Sad tonight - ds1 told me he wants a Mummy and a Daddy at home...

[Dottydot]

I'm being completely self indulgent, but allowing myself to get all sad and emotional because during a daft argument with ds1 he said he didn't want 2 Mummies, but a Mummy and a Daddy who lives at home (his Daddy lives about 1/2 mile away at the moment).

Dp and I knew this kind of thing would happen, but he's only 4..!

So someone please tell me it wouldn't matter what our family make up is, he'd be wanting something different and is just lashing out to hurt me.

(By bedtime he was telling me he's glad he's got 2 Mummies and he loves me - but that's not the point...).

Sorry, haven't read all the posts - but in the last couple of months, Ds, 4, has MOANED that he has a daddy and a mummy instead of 2 mummies like his friend, said he would 'send daddy to the poor children' when we were clearing out his old toys, become indignantly annoyed because we should all be the same colour, and he's going to get a light brown mummy who looks like him, going to leave us and live in Scotterland, insisted that he is vegetarigen like his friend max, NOT like us....it goes on and on and on....

Dottydot - a lot of it is just 4 year-old 4-ness. Some of it is absorbing that there ARE things about some children and their lives that are a bit more different than others. We get some of that, too - is Ds the only one with a small foot? You will deal with that really really well, and give your boys the self-estem and language to be able to talk about their lives with confidence and pride, I know you will.

And when they are processing that sense of how differnt / the same are they frm thier friends, i think they 'try it out' at home, on you. The fact that they are doing that, i think, means they are actually starting to own it.

Haven't read the whole thread - sorry - but agree with www etc saying that kids say things - all kids say things! Ds' best one was about a week before ds2 was born, saying to me 'I don't love you Mum - and once the baby is born you can go and live in London.' But he doesn't mean it at all, and he did apologise (he's 4 btw) - it's just a weapon in his armoury! Sorry you're feeling sad.

Over the past few years I've had from my three children aged 2 upwards:

I hate you
I'm not your friend
You're not coming to my party
Tom's mum is much nicer than you
You've ruined my life
Go away Mummy
I won't let you read me a bedtime story
It's much more fun at Sophie's house than here

And I'm sure there's more to come as the teenage years kick in.

You just have to let it wash over you. It helps if they say something so outrageous you can laugh at it tends to take the wind out of their sails rather. Do your best not to let it upset you if they see it gives them power you're more likely to get a repeat performance.

And I don't think it's about your family set up -- my children are v. matter of fact about other kids' families, ranging from complicated divorce/blended family situations, through same-sex families right up to one of my children's classmates whose parents are both in prison.

Sometimes with ours we go through all the different families we know to see the variety. i.e. dd1's school friend lives with aunt, her mother and father are both occasional visitors. other children live one week with one parent and one week with another. others live with 2 mummies. one lives with biological mummy and her partner half the week, and her "other" mummy the other half. etc. There are loads who don't live in the standard nuclear family, i'm sure you must know a fair few too. that might help him realise that he's not that unusual in not being in the traditional family pattern.