Gender Norms, Feminism, and Parenting the Boyest Boy Who's Ever Boyed

I have known since I was a child that my first child would be a girl. A little witch to follow in my footsteps and learn to cook and to bake and to train horses and change a tire and sew a sweet dreams pillow. I have known this since I was a child.

Then I got pregnant.
"Der mentsh trakht un Got lakht."
Man plans and God laughs.

I found out about my pregnancy at about 4 weeks. 

Around 6 weeks, I started having dreams. Simple dreams, message dreams. 

I was sitting in the pasture at my first house, my baby boy next to me on a blanket. 

A few weeks later, I held my little boy as we walked through a park. 

A few weeks later, my mother (deceased) talked to me about raising boys. 

Yes, Universe, I got the picture. 

So, I wasn't surprised when my son mooned the ultrasound tech at 20 weeks, flashing his little testes and penis as clearly as an ultrasound can possibly show. 

I wasn't surprised. 

Just devastated.

I cried hysterically the entire way to the car, my husband supporting me as I stumbled, eyes so swollen I could barely navigate the stairs. 

For days, I cried my goodbyes to the little girl I'd wanted, and prepared to raise a boy. 

Then, one day, I read an article about how in some ways it was 'easier' to raise girls when you're a feminist- their struggles will be the same, their fights, etc- but raising boys as a feminist is harder, and, the author argued- even more necessary. She pointed out that these days, girls are raised to be allowed  a leeway for 'toughness,' and 'tomboyishness,' that many of us weren't. But boys don't get the same leeway- they're still expected to be manly men who don't cry or show emotion- unless it's to their partners later, when they're expected to be sensitive feminist gentlemen. Um, wut?

Gloria Steinem sums it up best: 

So I vowed to raise my son more like I'd raise a daughter.Instead of choosing a bunch of blues for him and monster trucks, I continued to ask for gender-neutral clothes. Unsurprisingly, I still received a lot of BOYBOYBOYLOOKATMEIMABOY stuff, and little of it I kept- But I also put him in pink cloth diaper covers, tie-dyed shirts, etc. The goal was to encourage whatever he liked, whether it was monster trucks, ballet, or both.

The goal was- and is- to raise a boy who understands privilege from all of the places in which he experiences it (let's face it, as a white male in an upper middle class home who will be well-educated, he's probably going to have a lot of it. I can't speak yet for if he'll be more than an ally to the LGBTQ+ community, but he's got a lot of other privilege markers), and can be an ally to all of the communities with which he interacts. 

To that end, my son (31/2 as of this writing) knows that most boys have penises, and most girls have vaginas, but that we have friends who are exceptions, and that you're a boy if you say you're a boy, and a girl if you say you're a girl, or you can be neither. He knows that if he's not sure, he should ask, "Do you like being called a boy or a girl better?" to respect peoples' gender identity. 

He knows that some boys have long hair (he does) and some girls have short hair. He knows that some boys wear nail polish and bows, and some girls ride motorcycles (his mommy does), and that there's no such thing as a 'boy toy' or a 'girl toy' because anyone can use any toy. 

He knows that he's allowed to cry and no one will ever tell him to, "man up," or that "boys don't cry-" or if they do, his mommy will set them straight. He knows he's not allowed to tell girls that they can't do something because they're girls, and that he can do anything he wants, short of giving birth, and technology might get there one day. 

Yes, my son is the Boyest Boy Who's Ever Boyed. He loves all things mechanical, and takes them apart obsessively. He wants to be a mechanic, and go to a nearby STEM school because, "they'll teach me to fix cars and motorcycles". I let him pick out most of his clothes, and his t-shirt drawer is full of monster trucks, Lightning McQueen, motorcycles, and anything else that has an engine. But he also sometimes chooses tie-dye, loves to wear his kilt and stick-on earrings, and gets mad if I smear his toenail polish while painting. My boy who hates when people mistake him for a girl (long hair and earrings will do that), but has learned to say, "Thank you, I'm a boy."

I'm raising the Boyest Boy Who's Ever Boyed... but that Boy still says that girls can do anything boys can do, that his mommy rides a motorcycle, and his Max loves to cook, and all of our friends should be able to get married like Mommy & Max are, no matter who they love. 

I'm raising the Boyest Boy Who's Ever Boyed, who asks before giving hugs or touching his friends, who expects to be asked by adults before being grabbed/tickled/ hugged/picked up and enforces his, "No," with confidence that mommy will back him up because touch requires consent- always and at all ages. I'm raising a boy who believes that #blacklivesmatter, and that if someone asks him to keep a secret from mommy or Max, that that person is almost certainly making a bad choice and mommy needs to know about it.

I'm raising the Boyest Boy Who's Ever Boyed who loves dirt bikes and dancing, who hates to get his hands dirty but likes working on cars, and who insists on helping me bake. My boy who loves books and reading and being gentle with pets and rough-housing with mommy and having tea parties with her- and anyone else who'll sit down long enough.

I'm raising the Boyest Boy Who's Ever Boyed, who understand that he needs to use his words about his feelings, to tell me when he is hungry, angry, lonely, tired, or just needs a hug. Who knows that he won't be punished for any of those things, but that identifying and articulating his emotions is hard, but gets him what he needs a lot faster. 

I'm raising the Boyest Boy Who's Ever Boyed, my feminist boy who I love so much more than that imaginary daughter who's never sat on my lap, never rubbed dirty hands on my clean work clothes, never kissed my cheek, never screamed in my face for no reason, never looked up at me with a 100watt smile and said, "Guess what? I love you, Mommy!"