The very young age at which little girls are asking for bras will break your brain.

I still remember the pure desperation I felt inside of that toilet stall, trying so hard to work out HOW to do the stupid thing up. Wondering which straps went where and with absolutely no clue.

And seeing as I had a mother who refused to not only acknowledge the fact that she had a daughter on the cusp of womanhood, she was also blind to the fact that she had one that quite obviously required a fitted bra, this rite of passage took place in a youth group’s toilet block with a hand-me-down bra from my best (and much more developed) friend of mine.

Now though, apparently the world has changed. Some might say dramatically so, and not necessarily for the best. In fact, recently, Stephanie Sorkin, an author of children’s books who lives in New York, was faced with a very unexpected question from her five-year-old daughter.

“She came home from camp and said, ‘Why am I the only one not wearing a bra?'” said Ms Sorkin, 43. “I was like, ‘If you don’t call it a bra, I’ll go to the store and see what you’re talking about, but a five-year-old doesn’t wear a bra’.”

Apparently, after asking around, there are many young girls, as young as five, who are wearing bra-like garments or small camisoles. Not because you know, they need to, but because it’s “cute”. Say what now?

 “This is the new undershirt,” said Sandy Sherman, a buyer for several locations of Lester’s, a chain of stores in New York and New Jersey specializing in children’s wear. “It serves the same purpose.”

 “It’s for them to wear under a shirt to give them that extra layer,” said Jil Garcia, Malibu Sugar’s president and chief executive. The company’s so-called bra camis, which look a bit like the top third of a thin-strapped leotard, are sold in around 600 children’s boutiques in the United States and Canada.

Mainstream retailers in Australia are also stocking bralettes for their young customers. In fact if you walk into any large department store today, you will be able to secure one in a child’s size 4-6.

“It’s important for us to offer the best breadth of assortment to the customer, and in this case she really feels that it’s important for her daughter to feel comfortable,” said Josh Saterman, Macy’s vice-president and the store’s fashion director of millennial, which includes children’s wear.

Oohh, would we say that our daughters, the ones who have JUST started school, would necessarily feel more comfortable with what is essentially a bra under their school shirt if not prompted by their parents?

I mean my daughter at that age was flat out remembering to put knickers on before she walked out the door each day let alone caring if she had her (non existent) boobs secured.

“My problem with bralettes as opposed to other things that kids might want is what it does to a girl’s image,” said Lori Evans, a clinical assistant professor in the department of child and adolescent psychiatry at the New York University Langone Child Study Center.

“Does it say to a five-year-old that there’s something wrong with her, that she needs breasts or that there’s an expectation?”

Is this simply an unnecessary trend perpetuated by parents for no other reason than they’re own want for their little girl to be “cute”. I mean, let’s face it, these kids are five, they aren’t going out and finding and buying these garments themselves. Somewhere along the line, this has become a thing.

Department stores only stock what sells. So somewhere out there, there are parents buying these. Surely we spend enough time being grown ups, shouldn’t we be trying to keep our children young and free from the constraints of adulthood for as long as we can?

That said, what do you think? Do you think it’s okay for five year old girls to wear bralettes under their regular clothing? Or is there a much more appropriate and necessary time to introduce these kind of garments to our girls?