Family Life: Bringing Up Boys

Raising Men
by Amanda Witt

When my boys were three and four, they spent a good bit of time patrolling the perimeter of the back yard with stick guns. One day they were making particularly gruesome sound effects and my feminine squeamishness, which I try to keep tamped down while mothering boys, got away from me. "I really don't like you pretending to shoot people," I told them.

"We're not pretending to shoot people," my older son said. "We're shooting pretend people. Dangerous ones."

Oh.

As one who has both boy and girl children, I can tell you they're different from birth. My daughter is something of a tomboy, and still she's nothing like her brothers. She has never hit anyone over the head with a zucchini, for one thing. She has never knocked her father's legs out from under him and laughed when he fell on her with bone-crushing weight. She has never lost a toenail or fingernail, climbed higher in a tree than the cats will go, picked up unidentified insects with her bare hands, or picked them up again after being bitten the first time. She has never captured a big black spider in my good Tupperware and left it for me to find unexpectedly while putting away leftovers.

My daughter is something of a tomboy, and still she's nothing like her brothers. She has never hit anyone over the head with a zucchini, for one thing… She has never captured a big black spider in my good Tupperware and left it for me to find unexpectedly while putting away leftovers.

My boys—sweet and well-behaved as they truly are—do those things regularly… They aren't learning this from me (except by my refusal to squelch it). They're learning it from their father, grandfathers, uncles; from the men at church who greet them with outstretched hand and expect them to answer audibly and shake firmly, from the men who lead worship; from the male friends who take them up in cherry-pickers, bulldozers, fire engines, and out in boats, who stop by to show them a new motorcycle, who talk to them with great seriousness about dinosaurs, asteroids, and snakes. Thanks to these men, my boys are going to know how to be men--not bullies, not henpicked eunuchs, but men… Here is the rest of this wonderful piece by Amanda at Wittingshire.

How Boys Are Wired Differently

1. Magnetic resonance imaging and PET scans reveal unique neurological processes in male and female brains. A boy’s brain “lights up” differently than a girl’s brain. These differences start long before birth.

TESTOSTERONE

2. Up until six or seven weeks after conception, all embryos are technically “female.” At that point, testosterone bathes the embryos that have inherited a “Y” (male) chromosome. This hormonal bath alters the brain’s structure in many ways and changes its color. The connections between the two hemispheres of the brain are actually damaged. As a result, boys have a harder time integrating and articulating what they know, feel and believe.

3. At puberty, testosterone floods a boy’s body again and over the course of time physically transforms him into a man. What many people don’t realize is that testosterone continues to influence a man’s every thought and action. Dr. James Dobson says, “What estrogen is to females, testosterone is to males.” Men and women have both hormones, but in wildly disproportionate amounts. These differing hormone levels continue to affect us throughout life.

At puberty, testosterone floods a boy’s body again and over the course of time physically transforms him into a man. What many people don’t realize is that testosterone continues to influence a man’s every thought and action.

4. Our actions and roles in life can elevate or depress our hormonal levels. For example, studies have shown that testosterone levels rise in athletes before they compete. But the reverse is even more evident: Hormone levels determine our actions. Testosterone in particular drives the masculine interest in car racing, professional football, hockey, guns, prize fighting, etc. Many woman enjoy these activities too, but far fewer are preoccupied, or obsessed, with them.

This information is quoted from Dr. James Dobson’s article "Why Boys Are So Different," which is adapted from his best-selling book, Bringing Up Boys. Discover the roles serotonin and the amygdala play in boys’ brains here. Are you curious about the men in your life? This short article, "Grown Boys are Different Too" explains the effects of testosterone in men and debunks the myths of patriarchy and discrimination which prevail in our culture.


When Things Go Wrong: The Healing Power Of A Father’s Blessing

After three-and-a-half decades of ministry, Terry Glass, with Terry Pluto, has written Champions for Life: The Healing Power of a Father's Blessing to address an issue that is sorely affecting the fabric of the nation. In his day, Terry Glass was one of the most outstanding football players in the National Football League. Nancy Madsen interviewed Terry Glass for Christianity Today.

