February 16, 2009 • 15 mins
An increasing amount of girls are experiencing a condition known as precocious puberty, where the onset of puberty comes earlier and earlier. Learn more about puberty in this podcast from HowStuffWorks.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
It's ready. Are you welcome to stump Mom never told you?
From house Stuff Works dot Com. Hey there, and welcome
to the podcast. I'm Kristen and I'm sitting here with Molly,
(00:22):
who is slightly under the weather, but she's getting better,
getting better, Thank goodness. Well, I was looking at some
some pictures um at home the other day, and um,
there's this one picture of me. I think I'm about
eleven or twelve hitting you know, the first beginnings of puberty,
(00:42):
a little awkward. I'm like the epitome of awkward, you know,
oversized soccer shorts, big T shirt that I probably thought
was cool. You know, I just I looked terrible. I
was a hot mess. I mean, I mean, can you
can you imagine what life would be like? How how
amazing your middle school years would have been if puberty
did not exist? Oh? Great school pictures, yeah, no bad
(01:05):
school pictures. No awkward Oh no shameful crushes, shameful crushes bio,
no gigantic exits on the day of your first dance. Well,
you know, some some people actually live in that utopia
we speak of and there's actually a condition called idiopathic
hypogonut a tropic hypogonutism, and I probably totally butchered that,
(01:26):
but um, the acronym is I H H. And it's
a condition in which people don't go through puberty. And
it sounds glorious, but you know, at some point you
do have to get over the humping puberty when once
you hit like sixteen seventeen, not going through puberty might
be kind of a bummer people to have a crush. Yeah,
Or the reason this happens is scientists think that people
(01:47):
with I H H actually lack a protein called kiss
pepton that triggers the physiological process of puberty. So you've
got these people, you know who don't who don't go
through puberty at all. But then let's go to the
other end of the puberty spectrum, Molly, and imagine getting
going through puberty when you are saying, oh, I don't know,
six years old. It would make first grade really rough,
(02:10):
Yes it would. But this happens, and it's actually happening
a little bit more in girls these days, and it's
called precocious puberty. Yeah, but this is more than just
you know, girls acting older than they are. This is um.
You know, they're going through the physical changes of puberty
much younger than is expected. UM. And you know it
happens both to both genders, but it happens about ten
(02:31):
times more often in girls than in boys. So it's
a real health concern for young girls. UM. But first
we probaly should probably talk about just how puberty happens.
To begin with, we all know the you know, the
basic signs of puberty. You got acne, you have hair
in places used to not have hair, body oder, body odor, sweating,
you might have to go shopping for your training bro,
(02:54):
terrible unexplainable crushes. Um. And all of this is happening
because your brain has just to release. UM. First, it
releases something called I'm not going to pronounce this roy.
I'm just telling you now, go NATO trope and releasing hormone.
I think you got it right. We're just gonna call
it g n r H though yeah, I prefer to
call it the guns and roses hormone because it's g
(03:15):
n r H. And so basically that hormone then is
signaling other glands to release their own hormone. So first
you've got lutenizing hormone and follicle stimulating hormone, and these
are the ones that are actually gonna tell your ovaries
it's time to make semestrogen, it's time to become a lady.
And once the estrogen is released, UM, then it leads
(03:35):
to breast growth, the body hair, the acne, and the
first UM period. Right, And so when it doesn't happen
at the time in which we think it should happen
in girls, which you know, generally about ten to twelve
is when most girls go through this stage. UM. If
it if it happens too early because of the g
(03:56):
n R H hormone, then that's central precocious purity, And
if it happens with the other hormones, then that's peripheral
precocious puberty. And this UH precocious puberty has been showing
up more often in UH in girls, and so you know,
people have been kind of alarmed about it. They're like
these horror stories of there was a I think it
(04:18):
was like in the nineteen eighties and nineties, like two
year olds in Puerto Rico who were already developing breasts
and like a five year old gave birth. Yeah, I
mean just sort of alarming things because it just doesn't
seem natural that the girls be going through through puberty.
