Ds3 wants to be a girl

[tumbledrierfault2]

Hi just wondering if anyone else has had a similar situation. My DS is 3 (will be 4 in spring) and since he watched frozen last Christmas he has been obsessed with Elsa. He loves magic and I thought this was the main driver behind it - he wanted to be a witch for Halloween etc and all of his games involve being magical. Recently though he's started to want to be a girl in every game - he wants to be the owlette in pj masks, only wants to be a princess or a queen wants to dress up like a witch not a wizard and loves to dance and twirl singing his favourite Disney (princess) songs. He doesn't ask for girls clothes or toys really he enjoys more creative toys like playdoh and crafts etc all of this is fine but what's stated to worry me is recently for the last couple of weeks he's started to say he wants to be a girl or that he is a girl and I'm not quite sure how to address it - I've told him he is a boy and that boys and girls can do anything they want to do and that nothing is specifically for boys or girls - cue but girls are princesses or girls are queens which is of course correct. I'm kind of at a loss as to how to address this and would love to know if anyone has had a DS act in a similar way for such a long time - lots of people have said it's probably a phase bjt wr are pushing a year and he's still princess mad if anything it's getting more extreme. I feel worried he's going to be left out in school or teased - he's such a sociable wee boy but he is sensitive too and I know that being teased or mocked for the way he's acting would deeply upset him.

My 3 year old GS thinks he’s Peppa Pig. He can be Peppa Pig if he wants to. He wanted to be called Digger about 6 months ago, running around the place with his hands opening and closing in front of him and shouting, “I am a Digger. Feed me dirt”…. It lasted about 3 months. I’m just wondering what other delights we have in store when he’s outgrown Peppa…. 😂

Bat Qeen 🤣

*Queen

Sorry, I was laughing too much

@TheBugHouse

If it helps my ds thought he was a cat for about two years at the same age! Think it was brought on by postman Pat! I had to mioaw at him during tantrums. He insisted he was a cat and not a boy. All his toys were toy cats and he miaowed at them too. It gets better in time!

Why do people always say this. It doesn't help. It's completely different

Ds was like this. It was about another 4 years before he decided to identify as she.
She's very happy. That's the most important thing.
However he feels, let him be him and be happy

Can you spell out what the difference is, @hadtoomanymincepies ?
Changing species and changing sex are both impossible. He could identify as a girl, but this is a small child we're talking about, not an older person who has become convinced over time that they have a mismatched gender identity.

Sorry that's in response to your first post, not your second.

In the 1960s I wore a duck hat and demanded everyone call me Donald. I also quacked at folk.
This lasted a year - it drove my parents mad !

Funnily enough I wasn’t a duck

Quack!

He’s three years old. My dd at that age spend half her life running around saying ‘I’m Gecko, I’m Gecko.’ I think my son was iron man for at least a year in primary school.

He loves Elsa. He likes pretending he’s her. Normal and fine. The whole ‘oh but I want to be a princess and they need to be a girl’ is irrelevant because he won’t be a princess because he isn’t a female member of the royal family. It’s just all normal pretending and he can be Elsa if he wants.

This is totally normal for young children just carry on doing what your doing and n d let him be him.

Sometimes older generations have trouble with the girl things and boy things ie boys can't like pink which is so silly. That's where the bat queen issue would come from. But then there's the opposite where people can be quick to label and assume that if a child wants to be a girl this is an identity issue.

Let boys and girls be comfortable to be what they want to be and they will grow up much more well rounded for it.

It's a shame that males are judged if they like colourful, flamboyant clothes. Look at the Georgian era - clothes for men were colourful, embellished and tactile. I grew up in the glam rock era with bands like The Sweet and artists like Mark Bolan, David Bowie. This continued into the 80s too - The Human League, Boy George etc. I personally had a huge crush on Adam Ant, but only in full make-up! Nobody young batted an eyelid that they didn't conform to strict gender stereotypes.

Gender roles seem so proscriptive today. Now, if Harry Styles wears a frilly shirt and lip gloss the media raves about him breaking gender stereotypes.

