Gender Neutral? Who are they kidding? Sep 30 '01    Write an essay on this topic. Tweet The Bottom Line Raise your child or children the way you think works for your family. Let children be who they are instead of trying to make them fit a dull gray mold. I have been reading and listening to so much talk these days about "gender neutral" and I must say it may be politically correct but in the real world I do not think it will work. I was raised to believe we could be anything we wanted to be but certain tasks around the home we delegated to the men and women. Our home some things were modified since there was my sister and me. We had no brother to do a lot of the “man” jobs so I felt that it was my responsibility to do what I could since I was the oldest. I have tried to raise my children with similar values. I feel that it is my responsibility to stay home with my children and raise them if I can. My husband works as a professional truck driver so I am basically mom and dad all the time. This puts me in role I was not raised to take. I was raised to be the caregiver, the mom, not the dad. Not the one that has the man to man talks with my son but I am learning. I was taught to stand on my own two feet but I never realized it would be so hard as I got older. Do I want my children to be gender neutral? No I do not. I want my son to open the door for a lady. I want my daughter to be a lady and my son to be a gentleman. I want my son to have a good job and be the “bread winner” so his wife can stay home and enjoy her children, my grandchildren. I want my daughter to get married and be a “stay-at-home-mom” like I am now. I worked when they were little and I missed so much. Yard work? I did it. Trash to the road? I did it. Dishes? My sister and I shared that chore. Other household chores we shared with mom. When it came time for the car to be worked on or the lawnmower to be fixed I was right there with dad learning how to do it. Did it make me feel less of a girl or woman? No. I just felt more confident that I could stand on my own two feet and fix things. Both my children can run the riding lawnmower and the push mower. My son runs the Weedeater. My daughter does not want to learn. That is fine with me. They have learned to work as a team and help each other. I can hear my grandfather telling me that my daughter (his great granddaughter) does not need to run the lawnmower. In his time the men did all the yard work that involved machinery. Does it make her any less of a woman because she can run the mower? No, not at my home. Clothes? When my son was born we dressed him in blue, bought dump trucks and all the boy toys we thought he should have. He had cowboy boots, a cowboy hat and John Deere green overalls. When our daughter was born she was dressed in pink, laced up with bows in her hair and little socks with lace. She had the little dresses with butterflies or flowers. Yes we put our son in blues, greens and reds or most any “bright” color. We put our daughter in every possible pastel color we could fine. Somehow in the confusion of my life as a new mom it was comforting to me to have my son in his John Deere green overalls with the little tractor on them and his cowboy boots on his feet. It was also in my comfort zone to put my daughter in every pastel colored outfit I could find. Is someone going to try to tell me I was a bad mom for doing that? I think not. Some girls will prefer darker colors or the more “manly” clothes or jobs. Ok so are we supposed to tell her she cannot wear those clothes or do that job because she is a girl? I do not think so. Let her celebrate her womanhood and let her have a choice. Right now my main concern is getting my children clothes that fit and look nice. Color is not a major issue. If my son wants the bright orange shirt with the skate boarder on it, ok fine as long as it fits! If my daughter wants the bright red jeans (not my first choice) that is ok too as long as they do not look like they are painted on. Toys? (store bought or found in the back yard!) My son had the bike that looked like a motorcycle and all the little toy trucks we could find. We got him a My Buddy doll because when our daughter got one he wanted one. She had dolls ranging from Barbies to Raggedy Ann and Andy. She had Popples and Rainbow Brite. When our daughter was little she really liked bugs! Any kind of bug, it did not matter. She would pick them up, look at them and keep them in a glass jar. Now she HATES any kind of bug. My son is the exact opposite. When he was little he hated bugs. His sister would toss bugs on him and make him scream. Now he is the one at 15 who likes bugs and devils his sister with them! He is the one tossing the bugs now. My children never fit the conventional mold of boy or girl toys are they grew older. They began to share toys. I remember when my son was about 10 or so he got very upset because his boy dolls did not have wives. What did we do? We bought him his own Barbies for his Kens. He had Grecian soldier dolls and he decided they needed wives too. We got him some. His Ken dolls came with a little boy named Tommy. No biggie until Tommy needed a mom and then we got him one. Do I think this made him a sissy? Nope. He is fine. He is into