Boys And Girls Are So Different — It’s Like My Son Is Literally Another Species
The #BoyMom Facebook groups did not prepare me for this.
When my husband and I found out that our second child would be a boy, I freaked out. Our firstborn was a girl, and I knew nothing about raising a son.
Now that I’m a #BoyMom, I’ve learned that boys and girls are even more different than I’d anticipated. For example, my daughter enjoys typical girl activities such as playing with the dollhouse my husband built for her, while my son loves to swim in the pond behind our house, disappearing beneath the surface for hours at a time. When he finally emerges, his entire body is wreathed by a glowing golden aura. He tells me that the microscopic aquatic creatures “recharge his life essence.” Typical boy, right?
If you visited our home, you’d have no doubt whose room is whose. With only occasional reminders, my daughter keeps her room (which we painted pink before she was born) neat and clean. My son’s room is a disaster area! I can’t walk around in there without tripping on one of his toy trucks or Nerf guns — and often I’ll open the door to the sight of all of his Legos floating several feet in the air. Usually, they simply hover, but sometimes they fly en masse to form intricate geometric shapes. Boys gonna boy!
My kiddos couldn’t be more different in how they dress. I’ve filled my daughter’s closet with head-to-toe pink outfits and lots of ruffles and sequins. But when I take my son clothes shopping at Target, he demands that we fill our cart with bubble wrap and aluminum foil. When we get home, he immediately goes to his room and constructs a sort of synthetic cocoon. By the time he “hatches” several days later, he’s usually grown a few inches and put on several pounds. Testosterone’s a hell of a drug!
Family activities can get pretty wild at our house, thanks to my silly son. For example, last week the three of us made chocolate chip cookies. My daughter (wearing the “Future Mommy” apron I made her) had barely finished stirring the batter when my son grabbed the metal beaters and started gnawing on one. Apparently, it wasn’t to his liking, so next he grabbed the mixing bowl. Suddenly, a second mouth materialized on his forehead, and he poured the cookie batter into it. That Y chromosome is pretty wacky!
Even though my son turned out to be different from my daughter in ways that the parenting books and the members of #BoyMom Facebook groups did not adequately prepare me for, my bond with him is just as strong. How silly that I was so worried about having a boy. I love him very much — no matter how many mouths he has.
Kate Antoniades is a writer and editor whose humor writing has also appeared in Points in Case, Weekly Humorist, and Little Old Lady Comedy. She is very bad at reading maps. You can follow her on Twitter at @kateantoniades.
