Boyfriends....

[MissAnn]

So DCG brought her imaginary boyfriend. Mom thought it was so cute. I told mom we don't do boyfriends here. I tell the kids...we are in preschool, we don't have boyfriends. Mom looked at me funny.....I said, well, unless you want to pay his weekly fees we don't have boyfriends here.

Why do parents want to encourage boyfriends/girlfriends? This particular girl is very precocious and the parents think it's just so funny. I don't. Let the kids be kids.

[TickleMonster]

All children have imaginary friends of some sort at some point during their childhood. Just because she is calling hers, her "boyfriend" it doesn't mean boyfriend in the literal sense. Its a normal phase. My boys were always coming home from headstart jabbering about different girlfriends they had at school. I never encouraged them to call the girls, "girlfriends". They did that on their own and I did think it was cute because I know they don't mean any harm in saying it. I'd say let it go. Its not a big deal.

[Unregistered]

kids pretend and use what they hear. She might have heard an older sibling or cousin talk about a boyfriend and has no idea what it even means. I doubt there's anything sexual behind it, if you're going that direction.


My kid talks about her imaginary friend "Doobie." I can assure you she's never heard that word, but kids make up stuff.

[MotherNature]

Even if she does mean 'boyfriend', at that age, it's innocent. She might blow him a kiss or something at most, b/c they want to emulate what they see adults doing. My son is 3 and calls people his friend, his boy friend, or girl friend...depending on what sex he thinks they are. Sometimes the same person changes sex/pronouns. NBD. I think you're making a big deal out of nothing and projecting something sexual on to something innocent. Kids don't think like adults do.

[Blackcat31]

Not really relevant but kind of boyfriend related...

I had a DCG, age 4.5 once who was obsessed with Justin Bieber.

She talked non-stop "Justin Bieber this" and "Justin Bieber that"...it was Justin Bieber everything!!

One day she showed up with a photo of him.

She asked all the other kids if they wanted to see her boyfriend, Justin Bieber.

Another little gal I had (almost 3) took one look at the photo and said in a super surprised voice "Oh he's a boy... then why do you keep calling him a beaver?"

I didn't think I could laugh as hard as I did... :: ::

Gotta love how kids hear and comprehend things sometimes.

[Leanna]

I get what you're saying MissAnn. I don't think that she is projecting anything on the little girl, but more so her parent. Sure, little kids want to mimic what they see and hear older people doing and I am sure the little girl is innocent in calling someone her "boyfriend." However, I do not think it is cute to encourage that kind of behavior. Little kids are bombarded with sexual messages from the time they are born and girls in our society are becoming sexualized waaaaaay too early. Look at the pants with the words across the bottom, T-shirts with suggestive sayings, the cut and style of clothes for LITTLE girls. Not cool. Girls change their behavior when they realize that society expects them to be constantly attracting and impressing the opposite sex...even very young girls do this. Again, not cool. Her mom should be telling her that she has plenty of time for boyfriends when she gets older. She needs to enjoy her childhood without worrying about boys/boyfriends.

[Naptime yet?]

I have a SAer who will talk about boyfriends, marriage, husbands, with my dd4. Often when they play house or whatever, someone seems to always be married or has a boyfriend (every once in a while it's little brother). I try to monitor the conversations because that doesn't bother me, it's what happens with the boyfriend that might.

But what is starting to bother me is SAer is always talking about death. "Pretend you died" etc. she's 7, maybe it's a stage? I've asked to stop, but I'm monitoring this one closely, too.

[daycare]

Not really relevant but kind of boyfriend related...

I had a DCG, age 4.5 once who was obsessed with Justin Bieber.

She talked non-stop "Justin Bieber this" and "Justin Bieber that"...it was Justin Bieber everything!!

One day she showed up with a photo of him.

She asked all the other kids if they wanted to see her boyfriend, Justin Bieber.

Another little gal I had (almost 3) took one look at the photo and said in a super surprised voice "Oh he's a boy... then why do you keep calling him a beaver?"

I didn't think I could laugh as hard as I did... :: ::

Gotta love how kids hear and comprehend things sometimes.

BC that is soooo funny. My niece who just passed also thought that he was her BF too.

I had a mom freak on me the other day when I told her that her child was creating an imaginary friend. She told me that it was not ok and that I if she hears her talking to any imaginary friend she would discipline her. I told her she was over reacting that it was normal part of development for children, she said it is not, it's border line sociopath.

I just dropped it and walked away.

[MissAnn]

All children have imaginary friends of some sort at some point during their childhood. Just because she is calling hers, her "boyfriend" it doesn't mean boyfriend in the literal sense. Its a normal phase. My boys were always coming home from headstart jabbering about different girlfriends they had at school. I never encouraged them to call the girls, "girlfriends". They did that on their own and I did think it was cute because I know they don't mean any harm in saying it. I'd say let it go. Its not a big deal.

No....she means boyfriend as in who she wants to kiss and lay down with. Like I said...she is precocious. She is the reason we don't have boyfriends in preschool.

[coolconfidentme]

I have a DCB2 who has been here since he was 3mths old. I have always called him boyfriend. I often call the little girls girlfriend. To my DCK it mean a friend who is a boy or girl. I guess it's how you help them interpret it, idk.

[Heidi]

My now 17 year old said her boyfriend was "Lonestar" when she was 3, almost 4 That "Amazed" song by the country band was playing on the radio a lot, and I always cranked it up.

She didn't know it was a band, she thought it was just a guy. She'd crack her older brothers up to no end sitting in the back of the car, talking dreamily about her "boyfriend, Lonestar". Things like "he's going to take me out to eat", and "he has lots of Legos", etc. I can't remember specifics...but it was pretty random stuff.

Yeah...she doesn't totally appreciate being teased about it now.

[Hunni Bee]

I get what you're saying. I don't like it either. I don't really have that problem with my current kids, but I did with a past one.

I had one little girl that was getting way too deep into the boyfriend thing...she was starting to kiss some of the boys, sit on their laps, starting to talk about their privates I was getting concerned, so I brought it up to her mother. Mom came back the next morning and said she told dcg she shouldn't kiss boys, and dcg replied "so I should kiss girls?", so she wouldn't be mentioning it to her again because she didn't want dcg to be gay.

I don't know if i ever came up with a response to that.