way on everything now”.

The problem that fathers and mothers seem to have is to try to keep their

daughters wrapped-up in the safety of the house. But they have their own

world out there. It is our job to make sure that they are as free and as safe

as we can make it for them.

P.37. All young women need independence from their parents for

their psychological and social development. One side effect of

today’s tendency to bubble-wrap girls is that they can feel trapped

and will escape in any way they can. Some will escape by internet

and mobile phones.

A major factor in Papua New Guinea is the mobile phone that girls can

use to communicate with girl friends, phone friends, strangers, cougars

and sugar-daddies. Poverty in families and unemployment in this country

may push many young girls into prostitution. They are learning the skill

of telling lies over mobile phone.

This is an amazing book to make parents stop and think. It may be useful

for parents in Papua New Guinea too. The overall message is that parents

are supposed to be parents first and then friends of their daughters. They

must place limits.

They have to make sure their adolescent children are safe but allow them

safe freedom. That may be a difficult balance to find both in Australia and

Papua New Guinea.

What parents and young girls do not need are strangers to intervene with

an anti-family, anti-fathers and anti-parenting ideology. It is difficult enough

for parents and daughters already. Not to forget sons.

There are people in this world who hover over families like the frigate birds

circling above the colonies of seagulls and waiting to swoop down and take

a baby from the nest.

Back cover: Part of the problem is that girls are becoming sexualized earlier

and their physical development is shooting ahead of their cognitive capacities.

By the time they turn 13, they look like they are ready for anything – but they

are not. Carr-Gregg argues that many parents are surrendering their authority

and allowing their daughters to be fast-tracked into pseudo-adulthood.

We appear to be losing it when it comes to parenting our girls and it’s time

to grab back the reins.

It’s a big day in my family. My daughters have gone off to play soccer at

the university alone. I have given them the usual talks about getting into

cars with men.

They were told not to allow themselves to be taken off by sex-starved

university students. They think I am a silly old man. But the book above

says they are secretly pleased that I am worried.