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Boys’ mental health and self-esteem suffer when they are not seen as a whole child and instead told to “man up”, suppress their emotions, not ask for help, etc. This can lead to pent-up issues that manifest later in life… the worst of which make national headlines. After you’ve finished check out the press release check out my review here:
American Academy of Pediatrics’ Nurturing Boys to Be Better Men: Gender Equality Starts at Home (10/24/23) is an evidence-based guide that gives parents tangible tools to foster the lifelong journey of raising their sons into men who are mentally healthy, empathetic, and committed to gender equality. Check out my review here:
AAP Spokesperson Shelly Vaziri Flais, MD, FAAP leans into her experience as a pediatrician and parent of 3 boys (+ 1 girl) with her roadmap of 3 main goals to promote greater generational gender equality:
- Promote a whole-child approach, recognizing our sons as capable of the full range of human emotions despite generational perpetuation of the idea of “male” characteristics.
- Use an ages-and-stages developmental approach, recognizing opportunities for growth and awareness not only within the child-parent relationship but also in how our sons interact with extended family, school, and the greater outside community.
- Propose how parents can best model gender equity for our sons, since kids do as they see.
Nurturing Boys to Be Better Men is full of conversation-starting questions, age-based suggestions for books to read and movies to watch and discuss together and tips for addressing specific hurdles like division of physical labor and of emotional labor.
The bookalso includes relatable stories from Dr. Flais’s own family along with those she’s worked with during her many years as a primary care pediatrician. The anecdotes and the science both serve to emphasize the benefits of gender equality for boys and girls, men and women, not only in the context of the family but also the extended family, school, and greater community.
Dr. Flais argues that gender equality should be an ongoing dialogue that happens between parents themselves and between parents and sons throughout childhood.
A board-certified practicing pediatrician, the mother of 3 sons and 1 daughter, and Assistant Professor of Clinical Pediatrics at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago. She is the author of Raising Twins, Editor in Chief of Caring for Your School-Age Child, and coeditor of The Big Book of Symptoms. She is an American Academy of Pediatrics spokesperson and frequent media contributor who lives in the Chicago suburbs.
On-camera clip of Dr. Flais: https://www.fox32chicago.com/video/734949
Upcoming review here and you can find other book reviews in our book nook here:
After you’ve finished check out the press release check out my review here:
Thank you,
Glenda, Charlie and David Cates
