Growing up different: A reflection on my gender and my identity
By Chris Barone
EDI 17 Psychology & Development of Adolescent Students
School of Education
Long Island University, C. W. Post
March 6, 2009
Growing up, I was different. “Different” is the word you use when your parents enroll you in a soccer team, and you sit in goal and pick dandelions during the game and hand them to your mother. “Different” is the word you use when you go to hockey games not to see the New York Islanders lose yet again, but rather to gorge on some pink cotton candy. “Different” is the word you use when your peers play hoops, and you wear your extra-slippery socks so you can pretend to figure skate on the kitchen tile floor. “Different.” Yeah, that’s the word.
As a kid, I never paid much attention to the gender roles that were assigned to me. I chose to instead focus on who I am and what made me happy. It was a fine time, considering I would later spend my entire adolescence deflecting the common assumptions made because of unique tastes. As dissatisfied as I am with how I grew up, I have to say this: my parents both understood and accepted the message that my gender did not always have to define my identity.
My parents encouraged me to play Little League and join a soccer team, but not because it was the ‘guy’ thing to do; they just wanted me to make friends and gain the self-confidence that I so sorely lacked at the time. While school was in session, they would push for me to join clubs about photography, computers, writing. During the summer months, they would show me different advertisements for summer camps and ask if I wanted to join. These activities were about my interests -- writing, photography, and computers. Sporting camps were out of the question, and they accepted that. They accepted me. They didn’t care if I was fulfilling some societal standard for young boys. They genuinely wanted me to be happy.
Both parents and teachers should aspire to have this quality. Being accepted by my family was a crucial part in accepting myself. It played a big role in helping me become who I am today: an intelligent, witty, creative, determined, young man who is just a little bit “different.”
Long Island University, C. W. Post
March 6, 2009
Growing up, I was different. “Different” is the word you use when your parents enroll you in a soccer team, and you sit in goal and pick dandelions during the game and hand them to your mother. “Different” is the word you use when you go to hockey games not to see the New York Islanders lose yet again, but rather to gorge on some pink cotton candy. “Different” is the word you use when your peers play hoops, and you wear your extra-slippery socks so you can pretend to figure skate on the kitchen tile floor. “Different.” Yeah, that’s the word.
As a kid, I never paid much attention to the gender roles that were assigned to me. I chose to instead focus on who I am and what made me happy. It was a fine time, considering I would later spend my entire adolescence deflecting the common assumptions made because of unique tastes. As dissatisfied as I am with how I grew up, I have to say this: my parents both understood and accepted the message that my gender did not always have to define my identity.
My parents encouraged me to play Little League and join a soccer team, but not because it was the ‘guy’ thing to do; they just wanted me to make friends and gain the self-confidence that I so sorely lacked at the time. While school was in session, they would push for me to join clubs about photography, computers, writing. During the summer months, they would show me different advertisements for summer camps and ask if I wanted to join. These activities were about my interests -- writing, photography, and computers. Sporting camps were out of the question, and they accepted that. They accepted me. They didn’t care if I was fulfilling some societal standard for young boys. They genuinely wanted me to be happy.
Both parents and teachers should aspire to have this quality. Being accepted by my family was a crucial part in accepting myself. It played a big role in helping me become who I am today: an intelligent, witty, creative, determined, young man who is just a little bit “different.”
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