r/australia • u/RenDenim • 19h ago
culture & society Dolly doctor - what's available for teens today, and tracking down the books
Hi all,
I have a preteen daughter. I was looking to get her a subscription to a magazine that had something similar to the dolly doctor section, but from my search nothing like this exists anymore and instead everything is just pushed to be online.
There were compilation books published years ago, but these are no longer in print.
Dr. Melissa Kang who wrote Dolly Doctor for years also has the series "Welcome To..." Though it's not quite the same as a monthly magazine that kids can write into with their own questions, and also chunks content to a small manageable amount to engage readers.
What resources are people in Aus buying or subscribing to for their kids today in this space?
Orrrr if anyone has any of the dolly doctor complication books they're happy to sell I would like to buy!
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u/rarecuts 18h ago
Going through puberty I learnt more from Dolly Doctor than anywhere tbh, good times
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u/disasterous_cape 16h ago
Girlfriend’s sealed section for me. First thing I’d do every month when I got my copy
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u/ThoseOldScientists 18h ago
Dolly Doctor was top shit at my school. It used to get read aloud on the bus on the way home. It was a communal experience.
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u/Snoozy27 17h ago
Communal experience indeed. At my school, the boys would read the Mad mags, but secretly (or not so secretly!) listen to the girls reading - and discussing - Dolly Doctor.
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u/Brutal_burn_dude 18h ago
I’m sad to hear that things like Dolly Doctor have gone the way of physical magazines. I didn’t get told anything much at home. Luckily I was a voracious reader who discovered Judy Blume in primary school and got almost all my info from there and Dolly Doctor. It makes me wonder what it’s like for kids who have parents who don’t discuss this stuff with them.
OP, if your kids are daughter I recommend two Judy Blume books- Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret and Deenie. They were a little dated when I read them in the ‘90s but they were informative and explored the topics with genuine sensitivity and insight to the experiences of young people.
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u/ZippyKoala 11h ago
I will add that Judy Blume’s Forever, although more than 50 years old, is still a fantastic example of what a loving consensual first sexual relationship should look like.
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u/RenDenim 12h ago
Thank you for the recommendation. I will add them to my list of resources to get. I want to ensure besides me being available to ask my kids have books they can read whenever they want for any topics they don't feel comfortable asking about etc.
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u/Odgal4001 10h ago
Talk to your kids’ teacher librarian at their school. They will have great ideas about appropriate books and resources, both fiction (eg Judy Blume and others) and non fiction (eg Kaz Cooke). If your school doesn’t have a qualified teacher librarian bring it up with the principal. This is just one of the many areas they can support parents and teachers, and every school should have a TL on staff.
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u/ladyangua 1h ago edited 1h ago
When she's a bit older you could add in Puberty Blues as a warning of the dangers she might need to navigate. Read it first yourself to make sure you are comfortable with the topics (date rape & drug use). And on that note, it is never too early to discuss drug use and drug addiction with your kids.
edit : Lol i see you are already familiar with the contents.
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u/threelizards 1h ago
Dolly doctor is so helpful because the questions written in are exactly the kind that are impossible for a parent to predict
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u/PsychoSemantics 11h ago
I third Kaz Cooke's Girl Stuff. Wonderful book. If you have decent op shops where you live, do regular sweeps for old editions of Dolly and Girlfriend.
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u/grimepixie 8h ago
Dolly Doctor and Girl Stuff taught me everything!
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u/PsychoSemantics 1h ago
Me too, though my parents were also good/open about all those topics too. Never felt like I had to sneak the sealed section.
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u/gossgrem 7h ago
Yes this one! I remember our friend had a copy and whenever we would have sleepovers we’d all pour through it haha.
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u/mollymoomol 5h ago
All of Kaz Cooke's books are great! I would consider buying new versions of her stuff though because she does regularly update the information in them as new science comes out.
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u/brackfriday_bunduru 18h ago
I feel like this is the kind of healthy and popular sex ed that gave millennials a healthy relationship with sex and it’s missing for younger generations.
We used to sit around as teenagers and read that stuff thinking we were being somehow risqué or taboo when in actual fact we were getting genuine sex ed lessons from trained professionals.
I agree with you. I wish those magazines were around for my kids.
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u/gnox0212 12h ago
On a more positive note - we Millennials who grew up reading dd are in general more likely to have better conversations with our kids about it when they come of age.
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u/brackfriday_bunduru 10h ago
I hope so. It’s just depressing that we had DD and Cleo and kids these days only have the fucking Manosphere, influencers, choking porn and puritanical reddit incels for sex advice.
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u/RenDenim 18h ago
Yes!! There is so much that was available to millennials like this that just... DOESN'T exist anymore?
A friend and I were talking. When we were young teens we would go to blue light discos. Don't exist anymore. When we were older teens there was an under 18 nightclub. Doesn't exist anymore.
A popular evening hangout was the disco roller rink. It closed. There is a new one now, but it doesn't have the same vibe as the one when we were kids, and it's never as busy as the one we used to go to in Surfers Paradise.
Cinemas used to have all night movie marathons pretty regularly. Our parents would drop us off at dinner timeish and pick us up the next morning! Doesn't exist anymore.
