Is your boy getting the right priorities?

Apparently, it’s not just an African mentality to give priority to the male child, as some years back the birth of Prince George was largely celebrated by the Queen of England. The preference for a male child seems to be a global thing. Back home in Nigeria, a woman who hasn’t given birth to a […]

Apparently, it’s not just an African mentality to give priority to the male child, as some years back the birth of Prince George was largely celebrated by the Queen of England. The preference for a male child seems to be a global thing.
Back home in Nigeria, a woman who hasn’t given birth to a male child is seen as not to have delivered the dividends of her marriage. There is either pressure from the relatives of her spouse or her husband himself. Questions like who carries on the name of the family arise. The mistake many women make is giving undue privilege to the male-child which in turn manifests in the kind of husband he will turn out to be.
Many women believe that a son is better than a daughter as a first child because it will consolidate her position in her husband’s home and secure her future as a wife in the family, not to mention eroding her fear of being discarded for a younger woman in the event that she doesn’t produce at least one male child.
Mrs. Bello O. Bisola disagrees with this notion. “Who says the number of male children you have secures you as an only wife in your husband’s house? I know of a lady who had four sons, but that still didn’t stop her husband from having extra-marital affairs, nor did it stop her mother-in-law from taunting her,” she argued.
Bisola added that: “The man goes out with all his boys and leaves her at home. I tell her always that her prayer for boys has back fired. If she had a girl, she would have been there to console and comfort her no matter what. And I ask, where is it written or said that a female child cannot do whatever a male child is doing or even better?”
Most women give their sons over-protective love and in doing so fail to realise or ignore some of the child’s excesses simply because he is a boy. We have instances where a mother favours her son(s) over her daughter (s) in terms of love, care and attention.
Mothers should raise their sons to be able to provide for themselves and their families in the future and also to be responsible.
“These days, parents don’t see training the boy- child from a positive perspective. They spoil the child with gifts and pocket money that even when he ought to have learnt to be prudent with money, he still goes about being extravagant in spending,” says Hajiya Jamila Ibrahim.
“Parents should train him to earn and manage money from an early age, no matter how little he earns, so that he will treasure the essence of life and learn how to help the less privilege,” she advises.
For all mothers of boys out there, they should learn to stop saying things like ‘he is a boy and will always get his way,’ ‘I cannot stop him.’ Instead, raise him to be a caring, considerate and loving son, who will one day be an asset to his home as the head of the family.
Condoning and pampering him even when he is disobedient isn’t in the best interest of your boy because such upbringing manifests negatively when he eventually becomes an adult.