And then that leads to all these other questions of
you know, like if they're already you know, if they're
(04:38):
sex hormones are released, then are they becoming sexualized earlier? YadA, YadA, YadA.
So it's just kind of a whole chain of things
from this one, this one hormone in the brain. Right,
So first, how early is too early? Um? You know,
in the nineties sixties, doctors thought eight to thirteen. You know,
Chris and I were talking about some sort of extreme
cases where with two years, two year olds and five
year olds eight to thirteen, um, sort of the normal
(05:01):
age range for puberty, and if it started younger than eight,
that was precocious puberty. But then there was a study
um led by researchers at the University of North Carolina
School of Public Health, and they found that nearly of
Caucasian girls and almost fifty percent of African American girls
by showing a side the puberty far before eight. So
that led to this new definition that's kind of the
(05:22):
standard now that it's kind of questionable controversial to you know,
that says if it's happening under eight, that's precocious puberty.
So let's talk about why this might be happening, because, Uh,
in some cases, in a small number of cases, there's
it's just an underlying physical problem like a brain tumor
or spinal court injuries, some kind of genetic disease or
infection that will just trigger the release of the g
(05:45):
n r H earlier in the brain. But but that's
in a pretty small amount of cases, right, And also
in a small amount of cases is the possibility it
could be a genetic thing. Um, they have found a
mutant gene that might cause UM precocious puberty. But now
they're coming up with all sorts new theories. We've got
UM exposure to chemicals basically environmental factors. Right there are
(06:06):
these these chemicals specifically, once again I might not pronounce
this right either molly polychlorinated biffin als or PCBs um,
which were once used they've been phased out of products
that are made now, but they were once used in
um coolants and flame retardants. And this huge class of
chemicals called slates, and slates are in a lot of
(06:27):
your bathroom products. These are plastic softeners UM. They also
find fragrances and things like your shampoo and UM. They're
found in nail polish, all sorts of things. And the
reason why these chemicals are sort of scary to some
scientists is because they actually mimic estrogen and UM. They
(06:48):
leach pretty easily from the products that they're in and
you can inhale them, or you can absorb them through skin,
or they can leach into groundwater supply, etcetera. And basically
it's like having you know, a sur of this fake
estrogen um in your body. So they're thinking that that
could be one of the reasons why girls are hitting
puberty faster. Yeah, and they've done some research to back
up this theory. UM. One stay it was in Puerto Rico.
(07:10):
We found that girls who are exposed to high levels
of PCBs in the womb started puberty sooner than girls
who didn't. And then there were the you know, the
girls that are growing breast his youngest too, that Kristin
was talking about. Many of them had really high levels
of thealates in their in their bloodstream. And then there
are dietary culprits, potential culprits. Baby girls who have been
(07:30):
fed soy formula in particular, might hit puberty earlier because
of parts of soy naturally occurring parts of soy um
called isoflavones, and isoflavones like the PCBs and slates are
mimic estrogen in the body as well. So once again
it's just sort of like, you know, the higher levels
(07:51):
of these estrogen like particles in the body, right And
they've also in the nineties there was a big to
do about artificial bovine growth hormone. This one's pretty much
been ruled out. Um. You know, it's a hormone that's
in milk and meat, but they say that it's not
really like estrogim per se once it's really broken down,
and that it digests too quickly to really be something
that might be kick starting puberty. But the biggest reason
(08:14):
right now that they've got on on track is dietary based.
It's it's basically a supersized diet. Childhood obesity. Yeah, the
rate of obesity in children ages two to eleven is
nearly tripled over the past few years according to the CDC,
And the reason why this might be the cause for
percocious puberty is that fat cells actually produce you guessed
(08:35):
it estrogen, and um, it also produces the hormone lepton,
which stimulates the release of hormones that also trigger puberty.
So but I mean, they can look at the girls.
So basically a lot of the girls, about sixty of
girls who have shown the evidence of precocious puberty are overweight.
