Boys. Besties. And the responsibility of raising tomorrow’s men.
It was day three post-birth of my second baby. We stopped at a harbourside park on the way home from hospital. It was an iconic Sydney day in which the sun sparkled off the water, bouncing soft light rainbows across my pram. Within it, my tiny baby boy, Otis, laid bunched up and peacefully sleeping. My other son Darcy, was playing adoringly with his Dad in the park. The anxiety-inducing, inevitably awkward, lockdown meeting of Darcy and Otis outside the hospital turned out to be very sweet and smooth, and my body felt good and almost elated after an uncomplicated and positive birth. In short, I felt like a superhero who had drunk the rose-coloured cool-aide by the litre. But, my golden haze was interrupted by a woman cooing over my pram, basking in Odie’s newness.
“Oh, that’s a little one! How old?” She asked.
“Just three days,” I beamed.
“You’re doing so well to be up and about.”
“He is my second,” I admitted. “My first is that little boy over there at the top of the slide.”
“TWO BOYS? Oh, I’m so sorry. It’s OK, you’re young. You can try again for a girl…”
I was left stunned. A stranger had just apologised to me on behalf of my two children for their biological composition. She was apologising for these two perfect tiny humans that I was currently seeing through a hormonally-induced dream-like filter. It didn't make sense – why are two boys something that in my experience, specifically women, feel the need to counterbalance or offset?
Tracking back slightly, we didn't find out the gender of our baby. Unofficially, I thought I knew. I was certain we were having a girl. I’d even named her and given her a personality – which, in hindsight, was similar to my own. She was a Cancerian, just like me (see the theme here?) and she was destined to be my bestie. Thankfully nine months later, when my beautiful baby boy was placed on my chest, I somehow forgot that well-rehearsed storyline and was overcome with the assurance that it was him all along. This was always how it was meant to be. I was a Mother Of Boys, caps intended.
This was always how it was meant to be. I was a Mother Of Boys, caps intended.
The stranger at the park had unearthed that memory. My heart constricted as my eyes began to follow the little girls who floated around the park in tutus and sequin shoes. I may never get that girl, my little best friend. But before I can get too wrapped up in this concept, a hot and heavy little body crashes into me, wrapping his limbs around my thighs. His energy crackling off him like popping rocks and forcing me back into the moment. “I love you Mama, and I’m a big brother. I got baby Odie this flower because I love him,” Darcy says, releasing a scrunched up yellow weed from his hand and gently placing it in the pram. His eyes glistened with pride and love. In his face, I see my little boy for exactly the human he is; kind, compassionate, soft and loving – the formula of my closest friends.
As I look here at my beautiful boys, I wonder why we as women seek that ‘bestie’ in girls and not boys, and how society allows that notion to survive? I consider myself a feminist and I’d be unfathomably disappointed if the situation was reversed – that is, if my husband was disappointed that he didn’t “get” a boy. “Why can’t girls do and be everything that a boy can,” I’d ask? “Why did you need a mini-you? Don’t put that on our children!” Well, to make me swallow my rhetoric, why can’t boys be everything girls can? Why can’t our boys be our besties? Why can’t we expect them to call their Mum’s often and regularly? Why isn’t the burden of organising the birthday lunch on them? Why do we propagate the narrative that boys won't be as stable or consistent in the family unit as they grow older?
By buying into any of the above ideas, we give our boys a get-out-of-jail-free card and further perpetuate the idea that females need to carry the emotional and mental load, right from birth. And the saddest thing about this narrative is that it suggests that boys aren’t as loving or interested – but in fact, boys are soft, sweet, loving and in need of connection and attachment, just like all children.
Well, fast forward to the future. To my darling boys, Darcy and Otis — I apologise in advance, but this is all on you guys. I expect everything from you both that I would from a daughter, maybe even more. If you don’t show up both physically and emotionally, I’m not going to be a Mum who’s ‘not angry, just disappointed – I’ll be both. But I also promise to check myself in my assumptions of what you need, how I parent you both, what I ask of you and the advice that I give you. Everything will be guided by intentions of building equality and I’ll try to never ask you to respond to anything based on your gender. I’ll just ask you to move through the world as you, which are highly loving and compassionate beings, capable of everything and more. Because if we really are to move beyond gender identities, we need to shift our expectations of relationships and the responsibilities of our children.
To quote the formidable Clementine Ford, "boys will be sensitive. Boys will be soft. Boys will be kind. Boys will be gentle. Boys will respect girls. Boys will be accountable for their actions. Boys will be expressive. Boys will be loving. Boys will be nurturing. Boys will be different from everything that the world has told them so far that they have to be in order to be a man."
It’s 2021, let’s leave the preoccupations with gender behind and agree that we aren’t raising boys or girls – but small humans who will exist and evolve according to their individuality, not gender. And more so, let’s raise boys that we want to be besties with.
Words and image by Natalie Dean-Weymark, Mother of two, and Co-Founder and Co-director of Compass Studio.