Somehow, I thought boys were different. Tougher. Throughout their early childhood, my boys have been. They are loud. SO loud. They are wild. They run everywhere, scream everywhere, and have limitless amounts of energy. They like to talk about gross stuff and do gross stuff. That's how boys are supposed to be, right? Messy, loud, dirty, tough....
So why, why didn't somebody tell me what it was going to be like to have a boy about to go through puberty? WHY? I KNOW what a girl will be like! I am TOTALLY prepared for a girl to have completely unreasonable emotional outbursts about hair. I am ready for the tears, insecurity and despair of highly hormonal days. I am ready to buy LOTS of chocolate to ease "the blues".
But my boy? I guess I just thought he would sail through with a cracking voice, rolling eyes and lots of showers. Oh, how wrong I was. I didn't really recognize the stage we were in until a couple of days ago when I was talking to a friend who has been through this. I was describing the "drama". The angst over moving to Boise that has now been suddenly replaced by the need to become a child actor. And people, it is an OBSESSION! Now, I realize that some of this is just due to his personality. He has always been one to get onto something and get...well, focused! If he watched a movie...he would reenact it with toys, when he read "My Side of the Mountain" he spent weeks recreating Sam Gribley's world in our backyard. So I know part of this is just him. But Heaven help me. You would think that when we told him we are not moving to L.A. this week that we had told him he only has a month to live. He spends every moment I allow him to "researching" child actors by watching his favorite shows. When I ban him from T.V. he moves to the computer to research them there. He knows every show they have been in, when they got their start, where they got their start, what they like to do, what they like to eat, who is homeschooled, who goes to what school...you get the picture. Before I serve a meal, he asks if actors would eat that particular food and has sworn off dessert and started "working out" every day because actors are healthy (although I cannot get him to even attempt to drink a green smoothie which I totally think an actor would).
When I chase him off the computer, he walks around the house aimlessly like a little lost child and peppers me with questions about everything acting. Because, you know, I am the expert! He wants to know why we can't just move there and you absolutely, positively CANNOT reason with him. Explanations go over his head, logical plans go in one ear and out the other. It is painful. I am SO tired of talking about acting, L.A. etc.
But the worst of it is that when I was talking to the above mentioned friend, her words of encouragement went something like this. He sounds like he is starting to go through the change. It is all the hormones. When Z went through this he was just like it and it only lasted about a year.
A YEAR? YOU MEAN I HAVE A YEAR OF THIS? She went on to explain that her son is now wonderful to be around and never gives her trouble, it was just that one year while his body was changing. Of course, another of her friends has a son about the same age and it took him about TWO YEARS, but he is great now, too.
I may quite possibly poke my eye out with a fork or claw my ears off within the next year. I guess this should not come as a surprise, if it was a girl, I would expect it. I just didn't know boys got so...hormonal. I wasn't mentally prepared for this!
So, as a public service announcement to all you mothers of boys who may have been raised around girls. Your adolescent boy will, apparently spend one to two years of his preteen/early teen years acting like a pre-menstrual girl. I just thought you should know!
My pre-teen boy...remembering the "good ole days"