So it's just one more reason to watch what kids eat,
make sure they go outsign an exercise. Um. But the
(08:58):
thing about it is is that once it happens to
a young girl, you've got to do something about. It's
a very serious medical condition because when you're like six,
you're just not ready to handle the emotional challenges that
come with puberty. You know that sounds like so obvious,
but you've got young girls who are more likely to
have psychological problems and intended pregnancies and substance abuse problems. Now,
I will say, though, Molly, okay, I UM, I looked
(09:21):
up precrotive puberty in the Encyclopedia of Clinical Child and
Pediatric Psychology because I kind of wanted to look a
little bit more into why, you know, say, developing breasted
age six instead of age eight might possibly screw you
up mentally down the road, and then Encyclopedia said that
girls with precocious puberty were no more likely to experience
(09:41):
emotional or behavioral disturbances. They were at risk, but not
necessarily more likely than um than other girls. And the
psycho sexual maturation, which is one of the main reasons
why you know, people fear precocious puberty of girls, you know,
becoming sexually active sooner. This Encyclopedia explained it in terms
of psychosex sual maturity going according to your social age
(10:04):
rather than your like physical development. So if you're you know,
if you're six and you're just hanging around like six
year olds and they're not really no one's really into
boys yet or what have you. It doesn't necessarily mean
that just because that's six year old hits puberty faster,
that she's going to become more sexually active. So some
conflicting evidence. They're on the conflicting evidence on that emotional part. Well,
(10:26):
I hope the Encyclopedia didn't disagree with sort of the
physical changes that can kind of affect you for the
rest of your life, because there are a few physical
effects that precocious period that you have. They are kind
of frightening. Um, if you begin puberty sooner than normal,
you basically have an early growth spurt and you get
taller right at first, but then your bones stopped growing
after puberty, so you reach basically, um, your full growth potential,
(10:49):
you know, potentially at the age of eight, so sooner
than you should. Yeah, a little, a little stunted. And um,
girls with percocious puberty are also at a higher risk
of breast cancer because they're exposed was to estrogen for
longer periods of time than than they otherwise would be.
And estrogen exposure promotes breast cancer. And also if you
(11:09):
get your period before age eight, you're a greater risk
for polycystic ovarian syndrome, which is the condition where a
sister grow in the overraison can interfere with fertility. So
you know, in a period of eight, all of a sudden,
you can't have a baby when you're thirty. And even
though these UM, precocious puberty happens, you know, ten times
more often in girls and boys. UM, if a boy
does have does experience it, they're the same types of
(11:30):
risks for for boys as well. You know, it's not
just girls who are getting the shortened of the stick
with precocious puberty, although um, one one thing that I
read that was sort of raised an interesting question about
sort of the psychological factors of it was that it
might be boys might have an easier time dealing with
precocious puberty because it might be more socially acceptable for
(11:51):
a boy you know, in his group to be the
first one to get chest hair and grow and get
a deep voice, whereas you know, the changes for a
girl are a lot more um obvious and maybe um,
you know, a little harder to handle socially. The fact
of the matter is the average age of a girl's
first period has been dropping point three years per decade
(12:14):
since the mid eighteen hundreds. Think maybe this is a trend.
I think that it might be a trend. I think
that UM, I think that it might be uh slightly overblown.
I'm not saying that you know, if your child experience
is percocious puberty, that you shouldn't do something about it. Obviously,
all those you know potential outcomes are are aren't healthy
(12:34):
at all. But I think that um, as a health trend,
it might be overblown somewhat because a study similar to
the one that you talked about in UM came out
in nineteen seventy six, sort of saying the same thing
that UM girls are experiencing puberty slightly earlier, but overall,
the average age of UM a girl's first a construation
(12:59):
UM has mained relatively the same. Interesting, so I think
that there's room for debate. Okay, but overall, diet diet.
But one interesting thing I sort of thought that, you know,
once puberty started, it was a runaway train and there
was nothing to do about it. But basically, if precocious
puberty does start, you can reverse it. Well, how would
(13:20):
how would it be possible for for doctor too reverse puberty?
