Raising Girls [Paperback]

Melissa Trevathan (Author), Sissy Goff (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1, 2007

'My six-year-old fusses with her hair for hours. Is this normal?' 'Yesterday my seventh grader was all sunshine. Today she's wearing black and won't leave her room.' 'I'm worried my teenager may have an eating disorder.' In today's complex world, parenting a girl is harder than ever. It takes more than love. It takes insight into the things that make your daughter tick as she grows from childhood to young adulthood. Drawing on the authors' fifty-plus years of combined counseling experience, Raising Girls takes you inside the mind and soul of your girl. You'll obtain seasoned, expert insights on * Your daughter's different stages of development from ages zero to nineteen * How you can effectively relate to her at each stage * What is normal behavior, what isn't, and when and how to intervene * How to deal with self-destructive behavior such as eating disorders, cutting, or experimentation with alcohol * ... and much more Spiced with stories, humor, and much reassurance, Raising Girls will help you encourage your daughter, challenge her, love her, and help her discover who God is creating her to be.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

“My six-year-old fusses with her hair for hours. Is this normal?”
“Yesterday my seventh grader was all sunshine. Today she’s wearing black and won’t leave her room.”
“I’m worried my teenager may have an eating disorder.”

In today’s complex world, parenting a girl is harder than ever. It takes more than love. It takes insight into the things that make your daughter tick as she grows from childhood to young adulthood.

Drawing on the authors’ fifty-plus years of combined counseling experience, Raising Girls takes you inside the mind and soul of your girl. You’ll obtain seasoned, expert insights on
• Your daughter’s different stages of development from ages zero to nineteen
• How you can effectively relate to her at each stage
• What is normal behavior, what isn’t, and when and how to intervene
• How to deal with self-destructive behavior such as eating disorders, cutting, or experimentation with alcohol
• … and much more

Spiced with stories, humor, and much reassurance, Raising Girls will help you encourage your daughter, challenge her, love her, and help her discover who God is creating her to be. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Melissa Trevathan has been a youth director, a teacher, a retreat leader, and is now the founder and executive director of Daystar Counseling Ministries in Nashville. She's worked with kids, teenagers, and adults for over 40 years. She's been a guest on TV and radio programs in the US and Canada, and cowrote two other books with Sissy Goff. When she isn't counseling, writing, or teaching seminars, she hangs out with her old English sheepdog, Molasses. SPANISH BIO: Melissa Trevathan, licenciada en educacion religiosa, es la fundadora y directora ejecutiva de los Ministerios de Consejeria Daystar. Es miembro de la Asociacion Americana de Consejeros Cristianos y cuenta con mas de veinte anos de experiencia en consejeria. Dicto cursos de postgrado de consejeria de adolescentes y participo como invitada en programas de television y radio en los Estados Unidos y Canada. En las actualidad reside en Nashville, Tennessee.

Sissy Goff has been the director of child and adolescent counseling at Daystar since 1993. She's been a guest on TV and radio programs across the US and Canada and speaks at churches, schools, youth conventions, and parenting seminars. She's written for CCM magazine and cowrote two other books with Melissa Trevathan. Sissy lives in Nashville with her little Maltese, Noel. SPANISH BIO: Sissy Goff, licenciada en educacion, licenciad en consejeroor profesional-MSHP, es directora de consejeria a nonos y adolescentes en Daystar. Es miembro de la Asociacion Americana de Consejeros Cristianos. Participo como invitada en programas de radio y television en los Estados Unidos y Canada. Es oradora en varias iglesias, escuelas y organizaciones juveniles. Asimismo, da clases sobre como formar a las hijas. Actualmente reside en Nashville, TN.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 18 and up
  
• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Zondervan; annotated edition edition (May 1, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0310272890
• ISBN-13: 978-0310272892
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.3 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #338,412 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Help and Hope for Moms with girls, May 7, 2007

By 

Hopeful mom - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Raising Girls (Paperback)

As a mother of a girl, I have found great information, perspective, wisdom, and a healthy dose of hope in this warmly written book on raising a girl. I've read many parenting books in recent years and this one offers a few things many don't. First, it gives insight into how well documented stages of development play into a girl's spiritual development - how girls understand and receive God in each developmental stage. This has helped me as a Christian mom understand my daughter's relationship with God better and know how I can encourage her to grow in it.

Secondly, Raising Girls is full of hope and perspective. As parents, we hear plenty about the dangers and pitfalls facing our girls and those are certainly real. These authors seem to be saying, while all that is out there, God is bigger. They point the reader to God and the hope He offers by giving us a new perspective on our day-in-day-out interactions with our daughters. They give a glimpse of how all we are and have and will experience with our girls can work together for a very hopeful future. This has helped me to panic less!

Lastly, it is just fun to read. Reading Raising Girls is like visiting with a great friend who encourages and challenges and tells some really great stories too. It certainly fits the reader who "reads to know they are not alone" -especially when it comes to parenting a daughter of any age! In Raising Girls, you'll find a friend.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great advice from Christian point of view, September 26, 2007

By 

M. Groos (San Antonio, TX USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Raising Girls (Paperback)

This is a very thoughtful look at the problems and joys of raising girls. The authors are clearly very knowledgable and committed to helping girls to grow up to be who they were meant to be, secure in God's love and their place in the great scheme of things! I love the way they use case histories & stories to teach. As a mother of 3 girls, I found this book very straightforward in dealing with the issues that young girls and adolescents face, but also helpful and encouraging.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars an ok christian book for parenting girls, March 8, 2010

By 

Jesse "Jessica Lowery" (Ohio, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Raising Girls (Paperback)

A book by Melissa Trevathan and Sissy Goff, this book is the one Amazon recommended to me as a complimentary book to "Wild Things: the Art of Nurturing Boys".
When I started reading this book, I was surprised and glad to see what a Christian focus it took - there was no trying to be sly about Christianity in this book. But, I was dismayed when I read that book authors were older women who were counselors and yet had never been married and never had children. I wondered how I could take their advice seriously, when I would be able to write off everything they said with the old, "Well, they've never lived this out. and they don't know what it's really like outside of the clinical environment." However, I came to repent of that attitude as I realised that they actually had an objective voice (or voices) that I did respect. Moms can tend to view, or skew things in a way that is biased by their own experiences; but these women didn't have that at all.
That being said, I think overall it was a helpful book - but a lot lighter fare than "Wild Things: the Art of Nurturing Boys". Although the authors spoke more about being a Christian parent; they also tended to tell a lot of stories and spend time on what I might call "fluff".
It does go into all the relationships in a girls life: her and her mother, her and her father, her and her siblings, her and her grandparents, etc.. And I think the descriptions of the different developmental stages were pretty accurate. So, the book does get my recommendation - just be aware that there is some "fluff" and that the authors are not parents.