The term “boy mom” and “girl mom” have only become popular recently and I as a 8 year “boy mom” veteran am embracing and loving the title. While I do grieve at the fact that I will never be able to buy my daughter a sweet 16 dress, or watch Dadjogger and a girl have a father/daughter dance; I find comfort knowing that I have three healthy, talented and kind boys to shape into good men and respectful people.
Ladies First
Something that I know is an “old term” is “ladies first”. I have been trying to teach my boys that it’s not all about them. It doesn’t necessarily mean that it has to be only women who go first, but let your peers go first, let your brother go first and show what kind of person you are to people where it is not all about me! Letting someone else go first shows patience, kindness, and self respect which are lessons that all kids should learn and need to utilize in life. I love to brag about the fact that my 3 year old (at the time) now he just turned 4 will open the front door for me when we go out to school and say “ladies first mommy”.
Man Up
My boys will grow up to be men but I also want to teach them that real men do cry and can release their feelings. The stigma of men not crying doesn’t apply in our house as we let everyone openly navigate their feelings as they would like. There is plenty of room in our house for our “fake” cries that we can differentiate from kid to kid and most of those end in a laughing session.
Enjoying their cuddles/showing affection
We do a lot of hugging in our house. I want my boys to be friendly and say hello and goodbye appropriately to those we know. This shows a mentality of making eye contact with that person to show that you are listening and giving them the attention they deserve. Our three boys show affection and love to embrace their family often!
Mama’s Boy
Who will take care of me? I have been asked this multiple times by strangers in the grocery store when they see me with three boys. Comments like “Oh, too bad you didn’t get the girl, who will take care of you”? People just don’t know what to say sometimes so things like that come out which is baffling. I don’t worry about who is going to take care of me, because I plan to take care of myself. All three of the boys have gone through the phases of being a “mama’s boy” where they want me over someone else to comfort them and as they get older and those chances are diminishing, I have to enjoy them while they still want to cuddle, hug me, and want me around.
From time to time, I add notes into my older two’s lunch bag. Something like “I love you” or “Hope you are having a great day”. Without fail, they write me a note back on the front. I thought it was so special when my 5 year old came out of school with his note telling me “I love you too, Mom” but then my 7 year old came out 5 minutes later and did the exact same thing. These are moments when you know you are raising compassionate people. I thrive on these small gestures and they can really change your entire mood for the day.
Gender Disappointment
I will be honest, I was slightly disappointed after the third boy and honestly not because I wanted to be a girly mom but because I wanted to know what it would be like to parent both a boy and a girl. But the older I get, the more I realize how crazy that was. I have three beautiful, funny, healthy, and active boys and I couldn’t be any luckier to raise them into wonderful people who will do amazing things in this world. As I have matured so have my thoughts on this stigma.
Boys will be boys
I absolutely hate this phrase. I think that boys shouldn’t have a stigma around them that they are all the same. Boys are all unique people with so much to offer. Kids are all going through life learning as many lessons as they can and to group boys into that one category seems unfair to me. Whatever life presents us, we will handle it as a family unit and there’s nothing better in life than that!
Hard facts
Being a boy mom means that we have a lot of energy in this house, smelly feet, and poop jokes, but would it really be different with girls? I don’t know obviously, but I know kids are kids. I do know that I love having them wake up and all we have to do is eat and brush teeth and skip the steps of hair. I do know that I enjoy bath nights where I am not blow drying anyone’s hair before bed because it dries 3 minutes after getting out of the bath and I do know that I enjoy being surrounded by so many wonderful boys! One of the biggest lessons that I have learned in parenting is having different personality styles when it comes to parenting and discipline for each individual kid. All of our boys have different interests and emotions and you have to cater your parenting to their needs which is difficult considering you think you parent them all the same.