That sounds counterintuitive? Well, what you need, and you know
I'm not I'm not saying everyone can reverse puberty, but
percocious puberty you need to see a specialist in growth
and hormonal disorders called a pediatric indo chronologist, And basically
they're gonna give you a lot of hormone tests, a
lot of brain imaging scans because they're gonna be looking
(13:40):
for those possibilities UM, like brain tumors, genetic things that
could have triggered it. UM. So basically, if if something
like that might have been the trigger, then they might
treat that first and see if that just kind of
stops the puberty. Um. But if there isn't any medical cause,
you can get um l h r H or g
n r H the guns and rows of hormone agonist therapy,
(14:02):
which basically, UM, you put hormones in that block the
body's production of the sex hormones that we're triggering this
early puberty. And someone who's getting this therapy, UM, it's
probably gonna be a monthly shot and you just stay
on the medication until you reach the normal age of puberty,
at which time you go off it and everything can
proceed as normal. Well, it's good to know that there
are ways to treat precocious puberty. But Molly, I'm curious
(14:26):
to know, Um, if diet really is one of the
root causes of precocious pure puberty. Okay, it's happening into
like a lot of obest children, if maybe that could
also be one of the ways to prevent precocious puberty,
you know, balanced diet because you know, also on the
reverse end, if if girls don't eat enough calories, specifically
(14:46):
like anorectit, girls believe it. Girls who aren't taking in
enough food, um, will also delay their period. So I
wonder if the opposite is true, If you can, you know,
with a healthy diet send them off on the right,
on the right foot. It's a good it's a good ry.
And I mean think of I mean you certainly can't
hurt to try, because a healthy diet will lead too
many other things exactly besides the healthy onset of puberty. Well, um,
(15:08):
I think that's about it for precocious puberty and fat well,
eat well. And if you want to learn more about
eating well or puberty or acne or any of the
other wonderful things that go along with it, you can
go to how stuff works dot com for more on
(15:29):
this and thousands of other topics because it has stuff
works dot com brought to you by the reinvented two
thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
It's ready. Are you welcome to stump Mom never told you?
From house Stuff Works dot Com. Hey there, and welcome
to the podcast. I'm Kristen and I'm sitting here with Molly,
(00:22):
who is slightly under the weather, but she's getting better,
getting better, Thank goodness. Well, I was looking at some
some pictures um at home the other day, and um,
there's this one picture of me. I think I'm about
eleven or twelve hitting you know, the first beginnings of puberty,
(00:42):
a little awkward. I'm like the epitome of awkward, you know,
oversized soccer shorts, big T shirt that I probably thought
was cool. You know, I just I looked terrible. I
was a hot mess. I mean, I mean, can you
can you imagine what life would be like? How how
amazing your middle school years would have been if puberty
did not exist? Oh? Great school pictures, yeah, no bad
(01:05):
school pictures. No awkward Oh no shameful crushes, shameful crushes bio,
no gigantic exits on the day of your first dance. Well,
you know, some some people actually live in that utopia
we speak of and there's actually a condition called idiopathic
hypogonut a tropic hypogonutism, and I probably totally butchered that,
(01:26):
but um, the acronym is I H H. And it's
a condition in which people don't go through puberty. And
it sounds glorious, but you know, at some point you
do have to get over the humping puberty when once
you hit like sixteen seventeen, not going through puberty might
be kind of a bummer people to have a crush. Yeah,
Or the reason this happens is scientists think that people
(01:47):
with I H H actually lack a protein called kiss
pepton that triggers the physiological process of puberty. So you've
got these people, you know who don't who don't go
through puberty at all. But then let's go to the
other end of the puberty spectrum, Molly, and imagine getting
going through puberty when you are saying, oh, I don't know,
six years old. It would make first grade really rough,
(02:10):
Yes it would. But this happens, and it's actually happening
a little bit more in girls these days, and it's
called precocious puberty. Yeah, but this is more than just
you know, girls acting older than they are. This is um.
