I love all of your little traditions, that sounds so cool

I think it may be a bit easier when boys are young, at least in my experience….although there were always things I struggled with. I was good at being nurturing – you know, all the typical “mom” stuff you described, plus my son and I found some common interests – things like nature, animals, and hiking, pretend play, reading, watching movies, etc. Yet there were also areas where I could never adequately replace his dad, areas of *real* interest to my son – things like playing with legos, cars, taking machines apart, video games, etc. Not that I didn’t try – I did, at least with legos and cars – but I couldn’t hide very well from my son my inherent lack of interest in these areas…and eventually, when my son started playing on his own more, I’d let him do those things on his own, and we’d do things together that we both liked to do. Because my son was only 7 when I met my husband, my son immediately took a liking to him. However, it took much longer for my husband to take on a real *father* role, and for the two of them to have a relationship where the word “love” is actually used to describe how they feel about one another – this probably has only come about in the past year or so.

Now that my son is 11, I am really thankful that he has a father figure. There are areas where I am good at supporting him, and areas where my husband is good at supporting him. He bonds with my husband over video games and cars and some movies, and he bonds with me over the same common interests we discovered years ago

There is definitely a difference between how my husband and I interact and react to our children, but we have the same values and we support each others interactions, which I think is super important. The differences, may have more to do with our personalities than our sex, although I think perhaps more women have my personality traits, and more men have my husband’s traits. My husband is definitely more easy-going when it comes to things like monitoring homework (both for his own son and mine), brushing teeth, cleaning the bedrooms, etc. He’ll get down on the floor and PLAY with the boys – ping pong, soccer, video games, watching youtube videos, stock-car race track, etc…whereas most of these things are virtual torture for me (except for ping pong – I like ping pong…and I suppose I like youtube videos too, but I rarely sit down in front of the computer for hours watching them). I’m more of the discliplinarian in the household….my husband only steps in if my son is being SUPER defiant, and even then, only if I ask him to (this might be different if he was my son’s real father, but perhaps not)….but I’m more of the nurturer too, for my son. I’m the one my son goes to if he is sad or needs to talk about something – at least now….although that might change when he gets a bit older. My husband and his own son have a really good, loving relationship, where his son seems to feel comfortable being very open with him – while his son really struggles with his mom. However, part of that might be because we have him on weekends, so his mom is doing most of the day-to-day discipline stuff, she is the one getting on his case about homework most of the time, etc. It’s not a great balance, but it is a factor of her choosing to move 60 miles away a year ago. When my husband’s son was younger, he was much closer to his mom than he is now. I wonder how many of their conflicts would be occurring if he still lived in town, and was living with us half the time like he used to, instead of just on weekends. Being with only his mom almost full time at his age seems to be creating a real strain on their relationship. At least, this is what we hear from him on a weekly basis. The resentment and anger he feels toward her can get pretty intense. Again, I think a LOT of that is just due to their personalities – they have little in common, and my step-son feels like his mom is infringing on his privacy and independence more than she should. But, the ways she infringes on his privacy and independence seem to be fairly normal parenting stuff that perhaps wouldn’t be such an issue if it was handled by both of them differently.

I’m sure there are families where the dad takes on the nurturing role, and the mom takes on the more “fun” role…but that hasn’t been my experience. I’ve actually found it more difficult, as my son gets older, to “connect” with him – he is less interested in some of the things we used to do together, and more interested in things I just canNOT get interested in. So I basically “let” my husband connect with him on those levels, and figure my son is getting the support he needs from at least one parent. And I continue to seek new ways we can connect…sometimes successfully, sometimes not.

Is it possible for a single parent to be both a mom and a dad? I honestly don’t know. I think it’s possible for a single parent to be a great parent, to raise a loving and secure child, and for that child to grow up into a productive, happy adult. I think some parents who have multiple interests – male parents who enjoy doing things their daughters enjoy doing, and female parents who enjoy doing things their sons enjoy doing…or vice versa….can fulfill most of their children’s needs to “connect” on both a nurturing/discipline and “fun” level. I suspect that most parents don’t have the ability to fulfill all those roles, and that is why I think it is ideal for single parents to 1) Discover areas where they CAN connect with their kids, and take advantage of those areas and 2) Develop relationships with other people who can take on those supplemental roles for their children. Maybe it is a boyfriend/girlfriend, or a big brother, or an uncle/aunt, or a grandmother/grandfather, or coach….or maybe even a counselor….but I really think it needs to be someone and that most single parents should not presume to do it all on their own. They may be able to do MOST of it – but it would be difficult to do ALL of it. When my son’s dad died, we started seeing a counselor together. The counselor was a man (I deliberately chose a man) and he was wonderful. I was really thankful to have him in our lives, because he helped my son and I work out issues that cropped up, that perhaps I hadn’t handled so great, or that my son hadn’t reacted to so great, or that my son or I needed to hear another opinion about. We went to counseling for about 5 years. It has only been in the past year that my son and I have stopped going, and a lot of that has to do with my husband embracing his role as a father even more. Instead of working things out in counseling, we could work them out at home, as a family.

I don’t think that the friction between you and your son is necessarily due to gender differences so much as it is to personality differences. Sure, you understand your daughter better, but you have mentioned many times how similar you are in personality. It is common for a child to take particularly strongly after one parent or the other, and she seems to be, in many ways, a bit of a ‘mini-me’. Your son is not. Not because he’s a boy, because he did not inherit your personality the way your daughter did. But he COULD have, just as easily been your miniature and your daughter the one you didn’t relate to. Yes, there are likely to be a developmental and emotional issue or two that you don’t get simply because of not having the experience…but I think that a lot of the clashing is not because he’s not a girl, but because he’s not littleWCM so you can’t look into the past and remember how you wanted situations treated when you were that age, as the same rules don’t apply. If your family included a father figure as well, perhaps they would click, but not necessarily. Nothing wrong with a male to do guy things with, but also no guarantee of harmony, either.