How To Prepare Your Son for an Unkind World
He knows that “different is good”. Here’s how to help him respond to the doubters.
For years while my son took a bath, I painted my toenails.
I would soak my feet while he splashed in the tub. We shared bath time together. A mom’s pedicure, as I started to call them.
Sometimes I would paint his big toe when he would ask in the shade of blue or green that was in my color supply.
It was a year ago when he was 8 years old that he said to me, “Can you paint my toes too?”
I paused.
In a matter of seconds, a thousand thoughts went through my head around the whys or why nots.
“Sure.”, I said. “Pick out your color.”
As we sat on the bathroom floor I was nervous for him. We live in Florida, in the land of flip flops and bare feet.
Would the other boys make fun of him?
How would adults react to him?
What would people think of us as parents?
And then I stopped and realized something- we had been teaching him all along to embrace who he was regardless of what people think of him and he was doing just…