You know, they're going through the physical changes of puberty
much younger than is expected. UM. And you know it
happens both to both genders, but it happens about ten
(02:31):
times more often in girls than in boys. So it's
a real health concern for young girls. UM. But first
we probaly should probably talk about just how puberty happens.
To begin with, we all know the you know, the
basic signs of puberty. You got acne, you have hair
in places used to not have hair, body oder, body odor, sweating,
you might have to go shopping for your training bro,
(02:54):
terrible unexplainable crushes. Um. And all of this is happening
because your brain has just to release. UM. First, it
releases something called I'm not going to pronounce this roy.
I'm just telling you now, go NATO trope and releasing hormone.
I think you got it right. We're just gonna call
it g n r H though yeah, I prefer to
call it the guns and roses hormone because it's g
(03:15):
n r H. And so basically that hormone then is
signaling other glands to release their own hormone. So first
you've got lutenizing hormone and follicle stimulating hormone, and these
are the ones that are actually gonna tell your ovaries
it's time to make semestrogen, it's time to become a lady.
And once the estrogen is released, UM, then it leads
(03:35):
to breast growth, the body hair, the acne, and the
first UM period. Right, And so when it doesn't happen
at the time in which we think it should happen
in girls, which you know, generally about ten to twelve
is when most girls go through this stage. UM. If
it if it happens too early because of the g
(03:56):
n R H hormone, then that's central precocious purity, And
if it happens with the other hormones, then that's peripheral
precocious puberty. And this UH precocious puberty has been showing
up more often in UH in girls, and so you know,
people have been kind of alarmed about it. They're like
these horror stories of there was a I think it
(04:18):
was like in the nineteen eighties and nineties, like two
year olds in Puerto Rico who were already developing breasts
and like a five year old gave birth. Yeah, I
mean just sort of alarming things because it just doesn't
seem natural that the girls be going through through puberty.
And then that leads to all these other questions of
you know, like if they're already you know, if they're
(04:38):
sex hormones are released, then are they becoming sexualized earlier? YadA, YadA, YadA.
So it's just kind of a whole chain of things
from this one, this one hormone in the brain. Right,
So first, how early is too early? Um? You know,
in the nineties sixties, doctors thought eight to thirteen. You know,
Chris and I were talking about some sort of extreme
cases where with two years, two year olds and five
year olds eight to thirteen, um, sort of the normal
(05:01):
age range for puberty, and if it started younger than eight,
that was precocious puberty. But then there was a study
um led by researchers at the University of North Carolina
School of Public Health, and they found that nearly of
Caucasian girls and almost fifty percent of African American girls
by showing a side the puberty far before eight. So
that led to this new definition that's kind of the
(05:22):
standard now that it's kind of questionable controversial to you know,
that says if it's happening under eight, that's precocious puberty.
So let's talk about why this might be happening, because, Uh,
in some cases, in a small number of cases, there's
it's just an underlying physical problem like a brain tumor
or spinal court injuries, some kind of genetic disease or
infection that will just trigger the release of the g
(05:45):
n r H earlier in the brain. But but that's
in a pretty small amount of cases, right, And also
in a small amount of cases is the possibility it
could be a genetic thing. Um, they have found a
mutant gene that might cause UM precocious puberty. But now
they're coming up with all sorts new theories. We've got
UM exposure to chemicals basically environmental factors. Right there are
(06:06):
these these chemicals specifically, once again I might not pronounce
this right either molly polychlorinated biffin als or PCBs um,
which were once used they've been phased out of products
that are made now, but they were once used in
um coolants and flame retardants. And this huge class of
chemicals called slates, and slates are in a lot of
(06:27):
your bathroom products. These are plastic softeners UM. They also
find fragrances and things like your shampoo and UM. They're
found in nail polish, all sorts of things. And the
reason why these chemicals are sort of scary to some
scientists is because they actually mimic estrogen and UM. They
(06:48):
leach pretty easily from the products that they're in and
you can inhale them, or you can absorb them through skin,
or they can leach into groundwater supply, etcetera. And basically
it's like having you know, a sur of this fake
estrogen um in your body. So they're thinking that that
could be one of the reasons why girls are hitting
puberty faster. Yeah, and they've done some research to back
up this theory. UM. One stay it was in Puerto Rico.
