First, there are the superficial gender concerns. As more than one person has told me, girls are more expensive. Others say, when I tell them it’s a girl, “Oooohhhh! You’re going to get so much stuff!” But I don’t need so much stuff, and I see no reason to spend more money on this little girl than I do on my son. We live in a 964 square foot house. The office has now moved into the dining room to make room for the nursery, which has crammed in it a crib, a futon, and a dresser. The dresser, through much debating, has been determined a necessity as the closet is full of my husband’s clothes and paperwork since the closet in our room is full and just for me. Where exactly am I supposed to put all this extra stuff a girl apparently needs? I’ve got just enough room for the necessities, and even then, it’s getting pretty damn cozy in here. Why does a girl need more stuff than a boy? Why, I ask?! My son is certainly not deprived of anything, but my husband and I consciously attempt not to spoil him. At three, my son is already starting to learn the value of a dollar. He has a daily chore list—make bed, set table, clear table, pick up room—for which he receives a quarter. He saves this up and uses it to buy something special, which most often he has been drooling over and working towards for a couple weeks. Last week, he bought an Ironman costume he had been wanting ever since the Halloween costume catalogue arrived in the mail. He’s now saving for the Hot Wheels Shark Attack. In an attempt to instill this same notion in my daughter, and refrain from a sense of entitlement for any reason—be it gender, looks, smarts, whatever—I fear that I will overcompensate on her behalf, and she will not only not be spoiled, but will feel deprived. I fear that, in an act of reverse discrimination, I may not buy her things just because she is a girl.
So with this societal expectation that girls are higher maintenance than boys, I fear that, in an attempt to counteract this norm, I’ll cause more harm than good. With my son, I already work to diffuse gender expectations. Just the other day, I bought him a pair of Princess Tiana socks from the dollar bin at Target. He loves The Princess and the Frog, so who cares that they’re pink and feature a princess? He certainly didn’t—he loved them! But I know that his love of The Princess and the Frog was only half of the reason I bought them. He also loves Cars and Sesame Street, who also had socks available for just a dollar. But I chose the pink ones with the princess to both show my progressiveness, and to instill an ideal in my son’s mind that he can wear whatever makes him comfortable, regardless of societal norms. If he asks me to paint his toes when I paint mine, I do. If he asks to put a clip in his hair when his cousin is getting a clip in hers, I do. I know that with my daughter, I will work to instill these same values—that she can be or do whatever she wants, without constraint due to her sex or gender. But will my buying her Spiderman and football shirts help her establish a sense of identity, or just get her made fun of?
Aside from the looks, there are many other cultural stereotypes surrounding girls. The other day, while talking with some friends about having a daughter, my friend relayed a saying she’d heard: “When you have a son, you just have to worry about one penis. But when you have a daughter, you have to worry about hundreds of penises.” I don’t know how many times I’ve heard my friends with daughters joke about sitting on the front porch with a shotgun when she has her first date. And if you know my husband, you know he is not even remotely joking about doing this. But why just for her first date? I’m scared of my little boy going on his first date. I’m scared of his little heart being broken. Certainly I’m scared of him “getting himself into trouble.” But I’m just as scared of the not-so-innocent girls he’ll meet, who can be just as aggressive in seducing a guy as a guy can a girl. Men say they know having a daughter because they were once teenage boys and all they thought about was sex. But I can’t say that I was much better than any of them. I made my rounds, and it didn’t have anything to do with being pressured by the guy. So while my husband may be on the porch with a shotgun for our daughter's first date, I’ll be on the porch with the shotgun for our son’s first date. However in my attempt to do this—to provided gender equity among my children—I may unintentionally deprive her of something. I fear that my attempt to crush the American norms of the pampered little girl will be received, by both her and others, not as an equal concern for her and my son, but rather as a dislike for her compared to him.
My heart melts every time I see my son. Every night I go into his room, tuck him in and straighten out his blankets, lay down next to him, give him a kiss, and tell him how incredibly special he is. I can’t imagine loving anyone as much as I do my son. I love my son more than anything, and I know in a Sophie’s Choice type situation, I would choose my son over my husband (or rather I believe, as until we are actually in these—or any—situations, we can’t say for certain how we’d react). Not necessarily because I love my husband less, but because he’s my son and my job as a mama is to take care of my son. But with a son and a daughter, how can one keep from having a preference? And considering I’ve had almost four years—five if you count the time during pregnancy—to establish such a strong bond with my son, how can it not be for him? How can anyone possibly be as cute and smart and funny and kind as my little boy? The capacity of the human heart is ever-expanding, with limitless capacity. So, consciously I know that I have plenty of room in my heart for them both—and then some. But our feelings are not always in conjunction with our knowledge: the battle of heart and mind.
Likewise, even before she is born, I am afraid the feelings my husband has for her will outweigh those he has for me. Along with the cultural norm to be spoiled, innocent, and dainty in pink, there is an understood bond between father and daughter. I have sense of jealousy regarding the relationship I know my husband will have with our daughter. To an extent, I think this additional bond is fake, and I’d like to think of my family as so progressively advanced that gender does not play a role in the complexities of our relationships. But I’m not stupid. I know my husband. And I’ve seen that relationship. My niece is thirteen, the product of divorced parents, a single mom. She is an amazing girl, with—although a typical thirteen-year-old attitude, which I would often like to slap right out of her mouth—a heart of gold. Even as just a niece, I’ve seen the special relationship she has with my husband, her uncle, who has been a more active part of her life than her father has ever been. I’ve seen the way she admires him, and him her. I’ve seen the way they cuddle up on the couch when we’re all watching a movie together. Their mutual respect and admiration are clear and visible. And it’s something every daughter deserves to have. Which is why I know that our daughter will be the apple of his eye, will hold a special place in his heart, will be the utmost precious thing he has ever and will ever love. And although I tell myself the same thing I did in regards to loving both my son and daughter equally—the capacity of the human heart is ever-expanding, with limitless capacity—I’m still jealous.
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