To think DS is gay and ‘friend’ is BF

[DenimMaker]

My DS, 10, has been friends with this 11 year old boy from his football team since he joined in April.
Since about mid summerish he has been gradually going round to his and him over to ours more often. And when they’re not physically together they’re always on the Xbox playing online. I just assumed it’s his best friend and I was glad he’d made a close friendship.

However on Sunday I looked at the family laptop search history to find something I was on earlier and found searches like “boys kissing” and “guys with abs” and I was stunned. The search time was when his friend was over so they were looking at it together. I haven’t said anything to DS or DH because I don’t want to humiliate him. I want to ask him if he’s gay but at the same time I want him to tell me when he’s ready. I’m not a homophobic person so I don’t mind if he is but it’s still been on my mind all week.

Do I ask him or wait for him to ask me? Do I tell DH?

Yeah i wouldn’t agree main concern here is internet safety rather than whether he is gay or not.

Just sit and wait a few more years. No rush to know right now

He’s 10, I wouldn’t ask him to label himself at this age, it could be that they’re both gay, or that the other boy wanted to look for ‘men kissing’ to see your DS reaction, or that they were curious after hearing something from another boy at football? I remember as a young teen being very interested in lesbians because I suspected (correctly) that my aunt was one and it was something I didn’t know about (of course we didn’t have the internet in the early 1990s so I couldn’t google it)

Normal curiosity, and doesn’t mean he’s gay/bi/whatever. My DD and her female best friend looked up naked men at that age. They are both gay adults now, as it turns out.

10 is for him too young to know whether he's gay or not. I'd be more worried about what he can see on Internet though. Make sure your parental controls are strong and set time limits for browsing.

He may be gay or maybe he and his friend talked about someone they know who is gay and it piqued their curiosity. If you’re going to talk to him about anything it would be about internet safety and putting in protections/rules to keep him safe when online.

As for his sexuality, he will come to you if and when it’s appropriate.

Wait and see, OP. He's curious which is appropriate at his age.

He's ten.

Stop thinking about a ten year old's sexuality!

This.

Also are you sure the search history is from your son and not your DH as another reply mentioned?

👆👆👆

A 10 year old isn't thinking of sex.

So therefore it's not their sexuality.

I wouldn't. Ds2 fancied ds1's male friend when ds2 was that age. He's 25 and definitely heterosexual now. Well afaik?
He might get embarrassed?
I've always had open chats with mine about sexuality and that it's ok to like either sex.

When did you know you were straight?

Leave it be. He'll talk to you when he's ready, for all you know it's just curiosity. Ten is too early to start labelling.

Hes 10. Just keep an eye on what hes goggling and anyone you dont know messaging him.
Other than that leave it alone

Not that poster but all the people I was crushing on aged 10 wasn't because I wanted to fuck them.

Which is what sexuality is.

I wanted to marry Bobby Ball or Barry Gibb when I was 10. It was nothing to do with sex I can assure you 🤣

This is key. Do you have parental controls on your computer/Google etc?

I knew I liked boys at 10, I had feelings of sexual arousal in yr 6/7 I actually think it's perfectly normal to start to know who you are attracted to at that age.

He's ten. He's exploring. Sexuality is fluid. Unless you think he's in physical danger, leave him alone to get on with it. This isn't something he wants to know mum knows about.

There's a lot of horror here at 10 year olds having feelings of attraction, but I'm pretty sure there was a lot of first kisses and boyfriends/girlfriends talk when I was in year 6! It was all very chaste, but denying 10/11 year olds are getting curious about all this is a little naïve. Though I agree to check that what comes up in these searches (again, normal curiosity) is age appropriate.

OP, he might be gay, or straight, or not know yet. It's premature to label this other lad his boyfriend, but if they do both think they might be gay, how lovely that they have each other as friends.

I think the most important thing is that you present yourself in a low-key way as open and welcoming to gay and bisexual people and non-judgemental about their relationships in a matter of fact way. So not "aren't gay people amazing! let's all go to pride next weekend!" but just that there are all sorts of relationships between adults and as long as everyone is consenting and caring, it's all pretty much fine. My experience is that younger kids are themselves incredibly matter of fact about the fact that men marry men, and women marry women, and some people have two mums or two dads.

He might be gay but this doesn’t mean he fancies his friend. Gay boys and men have male friends they don’t find attractive. He’s allowed to be good friends with someone without it meaning anything.

Me too. I knew.

yabvu to give your dc unsupervised internet access

1. Whatever his curiosities he has proven himself far too young and vulnerable to use the internet unsupervised as is every 10 year old IMHO. If he was 17 I might give him some discretion but at 10 I don't think you can avoid the uncomfortable conversations. You need to tell him that it's healthy to be having these feelings whether they're about boys or girls but it's not ok to be looking for things like that online. Internet access will be fully supervised from now on. You love him and support him regardless and he can feel safe to discuss anything with you.

2. I think assigning pre-pubertal children a sexuality is a bit gross tbh. I think that we should be avoiding strong labels or identities of sexuality or gender in kids. If you can't explore and change your ideas about these things when you're growing up then when the hell can you?! If we become obsessed with labelling it then we create a generation of kids who feel that they have to fit a certain label and often they might then find it difficult to backtrack from this identity should they want to or they might feel emotional distress at having to meet the expectations of this label. Give them the freedom and safety to explore in a healthy and age-appropriate way, avoid any labels or discussions that sexualise a child (ew!) and what happens will happen.

Your absolute primary concern should be his internet use though. Surely you can see that it's this that is the safeguarding concern

He’s a child 😭 it could very well be his friend told him what the word ‘gay’ meant so he was curious or they typed it as a joke. Whatever it is, you need to talk about the internet and tje dangers.