Boys Will Be Boys

The man and I have had a budgetary reassessment this week, and in our discussions we have discovered that we have fundamentally differing attitudes to money. He flies fly by the seat of his pants, I need to be more organised (shocking I know). I can save very successfully as long as any money is instantly removed from my grasp and put somewhere I don’t have access to. The man on the other hand would rather just save whatever is left over at the end of the month. This is totally beyond my comprehension. What left over money? If I can get money, I will spend it.  

Are differing attitudes to money a result of gender differences?

With the man, two small boys and a boy and girl cat, I am outnumbered by four boys to two girls. Having two boys has been far more exhausting than I could ever have imagined and I have finally come to the conclusion that I may never go on to have a daughter who can be on my side. Therefore I really need to start to understand the male psyche, so I have been reading a book called Growing Great Boys by Ian Grant.

The trouble with parenting books is they make you feel solely responsible for the turn out of your offspring, as if what you do in childhood has a direct impact on how they turn out. This may be true if you are neglectful or abusive but for the rest of us (semi) normal parents it’s a frightening concept, especially to a mother of boys (or father of girls I presume). Understanding boys is a whole new world for me, and I need to get up to speed quick, because, as Grant says, “growing boys is easier than fixing men”.

After all these years of bra burning, equality and women trying to be the same as men, I, somewhat naively, thought that boys and girls were meant to be the same, and be brought up in the same way. I have gone to great lengths to encourage neutral gender roles in my sons toys. They have a kitchen and toy Dyson, as well as a workshop and tools. They have a till and play trolley and a train set. They play without bias, and sometimes I find my eldest (now 4) trying on my jewellery and “being mummy”. When the man caught him spraying perfume (in his eyes “because that’s what mummy does” – I don’t, honestly, my eyes are no more fragrant than anyone else’s) he showed him his aftershave and said “at least if you’re going to do it, do it the manly way”. All very normal, healthy boy behaviour, and I have been smugly congratulating myself on how well I have avoided gender stereotyping in bringing them up. But now I start reading this book and I learn something shocking. Newsflash: boys and girls are different.

Not just physically, but mentally, chemically, emotionally and in pretty much every area, and need to be treated as such. Reading this book has completely changed my attitude to parenting, now I’m not just bringing up boys, I’m creating MEN. That scares me. I don’t know anything about being a man. Apart from The Rules (not really an appropriate aid in bringing up boys) and the fact that boys are usually meanest to the girls they most like, I am clueless. So I am now responsible for bringing men into the world; big, scary men with horrid feet (ever met a man with nice feet?) who will eventually go on to date women (or men, I don’t mind) and my input will affect how they treat women (or men) in the future. I thought it was enough to be gentle, encouraging and caring, but apparently boys mums also have to be tough, like sport and encourage rough and tumble play. I’m not a particularly girly girl, but I’m no tomboy. I feel like I wandered into what I thought was a sewing class only to discover I’ve signed up for eighteen years of martial arts training instead.

Apparently wrestling, climbing and running around like lunatics are normal and healthy for boys and to an extent should be encouraged. And there’s a reason why my youngest won’t sit quietly and do craft for hours on end, because there’s a perfectly good bookshelf over there that he could be climbing instead. Boys explore their world by touching, tasting and feeling things, so that’s why son number 2 will spit out a meal I have lovingly prepared but happily munch on a fluffy month old biscuit he found languishing down the back of the sofa.

I’m genuinely shocked at all this. Apparently, when it comes to gender differences, nature wins over nurture every time. So it doesn’t matter how much I encourage my boys to dress up, play with dolls or talk about their feelings, they will still refuse to ask for directions or read the instruction manual. But at least they might have some money leftover at the end of the month, and I will teach them to spend it on their Mrs (or Mr).