Hopefully the trend will go full circle and it will again be acceptable for males to wear bright colours and makeup without telling them they're born in the wrong body. It's just clothes and hair - your little boy wants to be a princess because he sees only females are allowed to look like that. Tomboys get pressure from the other direction as they don't fulfil the girl stereotype. It's madness really.

My daughter was an all singing, all dancing, all dressed up frozen, sounds of music and mary poppins fan at that age.
She's older now and only has eyes for Jeremy Clarkson. She wants to be a fat bloke in his 50s... in a bugatti, goes without saying apparently

My son wants to be a tractor. Or should I say he IS a tractor?

He's role playing. don't overthink it. Get comfy reassuring him that he's perfect just the way he is. Get whatever toy he is exploring. See the world through his eyes whilst he still let's you look.

Sounds totally normal to me. At such a young age they still live in imagination land where the sky is full of rainbows and cats dance the tango. I'd just let him get on with it and not worry.

Leave him alone and stop making a big fuss of this. My brother and I (very close age) loved playing “dress up” and role play and we would cross dress until late primary school age. I am very girly and he is definitely not trans. If you keep saying “you’re a boy. You can’t wear dresses and pretend to be a princess” then he’ll grow up thinking he’s not normal and that maybe he’s a girl.

It sounds like you are handling it well. My DD was a puppy for about a year. Complete immersive role play including cocking her leg at trees when out for walks and answering every question with barks and whimpers.

Don't worry about other people. Your son won't

My DS has variously been a train, a princess, a tractor, and a robotic vacuum cleaner. At 5, I just tell him he can be anything he wants, do whatever he wants in the future, play with whatever he wants, wear whatever he wants (dress up day he was a princess, the next one a builder in a skirt).

Eek why did you so badly want to correct him saying "I'm the bat queen"? It's lovely that he's expressing his imagination. It doesn't mean anything deep. You seem very bothered about what other people think of you and your child? But just let him be a child and keep playing.

My DD changed her name for a year at age 3-4 because she wanted to be the same as a character in a film. It's what children do.

My dd was a dog. She used to have her afternoon nap curled up on a big cushion and I had to put water in a bowl. She always wore a tail on elastic round her waist. She only answered to whatever her dog name was.

It was useful if I wanted anything from upstairs, she was a good fetcher.

It lasted a whole year.

How many girls in real life grow up to be princesses or queens? About 10. And none of them look like Elsa.

So it's not that great an argument even for girls.

Let him be, it's a normal stage of development.

I love the way that being inteterested in arts and crafts is viewed as a gay sign post for a boy.
So much work to do.
Let kids be kids.

My son was the same. He loved dresses and would dress up as a princess at any opportunity. He often would go out in them as well and I was aware of some looks from people, which is sad as he was only 3! My other son loves to play with dolls and hairdressing. Son 1 grew out of the princess stage and is now a very stereotypical boy. We just always followed whatever they were interested in and I think my first son just loved glitter and colour - which is hard to get with stereotypical boys clothes and toys.

Kids are weird. You smile, indulge him, and take lots of photos for his 18th. He'll be a boy again soon enough.

I hate steretypes so much.

It shouldn't even be a thing to be concerned about.

A boy, likes stuff..
But because it's stuff people judge as 'girls' it's some how a concern about the boy... Whilst he just likes stuff..

Let him like stuff. Plonk him in a toy shop or a clothes shop and let him pick exactly what he wants without worrying it has deeper meaning.. (it doesn't have any deeper meaning and no hand wringing is necessary)

Imma sit here now and remember the years I was convinced I was a ghostbuster. Running around with a back pack and the hoover hose stuck in it. (I was.convinced ghosts were real and I was going to catch them when I was older..)

DF was obsessed with clowns at that age abs for a very long time. Dressed like a clown, read books about clowns, watched things on tv with clowns in, said he wanted to be a clown.

His DM just went along with it and he grew out of it at about 8.

He's an electrician now so never did transition