Even a more basic thing - I remember having a great map of all the local bike and pedestrian paths when I was a kid. Recently went hunting to see if this still exists, found a PDF. Emailed the council to ask if they're still available physically, oh nope digital only.... Ok so how does that help a child who doesn't have a phone? (Plus they're still formatted for print, not optimised for mobile use).
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u/melface95 16h ago
You'll be happy to know that Blue Light discos still exist in South Australia 💙
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u/RenDenim 12h ago
That's great!! Apparently the people who bought homes next to the blue light disco location on the gold coast all complained until they were shut down.... Even though blue light existed before they bought those homes -.-
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u/lemachet 11h ago
We had "socials" we called them - basically a dance or disco, whatever, at the school gym from 6-10 once a term.
These don't seem to be a thing at my kids high school. They were in primary.
Plus hanging out at the mall on Friday nights.
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u/RheimsNZ 18h ago
I had no direct need for it as a single man with no kids but I remember Kaz Cooke's Girl Stuff being quite good when I picked it up many years ago. I saw it at the library the other day, that might be a solid option. Have a look for it online
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u/Feeling-Disaster7180 18h ago
When I was about 10, I found a copy of that book sitting on my bed when I got home from school one day. My mum never acknowledged it, it was like it just magically appeared. That’s the closest I ever got to having “the talk” lol
(Great book tho)
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u/RenDenim 12h ago
Lol at 10 my dad handed my the book Puberty Blues. I'm guessing he never read it himself. That was a wild choice of an alternative to having "the talk". Like it covers themes like peer pressure etc but it has stuff like a girl having sex before she gets her period....
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u/Feeling-Disaster7180 1h ago
He probably just saw “puberty” and was like “yep that’ll do” and hurried out of the store lol
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u/Bathelomue 18h ago
Oh God these were the type of books in Albany's public library that got some nutjobs complaining to the council and creating a petition to ban. Which was rejected by council.
Backwards town, glad I moved away lol.
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u/dottispotti 16h ago
I so wish I kept all my girlfriend and dolly mags! I used to be worried my mum would see i’d been reading the sealed section so i either glued it back up or kept it sealed and read it through the opening with a torch! My library had copies and I would read every single sealed section i could get my hands on.
Sad there’s nothing like these magazines anymore, or if there is its not so mainstream and a ‘shared’ experience with your girlfriends each month.
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u/RenDenim 12h ago
Yes I think this a massive loss for a shared experience for teen girls now, especially something that's educational, answers questions they want answers but vetted by a safe, qualified adult
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u/WickedSister 12h ago
The Yumi Steins books are amazing. Very informative and age appropriate. The "welcome to your period" book is the only one I could find that mentions period cups, reusable pads, period discs etc. The rest only mention pads or tampons.
I've bought my girls "welcome to boobs", "welcome to your period" and "welcome to consent". I haven't given them "welcome to consent" yet as they're only 10, but I will when they're around 12. When they're old enough, I'll also give them "welcome to sex".
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u/gnox0212 12h ago
Hahaha I remember being on holiday, my mum snatching my magazine from me. Flicking through the sealed section. Giving a quiet "Hmf, good". And handing it right back to me.
I used to take all my knowledge from DD and answer a bunch of sex ed questions on Yahoo answers lol. Which probably explains why in my 30s I still enjoy Reddit more than I should.
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u/spakattak 15h ago
I used to sneak into my sisters room and read her Dolly magazines. She had a gigantic stack, like half the height of a full length mirror. I know the height because the mirror was leaning against the magazine stack, which itself was leaning against a wall.
Well it was a neat stack and Dolly magazine has a very shiny cover, slippery almost. I guess I didn’t stack them back quite as neatly because one afternoon, the pile toppled and knocked over the mirror, which smashed. I denied any knowledge. Still do. The above is just my thoughts on how it could have happened.
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u/Unlikely-Egg4110 12h ago
I recently bought the puberty books for my kids from here https://michellemitchell.org/shop/
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u/tilleytalley 16h ago
My mum had a copy of 'Every Woman' and got me a copy of 'Every Girl' by Llewellyn Jones. Really great books.
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u/Lanky-Principle-8407 10h ago
The welcome to books are great. I’m a social worker and have used them with kids
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u/eiiiaaaa 16h ago
I read period queen by Lucy peach when it was first released 5 years ago, and even as a 30 year old woman I found it really interesting and informative. It's very comprehensible and humerous. I'm a high school teacher and have recommended it to some of my younger teen students. I wish I'd learned the stuff in it when I had been that age! I have my copy set aside for my own daughter when she's old enough.
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u/Educational-Sort-128 9h ago
I would rather have read the books
To myself than what occurred in my household which was graphically illustrated books about procreation which my mother would pore over and spend way too long pointing out
erect penises. Unbelievably awkward and cringey.
We did have a copy of the Little Red School Book which was translated
from the Dutch and very racy.
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u/pregers_ 11h ago
Chantelle Otten is a fantastic resource in this space. Her book “the sex ed you never had” would be great for someone your daughters age
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u/OneUpAndOneDown 18h ago
I just had a cringe moment remembering that Dolly doctor referred to girls as "dolly birds".
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u/MORTYC187 18h ago
I can smell my high school girlfriend’s Impulse deodorant reading this title.