Gundam Wing and DragonballZ Z. He likes model cars and Nintendo. Doctors? My son likes men and my daughter likes women. No biggie for me. I prefer a woman especially when it comes time for the yearly breast exam or Pap smear. Old fashioned you say? Maybe so but I am just not comfortable with a man looking at me with out any clothes on. There I said it. Maybe I am bashful or maybe it is my mom’s influence or my grandmothers. I don’t know. I just know that as a child when I was sick or hurt I found my mom or my grandmom. Dad was the one to fix my bike if I broke it. Now that my children are teenagers, dating is an issue. As a teenager beginning to date I took comfort in knowing my dad was the “man” of the house and God help anyone who hurt me. I liked him intimidating the boys when they came to the door. Somehow it made me feel safe knowing he was watching over me and doing the “dad or man” thing. Don’t get me wrong, my mom was good at it too but dad, standing 6’ 2” in the door was more intimidating than my mom at 5’2” was. I have to find my ground as the 5’5” mom and stand 6’ tall. Women talk? When I crossed the threshold from a young girl into a young woman and began needing feminine supplies, it was mom who taught me that. There are just some things that are woman talk like there are some things that are man talk. That again is MY comfort zone. It may not be yours. Man talk? I had to cross the line into the man talk world when I caught my son in the shower relieving himself. “Ok, don’t panic” is what I told myself, “You knew this was coming and you knew he was doing it you just know for sure now”. My son was embarrassed by me having to talk to him but I was the only one around. His stepdad was in California so I was it. We got through the situation but I still felt it was a “man talk” thing. In my little corner of the world I like my kids knowing who they are and what they are. Now with that being said I know that in the real world anything is possible. I know that my son could turn out to be a bum after he leaves my home and that will be his choice. I know my daughter may not want to have children and head a major corporation. We have tried to raise our children with the ideals we hold dear. God, country and family. Each member has a place in the family of God or country and in our family. Their place may not be what it was 50 years ago but that is fine. Our world is always changing. Doors are open now to my daughter that were not open to me. Sports? My daughter is the athlete in the family. She is a great softball player and made All Stars her first year playing. My son on the other hand is not impressed with baseball. He played for one season and that was all he played. Does that make him less of a man? I don’t think so. He just does not like the game. He prefers his models or bike ramping. He is still getting his exercise and that is fine. She can play football. I had to fight to play baseball on the boy’s team because they did not have a girls team when I was in the 5th grade. Chores? Do we really want to go there? Both my children run the vacuum, clean the bathroom and so on. They both can run the dishwasher but a funny thing happened. My daughter wanted to learn how to do the “house stuff” while my son showed little interest as he got older. My son likes to do the “bigger jobs” while my daughter likes the littler jobs that require more detail. Their brains are wired differently to pay attention to different details. We just work with it. Political terms? I am so tied of hearing Congressperson or Chairperson. I just do not see what the big deal is. Do we have to be so sensitive as to say Chairperson instead of Chairman? It is just a word. Do your job as you were assigned to do and everything else will fall into place. I know this may not be a popular statement but I am so tired of trying to be “politically correct”. It is like someone saying that they are this kind of American or that kind of American. I thought we were all American if we lived here. Gender neutral? No. Kids are already confused enough by what they see on television or what they hear in their music. I feel that we have a responsibility to teach them that there is a difference between men and women. Yet at the same time teach them they can achieve their dreams no matter what they may be or how silly they seem to anyone else. Our brains are wired different. We are made to be different. As my children have grown and gotten to meet different people (some I like and some I do not) they are influenced by what they see or hear. Their friends influence them either good or bad. Kids that are not really their friends can influence them. This can encompass anything from clothes to food to how they talk. I am raising them to be “gender conscious”. I want my son to open the door for a lady. I want my daughter to act like a lady and my son to act like a gentleman. I want them to realize men and women need different things in their lives to make them whole. We react differently to things around us and that is OK! We are different and that is OK! Thank you for taking the time to read my review. I truly hope I have not offended anyone. I as always welcome comments.

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