What is our country's biggest problem?

A lack of the father's blessing. The FBI studied the 17 kids that have shot their classmates in little towns like Paducah, Kentucky; Pearl, Mississippi; and Littleton, Colorado. All 17 shooters had only one thing in common. They had a father problem. I see it so much; it's just unbelievable. There's something about it when a man doesn't get along with his father. It makes him mean; it makes him dangerous; it makes him angry.

On the day before Father's Day, I was in North Carolina in a juvenile prison. I ate lunch with three boys. I asked the first boy, "Is your dad coming to see you tomorrow on Father's Day?"

He said, "No, he's not coming."

"Why not?"

"He's in prison..."

There's something about it when a man doesn't get along with his father. It makes him mean; it makes him dangerous; it makes him angry.

A kid who is searching desperately for a blessing will put himself in all sorts of contortions in order to get it. You see this in gangs. Kids get into gangs because they want to be accepted by a family. Most kids that get into gangs have no father relationship… They have these little teardrop tattoos. Have you seen them on a kid’s face? Those little tattooed teardrops stand for some heinous crime they committed in order to get into the gang—the initiation fee. If I have to kill someone to get into the gang, I’ll do it, because I need to feel that I’m part of a family. And only a father can make a child feel that way. A mother, by herself, has a hard time ever doing that. All those guys on death row love their mothers. It’s their fathers they’ve got the problem with.

Describe the concept of the father’s blessing.

You see it in Genesis 27:30-38, where Isaac is blessing his son, and Jacob steals Esau’s blessing and his birthright… The blessing always involves a hug and a kiss… I found my kids love to be hugged and kissed. I grab my little girl by her ears and look into her eyes and say, “I love you, I bless you, I think you’re absolutely terrific.” That’s easy with her because she’s little and dainty. But I’ve got two boys, 280 and 290 pounds. One played pro ball, and both played college ball. …I grabbed that eldest son of mine recently and said, “I love you, I bless you, I think you’re terrific, and I’m so glad you’re mine.” His shoulders began to shake and his eyes filled with tears and he said, “Dad, I really needed that…” …it’s got to be something that is continuous and unconditional in order to be a real blessing, in order to be real love.

“I love you, I bless you, I think you’re terrific, and I’m so glad you’re mine.”

What do you tell people who have had bad relationships with their fathers?

I think that the dangerous thing about this whole concept of [a father’s blessing] is that I could imply to some poor kid that he’s a criminal because he didn’t get his dad’s blessing. But the answer is to say to him that he needs to find a substitute father…

One reason I think our prison ministry is so effective is that our counselors are like substitute fathers for the kids. They have to meet once a week for 2 hours for 12 weeks. We’ve had unusual success with that. We only have about 10 percent who get back into trouble, instead of the normal 80 percent. It incorporates everything I’m talking about—the blessing, conversion, mentoring, father/mother substituting, and, to me, it is really the answer for the kid in prison.

…the answer is to say to him that he needs to find a substitute father…

Related Links on this Vital Topic

• The Raw Statistics: “When Boys Run Wild” is at Focus on the Family.
• The best-selling book, The Blessing by Gary Smalley & John Trent has been revised and updated; read the updated book reviews here.
• How to Bless Your Teen is at the Canadian ministry, Christianity.ca
• A British Mom blogs earnestly about the Family Benefits of Homemaking at Echo From the Green Hills.

Do you know a boy who needs to hear and feel his father's blessing?

Photo Credits: Jigg, Lisa Funk, John Carleton, Tree Meat, Tom A, Laataylor (Flickr)

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Remember the law of my servant Moses, the decrees and laws I gave him at Horeb for all Israel. See, I will send you the prophet Elijah before that great and dreadful day of the LORD comes. He will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers; or else I will come and strike the land with a curse. (Malachi 4:4-6 NIV)