Guest Author - Marie Stroughter

In these days, PDA stands for Personal Digital Assistant, but when I was growing up it meant, “Public Displays of Affection.” My son is seven years old, and is going into that “Twilight Zone” where Mom and Dad kissing is icky, girls aren’t as good as boys, Dad is really cool, and Mom hugging you in public is not cool at all.

My son only has one foot in the “Twilight Zone”…The rest of him still enjoys a cuddle (at home!) from mom, particularly when injured or not feeling well.

So, what do you do when your son hits this developmental milestone? Keeping these things in mind will help you as you both make a difficult transition and navigate some tricky developmental areas:

· This is not a rejection of you! Your son still loves you and will always love you!

· As much as it may hurt, remember that he is growing up (something we desire!), and that this is normal behavior as he sorts out new thoughts and ideas.

· Usually, this stage is temporary. Boys at this age are just very self-conscious about a lot of things, particularly those relating to the opposite sex.

· Don’t force the issue...give your son some space.

· After age six, boys move from the Oedepal adoration-of-mother stage, to latency, where the son begins to closely self-identify with the parent of the same sex: Dad.

My son wants to dress like his dad, hang out with his dad and do everything like his dad does. He likes to ask me questions about what it is like to be a girl, and what I like best and least about being female. I know from these cues that he is sorting out what he knows about boys and girls. He is sorting out what he sees on television and reads in books, from what he sees in real life. He’s trying to sift through what is true and what is a stereotype. All of this is complex as he moves from a lesser cognitive standpoint to what is known as “concrete operations,” where one’s thoughts and feelings are formed into the ideas that will guide and shape their thinking from here on out.

As a mother, it’s hard to watch the boy I nursed at my breast for so long turn into a big 7-year-old, but it is what I always hoped for in raising him: that he grows more and more independent of me each day. In theory, it’s what you want; when it happens, it pierces your heart. But it’s proof positive that you are doing your job well! If negotiated correctly, the boy who emerges from the other side of this “Twilight Zone” will have a very close relationship with me, but on his own terms, and it will be the basis for our future relationship as adult mother to adult son.