Terrible

All ages come with their challenges. Newborns need constant attention and deny your sleep, one year olds are constantly finding ways to get themselves killed, but only two year olds are actually named after how terrible they can be.

I love the internet, but it has a few negative consequences. One such consequence is that it causes us to radicalize every issue. Everything is either incredible, or the worst. There's very little room for nuance. This could be said for the way we discuss parenting online. Sometimes it's shown to be a complete train wreck that ruins your life, other times it's glorified above all else. I don't want either of those things to be what this space is for. I want this space to be an honest look at what being a dad is really like.

Honestly, sometimes it's really hard. When Grace was just starting to interact with us, she was the sweetest, most innocent thing you could imagine.

Look at that face. How could that face ever cause anyone any trouble? Terrible twos? Yeah, like my sweetie is ever going to hit that stage. Honestly, by the time she hit 2 I still felt that way. Sure, she was a little more strong willed, but she was so sweet.

I didn't really notice it until her brother came along. Suddenly, she wasn't getting all the attention she was used to. That's when she started acting out. She's clever, because she knows when you're busy. The time to do it is when there's only one parent, and they're busy with Isaac. What's that? I can't throw my food? Well you're busy with Isaac, so across the room it goes!

Or when she does little things like intentionally hit or scratch you, and then laughs when you tell her to stop. Honestly, it's weird how you can feel hurt by the laughter. Suddenly your sweet little baby finds your pain amusing. You know that she doesn't really know what's going on, and that she loves you, but it's hard to be rationale in some of these moments. Especially when you haven't gotten a proper nights sleep in weeks because of the new addition.

Having a two year old is hard. They're smart enough to remember things for months, but you still can't explain long term consequences. Sometimes you forget that they're still toddlers, because they understand so much of what's going on, but they are. You can only reason so much with them.

Grace has moments where her behaviour could be described as terrible. Moments, where as a parent, you're left dumbfounded and frustrated. But there's another sense in which Grace is terrible...

Grace is terribly curious. She wants to know what everything is and how it works. She loves to learn.

Grace is terribly imaginative. Baking strawberry cakes is her favourite new game, but strawberries can be anything. They can be her toys, Mr. Potato head pieces, her lego, or thin air. 

Grace is terribly loving. The amount of hugs and kisses everyone in our family gets is amazing. She's stepped up her hug game too, they involve squeezes now!

While the terrible twos can be frustrating, they can also be exciting. Watching her play evolve, seeing her language skills grow, seeing her memory expand, seeing her develop traits like empathy. These things are all incredibly exciting. Terribly exciting. There will be bumps along the road. There will always be challenges. That's okay. Grace will always be my little girl. She's still sweet and innocent. She's developing a personality before my eyes, and it's inspiring. If this is the trade off, well, a little terrible never killed anybody. 

The gender question

Something people like to talk to you about when you're having a baby is the gender of your baby. It generates endless discussion. Are you going to find out the gender? What do you think it is? What are you hoping for? I've also heard many discussions about who's easier, boys or girls, and have celebrated the idea of having one of each. I don't want to dismiss these discussions or pretend I'm above them, because honestly I've participated in them too, but I do want to challenge them.

Let me start by saying that I won't argue boys and girls aren't different. That's just objectively false. I've seen it play out as a teacher, the girls at my school cause trouble by talking, the guys do it by fighting. You can see it in other places too. There's a reason sports leagues are separated by gender. Boys and girls are simply different. What I want to argue is that those differences are clear when you look at boys and girls as a whole, but that isn't really helpful on a one to one basis.

Have you ever walked down a baby clothing isle? It's quite an experience. Everything is adorable. It'll melt your little heart. However, something always bugs me about it. Look at the boys side, you'll see things about being tough, being rock stars, athletes, and lots of other fun stuff. Look at the girls side... everything is about being cute or being a princess. Now, don't get me wrong, some girls really identify with the princess thing, and there's nothing wrong with that... but why is that the only option? Why don't girls get to be tough, or athletic? Why can't girls rock? The most extreme version of this reared its ugly head in value village this Halloween.

Look at that. It's kind of creepy, isn't it? Boys get to dress up like cops and firefighters, girls get to dress up like girls going to a Halloween party. Without even touching the sexualization of young girls, we could talk endlessly about the problems here. Part of the reason there are differences between girls and boys is biological, and part of the problem is from socialization. When we give girls these kind of options, we socialize them. The message is clear, boys get serious jobs, girls are cute. 

Now, obviously more boys will be firefighters and cops than girls, because of the nature of the job. That makes sense. I'm fine with that. The point is that just because most boys are better suited for that than most girls doesn't mean that no girls are.

Studies have shown that parents are more likely to discourage girls from doing the same activities at the playground that they encourage boys to do. Boys are rewarded for taking risks, girls are punished. There are little things we do throughout our interactions with boys and girls that socialize them in ways we don't even think about.

I have a boy and a girl. I want them both to know that they can do whatever they want to do. When I look at Grace, I don't see a girly Disney princess. I don't see a tom boy either. I see Grace. She loves to run around. She loves running, jumping, playing catch, dancing, reading, and pretending. If she wants to play sports, that's fine. If she wants to dress up and play princess, that's fine too. When I look at Isaac, I don't see a future quarterback. I see Isaac. He doesn't do much yet, he's 5 weeks old. He's a bit of a blank slate. He can grow up to like whatever he wants. If he likes sports, great. If he likes baking, also great.

The point is, conversations like "who's easier, boys or girls?" don't really make sense to me, because I don't really think of it as raising a boy and a girl. I think of it as raising Grace and Isaac.