Guest post: "My little boy is a gorgeous, sparkling Lady Gaga - and he already feels judged"

[MumsnetGuestPosts]

Lady Gaga woke me up at 6.24am this morning.

She stormed into my room, platinum hair waving, four-inch glitter platforms thudding, high-pitched voice proclaiming that "the show was about to begin NOW"; we must all go downstairs IMMEDIATELY or we'll miss it.

She can be a serious diva, that Gaga. She demands a full house for every single one of her thrice-daily performances; she insists on at least five costume changes per show; she has a wardrobe bursting with bling; she never wears fewer than six spangling earrings and eight diamanté necklaces at a time. She also has an insatiable desire for ice-cream, a violent dislike of spinach, a hatred of bedtime and requires at least two stories before going to sleep at night.

She also only exists in our house. Her personality is so large that she longs to venture out into the wilds of Hackney and proclaim her Diva-dom to the world. But even Gaga isn't impervious to the one thing that strikes fear into the strongest of Diva's hearts - the judgement of her public.

Our Gaga knows that she's expected to look and act a different way: she 'shouldn't' be wearing her new eye-shadow; she 'shouldn't' be perfecting her hip wiggle dance move. Instead, she 'should' be wearing trousers; she 'should' be playing football; she should not, in fact, be calling herself a 'she' at all. Even at just five-years-old, this splendid specimen of all things sparkly is expected to hide her light under a gender stereotype.

And I've battled with this conflict myself, too. All any parent wants for their child is an easy life (in the best sense of the word) and for them to be safe and happy. We had a conviction that we'd never force our boy to be anything other than who he wanted to be, yet, when this conviction was tested, we found ourselves trying to resist fuelling his 'girly' requests. If he wanted to buy a princess magazine so he could add the attached pink lipstick to his collection, we'd try to steer him towards Spiderman or pirates. I even suggested to his best friend's mum that maybe they could buy our boy a football for his fifth birthday, because it might encourage him to play the sport. I found myself battling with prejudices I didn't even know I had.

His dad and I eventually decided that it was best that he didn't wear his 'girl's stuff' outside the house. We'd seen how it hurt our boy when his friends laughed as Gaga made her grand entrance at home - how would strangers react on the street? Instead, we explained again and again that different people like different things and tried to build up his glimmering armour.

When it became clear that our boy's passion for tutus, high heels and dresses wasn't just a brief phase, we agreed that he could wear some stuff outside the house - hair-clips, jewellery, and the more practical accessories - but by that point, he'd already decided that he didn't want to. He'd received too many questioning stares from his reception classmates when he'd tried to dress up in the princess costumes at break-time, or wear the paper flowers in his hair at craft-time.

A year on, our diva is stronger than ever. We've learnt to fully embrace and be proud of our boy's inner and outer Gaga. Her full glory may still just exist inside our house (our boy's choice, not ours), but her influence extends way beyond that. Put simply, she makes our bejewelled boy happy - and he can kick some serious arse on any dancefloor. He invites his trusted friends to Gaga's exclusive shows and has even accepted a couple of them as 'backing dancers'. Superhero toys are now stowed in our daughter's room (she's two and her favourite word is 'Batman'), replaced by many, grin-inducing Barbies.

I recently read something interesting: when Barbie was first released in 1959, guess who begged to be bought this gloriously shimmery vision in pink? Boys. Way more boys than girls. So, G.I. Joe was born. The boys still wanted Barbies, but they were bought the Macho Man instead. I wonder how many other young boys are struggling with what they 'should' be doing, wearing or being. As parents, all we can do is support them - and try and make life easier for these courageous non-conformists by helping them to choose for themselves.

[Anotheronesoon]

Your little boys sounds very sweet. Thanks for sharing your story and I wish you and your family an easy ride and happiness!

[BabyGanoush]

It is quite normal for boys to go through a phase of identifying strongly with a character from popular culture, male or female. (Girls too probably, but I only have boys so can't speak from experience there).

At 4 he demanded to be called by his alter ego "Amy". His teacher was wonderful and just went with it, said it was normal. His books, name chart, everything was Amy. For almost a year.

He grew out of it, don't know if all children do, but it was definitelythe right thing to just let him get on with it.

