The Social Experiment

Ah remembered today that the whole point of writing 'Mum Versus Toddler' was because my friend came over last week. She is a very strict mum - big on boundaries, discipline and routine so she was pretty shocked to see how I am raising The Toddler and how he just wanders around doing his own thing. She actually asked me if he was a Social Experiment. It was brilliant. Okay, so she was joking but part of her meant it and I loved it. It was the funniest thing I'd heard for days.
I meant to write my whole blog about it but I went and bloody forgot! That's intelligence-after-children for you. They definitely take out some brain cells with the placenta.
Anyway, the truth is YES. The Toddler is a kind of Social Experiment in that I am interested to see if he turns out okay without me being clingy, naggy and strict on him. In essence - non-parenting. I'm so ready to jump on the other two that it will be most intriguing to find out what happens with The Toddler. I bet he turns out the best.
All this is said tongue-in-cheek of course. I'm not like that couple who are raising their child non-gender specific or whatever bollocks it's called. The child's grandparents for pete's sake don't even know if the kid is male or female. I understand that the parents don't want to put the social norm of pink for girls/ trains for boys stuff on the child but IT'S NATURE!!!! (Unless of course you count The Tomboy who is out there on her own. Gender-creative I like to call it.). Surely the child will feel that having a gender is wrong? It's been forced to keep its gender a secret? That's a parenting disaster waiting to happen, I'm sure. Which is great for me because it will make my fuck ups not look so bad.
In the future, if anybody blames The Toddler's behavioural problems on me, at least I can say that he was brought up knowing that he was a boy. Even though he'll probably end up in therapy with all the gender-neutral kids. He's got me for his mother, after all.