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Parenting

09th Apr 2023

You need to read this mum’s important message if you have a son

Word of warning: you might shed a teeny tear.

HerFamily

If you haven’t heard of the American publicist, producer, and writer, Jaime Primak Sullivan, we suggest you get to know her name pronto.

Her social media posts often go viral, and she calls herself “the meanest mom ever,” but we think she’s hilarious and totally on-point when it comes to parenting today.

In a Facebook post, she calls out the stranger who said (to her face!) to stop “babying” her eight-year-old son who had been hit in the face with a basketball.

Her response is succinct, and nails parenting boys in every way:

“I climbed back up on the bleachers. My hands shaking. I was so angry. I fussed about it all the way home. My husband blew it off. “Who cares what they think?”

“This notion that boys can never hurt, that they can never feel, is so damaging to them long term. The belief that any signs or gestures of affection will somehow decrease their manhood – this pressure to always “man up” follows them into adulthood where they struggle to fully experience the broad scope of love and affection. The only emotion they healthily learn to express is happiness then we wonder why they are always chasing it.

“They’re taught that sadness is weakness, that talking about their fears or shortcomings makes them less than. They don’t mourn properly. The struggle to grieve. They’re afraid to cry. It all spills into the way they husband, and father and I hate it.

“Love is a verb. It is something you do. It is not the same as babying, coddling or spoiling. It is something my son deserves. I will always love him when he is hurting, and my prayer for him is that he is alway open to receiving love so he can love in return and keep that cycle going.”