Embrace your kids for who they are, let them be themselves.

I was amazed how his peers and adults too just rolled with it, btw. Hope it's the same for you!

[TheWildRumpyPumpus]

Interesting reading. So do you think your son wants to be a girl? Or just likes the drama and diva-ness of Lady Gaga?

I don't have any girls but I don't think I'd let them wear 4 inch glittery heels at 5 anyway, so I find that hard to get my head around. Neither of my two boys are into the stereotypical football, rough and tumble things, they love One Direction and all that and playing with kitchens and dolls.

Bit different to putting on heels, feather boas and being a 'diva' though! Where do you see it leading?

[Nightingalemumoftwo]

why create a closet cross-dresser by letting him dress up in Gaga's outfits only in private? Why not letting him dress how he wishes in public too? For example, would he be happier if he wore a girl's school uniform?

[ashtrayheart]

I have 2 young girls (as well as an older girl and boy) and this would drive me mad regardless!

[dementedma]

Being woken at stupid o clock with demands to see one of 3 daily performances wouldnt go down well here, regardless of gender!

[Jackie0]

This is very normal you know.

[OddBoots]

I have a 15yo ds who at various points liked and identified with things society sees as feminine but there is absolutely no chance he (or his sister) would have got away with diva like attention demands - he doesn't now and he's a teenager in the midst of GCSE stress.

[munchkinmaster]

I'm not sure I'd use the pronoun her. Surely he is a boy who likes glitter etc. By saying her you are setting these things up as "girls" things and reinforcing stereotypes. Giving this persona a name promotes separateness, I'd be careful he needs to be building his own self identity, not splitting it.

You obviously love him and take great joy in his behaviour. I have girls and I'm afraid make up, earrings, waking me up at 6am do not give me joy.

[TheCowThatLaughs]

The being woken up and 3 performances a day is not something I would allow. He needs to be taught to consider other people's feelings and preferences too. I would probably just not make a big deal out of it, instead of the household having to all dance to his drum, which is what it sounds like is happening at the moment.

[TheCowThatLaughs]

I agree with munchkin about not using "she"
No matter what he likes to wear, he's a boy and that won't change. If you allow him to be she he will feel that he can't be who he is as a boy, which I assume is not what you want to convey.

[26Point2Miles]

If you are so proud of this why are you calling him a 'diva'

Does he know he can't be a 'diva' out in the real world? Not many of us get away with that once away from our indulgent parents

[26Point2Miles]

thecow I fully agree

This is another weird MN guest post!

[TheCowThatLaughs]

It certainly is, 26.2

[TheCowThatLaughs]

Sorry, 26Point2, I abbreviated you by accident!

[dementedma]

I wouldn't have a problem with him wanting to dress up in what are seen as girls' clothes. I would have a problem with the spoilt and demanding behaviour and need to be the centre of attention all the time, whatever he was wearing.

[babybelling]

NC as would out me.

My DS was taken to be a girl by strangers for most of his childhood, and it only stopped when he hit puberty. (He had long hair, a pretty face, hates football, is quiet and comparatively well-behaved when a lot of his friends are a lot rowdier, and wore reds and bright colours when all the other boys were in blue.) He barely noticed, never cared, and indeed hasn't noticed now that it's stopped. He knows he's a boy, and has never expressed interest in being a girl, but has never cared that people took him for a girl. He never bothered to correct anyone calling him "miss" in a shop, for example - half the time I don't think it registered with him that it was happening. (DS has never been a fan of bling, though I've been staggered that something so mild as a red coat and not a blue is apparently enough to flag a kid as female, not male.)

The interesting thing - and the reason why I am posting here - is that almost all the boys during his school career (both primary and now secondary) are very, very socially conservative and gender-conforming - football and swearing and very short hair - and are from very traditional, socially-conservative families, and it hasn't been an issue. There were two instances of new boys trying to curry favour with the existing crowd by saying he "looks like a girl", only to be met with bafflement and "yeah, no he doesn't" from DS's mates. DS is an outlier on other axis as well - he says out loud to his friends things like that being gay isn't a problem or a big deal, and he believes in the theory of evolution, and stuff like that, and while his friends disagree with him, it doesn't seem to bother their friendships. (He's braver than me, although I don't think he sees it as brave at all, just Stuff You Talk About With Your Mates.) I don't know how or why this mutual acceptance happened, but believe me I am very grateful.

