Oh,Boy! A mom’s reflections on how raising a boy can be, well, different!

When I was pregnant with my second baby, I felt different. Though my doctor kept insisting I was having another baby girl right till the sixth month, I was pretty sure this wasn’t the case, and I was right. This feeling was not based on any scientific basis or even on old wives tales. It was pure instinct. Little did I know that this “difference ” was not going to stop with my baby’s birth. Raising a boy has proved to be a bigger challenge than I’ve ever expected. I can’t claim to be an expert, raising one son and one daughter doesn’t show a clear pattern of behavior, therefore I can’t generalize. It might be just a difference in character and doesn’t have to do with gender. It might be due to their order in the family. Being the eldest or youngest definitely matters to how parents interact with their child and to how siblings treat each other. But regardless of the reasons, my husband and I can’t help comparing between these two.

We sent both of them to nursery a little before their first birthdays. While Raya has managed to make friends with everyone since day one, and has had a best friend in every place she’s been, Zaid does not enjoy the company of kids his age unless it’s accompanied by constant adult participation. Someone older has to be there for him ALL THE TIME. He has also managed to make enemies even at the tender age of two. He shares a love- hate relationship with another Zaid from his class. They are obsessed with each other but tend to always be on each other’s tails. At the tender age of two he comes back with bruises and scratches, a blue eye once and a bumpy forehead quite often. This is not to claim that he is a victim, we have come to believe that he is the initiator of most of these encounters, if not all. He is an expert in teasing and in revenge. Ask for something and expect the opposite to be done, don’t obey his demands and expect your most expensive perfume to be held against the TV screen threatening to smash them both. Take your mobile away from him and see how he gets his rifle and starts making shooting sounds, all the while waving his rifle clumsily in your face that you could actually be hurt. Just for the record, we don’t buy him guns and rifles, he has one which is part of a Halloween army man costume, so really you can’t blame us for his hostile tendencies. While his sister could be reading, coloring or watching Tv all day, he has just recently started hearing or reading a story, and would not sit still if it lasts more than a few minutes. TV is no attraction unless it’s an animal show or something about tools and construction sites. He actually enjoys documentaries better than cartoons, and is usually more fascinated by a toy’s back rather than front, he flips everything over and starts figuring out how it’s assembled. Raya has always been sensible and obedient, she always had a sense of humor, a polite sense of humor if I might say, the other day she watched "Mind Your Language" DVDs with us, and loved them, while this guy, he finds UNDERWEAR humorous, pulling down his and other people's pants to make everyone laugh is a normal thing for him. Not to be unfair to him though, he is more focused than his sister and if I give him a mission like putting his animals in their box, he gets to it faster and actually finishes it, while she gets too involved in the toys that she starts playing again and would never get things done. But in spite of allthis rough exterior, he is mama's boy by all means. The way he cuddles when he's sleepy, the way he says mama bahebek and expects it to buy him approval for everything is so adorable. Recently, reasoning started to make an effect on him, after, say the tenth time of repeating one rule, but at least we're getting there. As I type this,

he was shocked that his sister eventually confronted his hostile attempts at taking over her Leap Pad with a big push that sent him to the ground, and that made him cry, not because of pain, but rather the humiliation of having her stand up to him, so he came and sat in my lap asking for his bottle. A big, rough, teddy bear, that's what my son is. One time I was complaining to his doctor that he is very spoilt and sometimes I don't know how to deal with him, doctor's answer was:"but Salam, you should know better looking at his father, us men we are all spoilt!" Well, there's a funny confession!

July 2006