Building Boys Bulletin 11-27-23
Building Boys Bulletin 11-27-23
A humbling holiday
‘Twas the day before Thanksgiving and I fantasized about getting drunk with my sister, spending the night at her house, and letting my husband and kids figure out the holiday for themselves.
I didn’t do that, of course. I’m a responsbile, mature woman. So, I bought a $9.99 bottle of wine at the grocery store instead and drank 3/4 of it while making pumpkin pies and raging (quietly and not-so-quietly) about all the things I had to do.
I finished my last client article around 11 pm and then stayed up, scrolling, past 2:30 am. As I got up off the couch, I noticed my head felt pretty congested.
I woke up feeling TERRIBLE — no surprise, I suppose, given the wine, rage, self-loathing, scrolling, and lack of sleep. But this wasn’t a simple hangover, sleep deprivation, or regret. It was COVID.
I spent the day — the next 3 days, actually — in bed and my husband and kids figured out the holiday for themselves. The man I yelled at a day earlier even placed a festive table cloth on the dining room table before sitting down to eat with my kids. He brought me a plate and checked on me attentively. My sister brought me soup. My brother asked if I need anything.
I’m still trying to reconcile their kindness, compassion, and care with the hostility and judgment I tossed their way only a few hours earlier.
I know this is love. I know that I have so, so much to be grateful for. And writing and reading this story, it seems clear that if I’d maybe asked for (and accepted) help sooner, I might not have gotten to the rage stage.
Like my boys (& yours), I’m still growing and learning. I’m an imperfect human being who hurts those who love her and yet desperately needs their love and support. I too make messes and poor choices.
It’s humbling to be reminded of those things all over again. I like to think I have things figured out. But like the rest of us, I’m muddling through life. I still screw up, and I still need support.
Here’s to building boys!
Jennifer
P.S. Don’t forget — replays of Talk with Boys Like a Pro are now available. Order your copy & get all the videos & resources delivered directly to your inbox.
IN THE NEWS
From Boys to Men: Teenagers Talk Mental Health
Highlights:
“I want to be able to make new friends, maybe have a relationship and more freedom to be able to go and do things, instead of sitting at home scrolling through TikTok and playing Call Of Duty.”
“The thing about crying, too… I’m a male. If I cry, it feels like I’m weak because as a man, you gotta be strong... society makes out men to be like… they’re not allowed to cry. And if they talk about mental health, they’re weak. If they show emotion, they’re a pussy.”
“There are a lot of pressures on young men right now. I don’t think it’s talked about often, but we’re constantly bombarded with marketing around what it means to be a man. The idea that being a man is associated with certain actions, certain products."
“I think the idea of wealth has also been linked to masculinity. ‘If you’re not wealthy, you’re not successful...’ That really has bled into teenage culture. They don’t want to pursue passions they might enjoy, for example, teaching, because they see on the news that the salary is low.”
“A lot of men that identify as masculine feel quite attacked by this new wave of ‘be less masculine’ and ‘be softer’. From my point of view, the problem is not with masculinity – it’s when masculinity becomes a mask for your issues that are going on behind that.”
Male Suicide: Patterns & Recent Trends
Highlights:
The overall male suicide rate in 2022 is 23.9 per 100,000, compared to 6.1 for females, or a 4x difference.
“In 2022 alone, 39,282 men died by suicide. This translates to a man dying by suicide approximately every 13 minutes.”
“Rural counties have higher rates of suicide than those in urban metros… Suggested explanations for higher rural rates include a lack of health insurance, increased social fragmentation, a higher percentage of veterans, more firearms, and greater impact of economic shocks”
Youth suicide rates for boys have surpassed their 1994 peak
Congress Isn’t a Schoolyard. Time to Deal with Toxic Immaturity.
Highlights:
There seems to be “a trend of high-profile or powerful men fixing to fight…[and] In today’s attention economy, it’s undeniable that these displays of ultimately juvenile masculinity play extremely well”
“….when senators act like children, without censure (and apparently without any regret…) how are we, as a culture, supposed to model healthy adult masculinity?”
Highlights:
“Are we asking what curriculum we should use to teach reading, or what children need in order to learn to read...?
“…instead of paying attention to the screeds of the Reading Wars, I wish we would pay more attention to how children learn best in general.”
Muscle Dymorphia is Fueling a Silent Male Mental Health Crisis
Highlights:
Male body image dissatisfaction has tripled in the last three decades, from 15 per cent of the Western population to 45 per cent.
Guys “are inundated with messaging to bulk up the moment they hit adolescence…[this pressure] is compounded by the digital world of #fitspo and #workout posts”
81% of the 18–24-year-olds surveyed have displayed at least one sign of muscle dysmorphia. This includes consistently thinking about whether they’re muscular or lean enough, exercising despite illness or injury, feeling anxiety for missing a workout, giving up social or work obligations for the gym, or maintaining an extreme exercise programme.
Bulking up, with the associated risky behaviours of skewed nutrient intake and excessive exercise, can be as dangerous as the drastic weight loss
Talk to Your Kids About Osama Bin Laden
Highlights:
A manifesto by Osama Bin Laden recently went around on TikTok. And that, @iproposethis says, is “an opportunity to invite our kids into conversations about media literacy."
“We have to remind them that even Hitler and Stalin and Mussolini said things that made sense sometimes, things that were compelling and felt like they might be solutions to whatever challenges the world was facing during their rise. If they hadn’t, they wouldn’t have risen to power.”
“It is our job as parents to take opportunities like this one — the fresh popularization of Osama bin Ladin of all people — to teach and reinforce media literacy, digital responsibility, and your own family’s values.”
ON BOYS Podcast
Christopher Pepper Discusses Health Education & Boys
On Building Boys
Do your boys like to write? Most boys don’t. Boys’ fine motor skills tend to develop later than girls’, and so for most boys, the physical act of holding a pencil or pen and creating words is frustrating and painful.
But what if I told you that’s not writing?
Oh sure, it’s writing in one sense. Call it writing with a small w: writing, tracing letters onto the page. The kind of writing I’m talking about is writing with a capital W: Writing, using written language to communicate…