Boys

For 6 years before I had my son, I was mom only to girls.  Of course I wanted them to have a healthy sense of the history of women and how to overcome any  obstacles related to that, etc... I read Cinderella Ate My Daughter and it changed my point of view on the princesses and pink culture and all that... But I never really thought about how boys fit in to any of that.  It seemed like a problem for parents of girls.

Well, I've been the mom of a boy for one year.  I watch him pick up and rock his sisters' baby dolls, wear their tiaras, and people giving him very "boy" gifts for his birthday... Superhero shirts, tools, cars, blue and red Legos, helicopter, truck, etc.  All amazing gifts... All wonderful and great toys.  But it is interesting.  And I don't  want to get into a whole toy thing here about how we instill this gender stuff subtly feom birth, that's a post for another time, and frankly, Cinderella Ate My Daughter is really a must read for all parents and covers all of that.

What I want to note, is that... (And we will see how I feel I. 5,10,15 years) it seems to me that fostering feminine qualities in my boy s more important than anything else I can do in relation to this issue. At least we are mostly aware of what girls have to face, and for the most part we allow them to be emotional beings (tho that being a negative label is another matter).  But boys?  We need to encourage them to pick up dolls if they are interested... To cry and let out their feelings... To hug and kiss and cry if they fall down and get hurt.  To run to mommy for a hug.  To ask a friend how they are feeling.  When they are babies, 5 years old... 30 years old... 90 years old!  Being vulnerable isn't something they should outgrow.

I don't know... But the fact that most shootings seem to be young white men, or even in a best case scenario, many men seem to reserve all emotion for sports (no wonder they put so much stock into sports, it's the only area they are allowed to have feelings)... This is disturbing.

I hope so much that I can nurture my son into a kind, sensitive, compassionate man.  His daddy is all of those things, so I'm hopeful. :)

But I think one of the tricks is... We need to keep encouraging the healthy expression of feelings and interests into adulthood.  Erase the phrase  "man up!".  Erase the idea that boys do certain activities or shouldn't do art, dance, etc.  My husband grew up doing sports and hated every minute even though he was good at them.  He felt anxiety heading to games and hated the feeling of competition... Even when he won.  He should have felt like he could share that and choose something else to practice.  

Human beings need to have and show love and compassion no matter the age or gender.