With some other boys I knew when DS was smaller, from more liberal/relaxed families, most of them were interested in experimenting with clothes right up until they started nursery. The boy who, when we had playdates, could always be reliably found trying on the girls' pink shoes left in the hallway, every single time, stopped as soon as he got to nursery, presumably influenced by his peers. (Which we all found sad.) I don't know what would happen if this boy had carried on with the pink shoes. Perhaps nothing, perhaps something.

I suppose what I am trying to say is that you can't necessarily predict responses from other children. I would not have expected acceptance from DS's friends, but it has just always happened, and this from a crowd where gender norms are usually very strictly observed.

[Rosieposy4]

I think you need to separate 2 things here, one his poor behaviour in terms of being demanding and diva like, allied to the fact that 4 inch heels are unsuitable for any child of 5 years old and he is being allowed to watch material far too adult for his years (lady gaga is not suitable viewing material for foundation stage kids IMO), this nees to be addressed now before it stops being cute. Secondly that you perceive his very normal behaviour to be special, or possibly indicative of him being transgender. It may be, it almost certainly isn't. It is normal 5 year old behaviour. I was desperate to be a man at that age, one my sons spent his whole life in princess type dresses, another child was insistent they were a dog. I am happily an adult woman, the princess boy happily a 21 heterosexual male, and the dog child is now a normal teenager.

[babybelling]

And I do agree with munchkinmaster and TheCowThatLaughs about calling him "he", not "she". It's ok to be a boy and dress however the hell you want, and calling him "she" reinforces the idea that only girls can like this kind of stuff.

[Marcipex]

What Rosieposy said.

[OneHappyBunny]

Our Gaga knows that she's expected to look and act a different way: she 'shouldn't' be wearing her new eye-shadow; she 'shouldn't' be perfecting her hip wiggle dance move.

HE shouldn't be wearing eyeshadow (or indeed have a collection of it) because HE is five.

HE shouldn't be hip wiggle dancing, again, because HE is five.

He shouldn't be wearing heels either.

Totally inappropriate, as is the whole house dancing to his tune at 6.24am. I would put money on your friends thinking the same thing.

It's so inappropriate. It's not the same as a child playing with a princess costume at all.

[almondcakes]

I have had similar experiences to BabyBelling. DS was frequently assumed to be a girl until he was 15. It really didn't bother him.

I don't think most parents would allow their daughter to insist they got up at 6.24 am, sit through three dance shows a day or let her wear 4 inch platforms. So I'm wondering if this situation is about parenting style or anxiety about gender.

Either way, I hope the DS gets to play make believe outside of school without getting negative responses.

[Joyfulldeathsquad]

He is not a 'she' he is a boy. There is nothing wrong with boys wearing what the fuck they want.

My brother cried his heart out at five because he wanted a bridesmaid dress on in stead of his morning suit.

Being a diva - girl or boy is not an attractive trait.

My friends son picked a doll the other day at a fair instead of a football when his dad won a prize. No one cared.

[leeloo1]

I find it strange, as I've worked in a lot of reception classes and almost universally there were a few boys who loved dressing up in princess dresses etc and no-one ever commented or looked at them oddly.

I do think that the OP should find a way for her ds to be able to wear the sparkly clothes he likes as a 'boy' - unless the ds is calling himself 'she'... which is a different issue.

[JeanneDeMontbaston]

I get where people are coming from with comments about age and heels/makeup ... but isn't the OP's point that plenty of parents would let little girls dress up like this and no-one bats an eyelid? We may get judgy here on MN, but that is a fairly MN-type response. If I were to go outside now, I'd see plenty enough five year old girls allowed to wear makeup.

But, anyway. I too hope the school cracks down on what sounds like bullying to me. Surely a teacher should be encouraging all of them to play how they want to play? He cannot be the only small boy who's ever wanted to wear a princess dress, so the teacher should be making it clear that's fine.

That is interesting about Barbie, though - I didn't know that.