(07:10):
We found that girls who are exposed to high levels
of PCBs in the womb started puberty sooner than girls
who didn't. And then there were the you know, the
girls that are growing breast his youngest too, that Kristin
was talking about. Many of them had really high levels
of thealates in their in their bloodstream. And then there
are dietary culprits, potential culprits. Baby girls who have been
(07:30):
fed soy formula in particular, might hit puberty earlier because
of parts of soy naturally occurring parts of soy um
called isoflavones, and isoflavones like the PCBs and slates are
mimic estrogen in the body as well. So once again
it's just sort of like, you know, the higher levels
(07:51):
of these estrogen like particles in the body, right And
they've also in the nineties there was a big to
do about artificial bovine growth hormone. This one's pretty much
been ruled out. Um. You know, it's a hormone that's
in milk and meat, but they say that it's not
really like estrogim per se once it's really broken down,
and that it digests too quickly to really be something
that might be kick starting puberty. But the biggest reason
(08:14):
right now that they've got on on track is dietary based.
It's it's basically a supersized diet. Childhood obesity. Yeah, the
rate of obesity in children ages two to eleven is
nearly tripled over the past few years according to the CDC,
And the reason why this might be the cause for
percocious puberty is that fat cells actually produce you guessed
(08:35):
it estrogen, and um, it also produces the hormone lepton,
which stimulates the release of hormones that also trigger puberty.
So but I mean, they can look at the girls.
So basically a lot of the girls, about sixty of
girls who have shown the evidence of precocious puberty are overweight.
So it's just one more reason to watch what kids eat,
make sure they go outsign an exercise. Um. But the
(08:58):
thing about it is is that once it happens to
a young girl, you've got to do something about. It's
a very serious medical condition because when you're like six,
you're just not ready to handle the emotional challenges that
come with puberty. You know that sounds like so obvious,
but you've got young girls who are more likely to
have psychological problems and intended pregnancies and substance abuse problems. Now,
I will say, though, Molly, okay, I UM, I looked
(09:21):
up precrotive puberty in the Encyclopedia of Clinical Child and
Pediatric Psychology because I kind of wanted to look a
little bit more into why, you know, say, developing breasted
age six instead of age eight might possibly screw you
up mentally down the road, and then Encyclopedia said that
girls with precocious puberty were no more likely to experience
(09:41):
emotional or behavioral disturbances. They were at risk, but not
necessarily more likely than um than other girls. And the
psycho sexual maturation, which is one of the main reasons
why you know, people fear precocious puberty of girls, you know,
becoming sexually active sooner. This Encyclopedia explained it in terms
of psychosex sual maturity going according to your social age
(10:04):
rather than your like physical development. So if you're you know,
if you're six and you're just hanging around like six
year olds and they're not really no one's really into
boys yet or what have you. It doesn't necessarily mean
that just because that's six year old hits puberty faster,
that she's going to become more sexually active. So some
conflicting evidence. They're on the conflicting evidence on that emotional part. Well,
(10:26):
I hope the Encyclopedia didn't disagree with sort of the
physical changes that can kind of affect you for the
rest of your life, because there are a few physical
effects that precocious period that you have. They are kind
of frightening. Um, if you begin puberty sooner than normal,
you basically have an early growth spurt and you get
taller right at first, but then your bones stopped growing
after puberty, so you reach basically, um, your full growth potential,
(10:49):
you know, potentially at the age of eight, so sooner
than you should. Yeah, a little, a little stunted. And um,
girls with percocious puberty are also at a higher risk
of breast cancer because they're exposed was to estrogen for
longer periods of time than than they otherwise would be.
