To think parenting high energy little boys is a different type of parenting?

[iwonderificould]

DS is now nearly six and I have to say I love parenting him now although he can still be quite hard work, but he’s got bags of energy, fearless, independent and fun to be around.

But thinking back to when he was a toddler … it was really hard work and not very enjoyable. He didn’t really play with toys in any meaningful way but could create chaos in seconds. One of his favourite things to do was to pull books off the bookcase and throw them across the room, or empty the cats water bowl. He was just a mini wrecking ball of energy and mischief. He didn’t even watch TV so I didn’t have that option.

We ended up out a LOT as a result. I remember my friends from the NCT group (all with girls!) commenting on it. If there was a group, we were there, we did soft play, parks, all sorts, I had so many passive aggressive sort of comments about it.

Three years later I had my second child and I understood that actually you don’t have to be out all the time. DH and I waited for her to destroy the house (sort of toddler part 2) but it didn’t happen and still hasn’t. I can stay in and do puzzles and playing.

There wasn’t and isn’t anything ‘wrong’ with ds; the opposite but I do find even now that energy needs burning. So when I read on here things like ‘when do they get time to chill / I loved staying home doing crafts and playing with mine / oh a long bath is all they need’ I realise some of us with children with bags of energy … we are doing a very different parenting journey!

My eldest is a girl but she is quite like this, we have always said she is a bit like a dog in that she needs the opportunity to burn off her energy before she can then sit and play with toys, do some reading etc.

My youngest is a boy, just turned 1 and is already very much the same way. Has been walking since 10 months, learned to SPRINT remarkably about 30 seconds after he learned to walk, sprints everywhere now, throws everything, laughs at the word no. I’ll be renewing our National Trust memberships for next year and signing back up to the soft plays annual passes again, I reckon we’re gunna need them😂

Um. Sport.

This is why loads of kids do sport? DS and DD are always on the go. Everything they "play" involves a ball or something like one. Ping pong against walls. Using hands to hit balls creating rules about what you are meant to hit. Makeshift hockey in the garden. Swingball.

They are now junior school age & do sports (rugby, tennis, hockey, golf). Its all good.

DD1 - can be infuriating in her own way but generally very girly, craft n movies type kid

DS quite high energy but also hyperfocus on random things like numbers for hours

DD2 dear God. Neither of the others has ever been to AnE, her, 6 times to date.

2yo found her climbing the 6' tall rose trellis in my mum's garden

Will jump off structures taller than my head with zero thought

In trouble for fighting at school most weeks until recently

Weekly sports: athletics, gymnastics, martial arts, swimming

Spent last summer "training for the police", doing sprints in the garden and doing press ups

Any opportunity to launch herself at something or whack something with a stick - she'll take it

And the NOISE OMG.

She is 8 and has recently started reading to herself, but prior, she's spent the first 7.5y of life basically fighting, running, and shouting

Our son has always been a very calm rule following child, he hasn’t actually needed a great deal of parenting where learning to behave was concerned as he just didn’t misbehave. He is just naturally quite placid.

Our almost five year old daughter however is the complete opposite, she’s great, but she can also be a huge pain in the bum. She’s loud (which isn’t all bad), she feels rules are there purely to be broken and she will weigh up if the bad behaviour is worth it compared to the punishment. She doesn’t know what sitting down means, and as she has CP thats actually very problematic as she needs well balanced movement, which you don’t get when you’re a human whirlwind. She does dance, swimming and skating, sometimes they clash and she does all three, she would happily then go on to sport number four, she’s essentially a jack russell.

My daughter is just like your son!

This behaviour in girls tends to be stamped on - girls are expected to sit and play nicely.

so an active boy might be take to the park to burn of his energy, where a girl will be told to sit down and stop running about.

i had a high energy girl. If i took her to the park the reactions from others was remarkably different if she was dressed in gender neutral clothes vs. “Girl”

if people thought boy there was much admiration, lots of pulling girls and smaller children aside to “let the little boy” past, lots of comments about how I had my hands full. If her outfit was girl coded the admiration turned to concern, lots of dads “helping” her down from heights and telling her to be careful…

My first boy and my girl are like this. They are crazy night owls too. And early birds 😭. But very fun. And the middle one (a boy) is chill. We chill together while the others do their thing. It’s easier now they’re older and are able to be safe alone.

Having had one high energy, wrecking ball and one placid child (both girls), I agree with you! I feel like people believe it more readily with boys and were surprised how boisterous dd was. However, dd1 did grow to be calmer later in primary school. I do know some families with kids who still need to be exercised a lot (their words) and it looks exhausting - they just don't stop moving.

Yea! We had to stop going to baby/ toddler classes where they were expected to sit down as mine just wouldn’t. Didn’t even attempt to eat in a restaurant / cafe!

I know people are saying not a not/ girl thing but I do think in general boys are more likely to be like this than girls. It’s well studied than they develop differently.

