Hand in Hand: Amy on Gender Roles

I’m with Erica—when Jake was small everything was a gun or a sword—even when he was playing with his dolls. But the nurture vs. nature question became much bigger in my life as Jake got older. When he was first ‘diagnosed’ with ADHD I thought: Well, there it is—nature won. Later, when it was depression and anxiety it seemed more likely that it was nurture—after all, Mama has suffered with both of those issues at one time or another. And most recently ODD (google it)—this one just seems like a title doctors have given to kids that are really difficult. ‘They’ say that kids like these elicit a certain type of parenting and that this was predetermined, but I don’t entirely believe it. I can’t help but think that if I had done things differently we wouldn’t be in this situation. ADHD is exhausting. Depression and anxiety is sad. But ODD, it’s almost impossible to parent. Angry, helpless, resigned, sad, empathic. The list goes on and on. How could this NOT be my fault?

Nurture versus nature? In my book they go entirely hand in hand.