And estrogen exposure promotes breast cancer. And also if you
(11:09):
get your period before age eight, you're a greater risk
for polycystic ovarian syndrome, which is the condition where a
sister grow in the overraison can interfere with fertility. So
you know, in a period of eight, all of a sudden,
you can't have a baby when you're thirty. And even
though these UM, precocious puberty happens, you know, ten times
more often in girls and boys. UM, if a boy
does have does experience it, they're the same types of
(11:30):
risks for for boys as well. You know, it's not
just girls who are getting the shortened of the stick
with precocious puberty, although um, one one thing that I
read that was sort of raised an interesting question about
sort of the psychological factors of it was that it
might be boys might have an easier time dealing with
precocious puberty because it might be more socially acceptable for
(11:51):
a boy you know, in his group to be the
first one to get chest hair and grow and get
a deep voice, whereas you know, the changes for a
girl are a lot more um obvious and maybe um,
you know, a little harder to handle socially. The fact
of the matter is the average age of a girl's
first period has been dropping point three years per decade
(12:14):
since the mid eighteen hundreds. Think maybe this is a trend.
I think that it might be a trend. I think
that UM, I think that it might be uh slightly overblown.
I'm not saying that you know, if your child experience
is percocious puberty, that you shouldn't do something about it. Obviously,
all those you know potential outcomes are are aren't healthy
(12:34):
at all. But I think that um, as a health trend,
it might be overblown somewhat because a study similar to
the one that you talked about in UM came out
in nineteen seventy six, sort of saying the same thing
that UM girls are experiencing puberty slightly earlier, but overall,
the average age of UM a girl's first a construation
(12:59):
UM has mained relatively the same. Interesting, so I think
that there's room for debate. Okay, but overall, diet diet.
But one interesting thing I sort of thought that, you know,
once puberty started, it was a runaway train and there
was nothing to do about it. But basically, if precocious
puberty does start, you can reverse it. Well, how would
(13:20):
how would it be possible for for doctor too reverse puberty?
That sounds counterintuitive? Well, what you need, and you know
I'm not I'm not saying everyone can reverse puberty, but
percocious puberty you need to see a specialist in growth
and hormonal disorders called a pediatric indo chronologist, And basically
they're gonna give you a lot of hormone tests, a
lot of brain imaging scans because they're gonna be looking
(13:40):
for those possibilities UM, like brain tumors, genetic things that
could have triggered it. UM. So basically, if if something
like that might have been the trigger, then they might
treat that first and see if that just kind of
stops the puberty. Um. But if there isn't any medical cause,
you can get um l h r H or g
n r H the guns and rows of hormone agonist therapy,
(14:02):
which basically, UM, you put hormones in that block the
body's production of the sex hormones that we're triggering this
early puberty. And someone who's getting this therapy, UM, it's
probably gonna be a monthly shot and you just stay
on the medication until you reach the normal age of puberty,
at which time you go off it and everything can
proceed as normal. Well, it's good to know that there
are ways to treat precocious puberty. But Molly, I'm curious
(14:26):
to know, Um, if diet really is one of the
root causes of precocious pure puberty. Okay, it's happening into
like a lot of obest children, if maybe that could
also be one of the ways to prevent precocious puberty,
you know, balanced diet because you know, also on the
reverse end, if if girls don't eat enough calories, specifically
(14:46):
like anorectit, girls believe it. Girls who aren't taking in
enough food, um, will also delay their period. So I
wonder if the opposite is true, If you can, you know,
with a healthy diet send them off on the right,
on the right foot. It's a good it's a good ry.
And I mean think of I mean you certainly can't
hurt to try, because a healthy diet will lead too
many other things exactly besides the healthy onset of puberty. Well, um,
(15:08):
I think that's about it for precocious puberty and fat well,
eat well. And if you want to learn more about
eating well or puberty or acne or any of the
other wonderful things that go along with it, you can
go to how stuff works dot com for more on
(15:29):
this and thousands of other topics because it has stuff
works dot com brought to you by the reinvented two
thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you
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