My active kids don’t like sports. One hates any sort of groups or club.

Not many eighteen month olds can play sport though, can they?

This is why (IME anyway) this type of child gets easier as they get older, as they can take part in sports and other activities where you just drop and leave. You can’t do that with preschoolers so you’re on the hook!

Not all the boys I know are like this but all the children who are, are boys.

I’m not claiming there are no girls like this or that all girls are perfectly behaved or anything though.

Oh god yes, totally different. I was always honest with people and if I was invited to a house I would explain why it mightnt be a good idea. Two occasions spring to mind where people kindly insisted that we come and claim to have childproofed. I mentioned to a friend about the bookshelf issue. She put an ironing board on a low settling in front of the bookshelf, apparently that stopped her DD. It took DS about 5 seconds to leap through the metal legs and start firing books around the room. Another had a set of Crystal glasses hanging upside down under a drinks table and insisted they had removed everything out of the way. I ran in and moved them all quickly and thankfully saved them but a couple of hours later they served tea in a fancy tea pot on a low table and within a millisecond ds pulled the top off and fired it causing it to shatter. The of course there was the usual story of people pretending to not be annoyed and me apologising etc etc. It got exhausting. One time I asked someone to watch him while I went to the toilet in a holiday house and when I came back he had unlocked a door climbed a gate and was heading head first into the pool. The person I asked, a family member had 'only gone to get a glass of water for herself'. He literally could have drowned. No matter how many times I told people how destructive he was or how intense the supervision was, they simply didn't believe me, and that's family members who should have known better. I had a second boy and a girl and nothing was ever flung around really. Toys occupied them for longer periods or they followed me around the house. They weren't on a constant rampage/ suicide mission like their brother.

Oh please don't start with that boy/girl mum nonsense. It's absolutely meaningless.

Based on years of doing break duty, I would say most children are pretty high energy and under-exercised. They are never ready to stop running about when the bell goes. They are forced into a sedentary lifestyle by school and their parents. It is one of the main reasons so many of them are overweight and/or badly behaved.

I recently had a really embarrassing consultant appointment with ds where he just couldn’t sit still, trying to pick up expensive equipment, swing round on the wheely chair, climb up on the bed … I obviously didn’t let him but I was just CONSTANTLY checking him.

It’s so tedious and stressful. I HATE this.

Boys may be more likely to be like this but this doesn't mean that Mums of high energy boys are having a completely different experience to mums of high energy girls, the experience is the same whatever the gender.

Depends on the activity.

mine hated some sports.

the sex division and perception of sport I found eye opening.

football was interesting. I signed her up as I thought it would burn off some energy, get her running around. The reality was lines of beautifully behaved preschool aged boys taking turns, waiting in line, doing drills while dads hovered and directed. While mine just wanted to run around kicking the ball as far as she could.

gymnastics, though, was a life saver. She did start at 18m in a baby class, and it was basically 45 mins of running, jumping, climbing, hurling herself into the foam pits and having a whale of a time. There was a little bit of structured coaching, where the coach got her to swing on a bar or walk on a beam. The next day she slept past 5am for the first time ever!!!

so the traditional “boy” activity was far less suitable for high energy kids than the “girl” activity.

@Yetanotherone12 i suppose what I mean is that with age comes a bit more independence so that you don’t have to be with / supervising them all the time which is pretty exhausting. I have to be out and about a lot with ds but I can sit down while he runs round now in a way I couldn’t when he was tiny.

Do they develop differently because expectations are different for boys than girls though?

boys being encourage to run and burn off energy, girls being told no and to sit down.

yes they develop differently, but chances are it’s because that development is directed differently by adults.

watch the bbc gender experiment:

even if we think we don’t differentiate, it is so innate we do it subconsciously.

@iwonderificouldI know exactly what you mean and can empathise. You are not alone.

I used to have to take them out a lot - now we're getting ADHD diagnoses.

I recently got cristised on here with some posters insisting going out every day was unnecessary.

Mine would be calm in meetings because we had time to walk miles and go through playgrounds before meetings and then had books/magazine/food/drink for periods of short calm.

But yes constant checking on them which was exhausting and sometime I thought all parents did at first but it could have been much worse TBH. Sleep was bad as well but met a family at nusury where GM was saying two generation few hours sleep and constant on the go behavior.

Mum of boys here, I’ve always joked that boys are like adolescent Labradors… (I worked in the animal care sector for years)
As long as you feed them lots, take them out for a good airing a couple of times a day, preferably where they can get muddy and carry branches, they flake out when they get home 😂
I loved those days when they were smaller, wellies, puddle suits and picnics. Now it’s standing on sidelines or listen to them shout into headphones….
Girls definitely have a different energy, I’ve got nieces who I love but I always feel more at home in the chaos that boys bring!

Oh don’t talk such shit. That is a spectacularly stupid thing to say and totally untrue.