Baby Steps: Parenting girls is no piece of cake

I thought being a mom of a boy was tough. I didn't know how to potty train a boy, I didn't know what kind of games and toys boys liked, I didn't know anything about super heroes and barely knew anything about sports. I thought it was going to be the hardest job. And then Cooper came and my hard job was not hard at all.

I learned how to play Batman and baseball, and I am told quite often that I am the best pitcher, too. I figured out how to potty train the boy, even if it took a long time, and after five years I'm pretty confident in my boy-toy-and-game-picking-out skills.

Parenting a boy wasn't nearly as hard as I thought it would be, and parenting my daughter isn't as easy as I thought it would be.

I wanted a little girl so bad the first time I got pregnant. I thought it would be so easy. I could dress her up in pink and glitter, buy her a Barbie and some stuffed animals and pop her into some ballet classes. Piece of cake.

But as any parent knows, parenting in general is not a piece of cake, let alone parenting a girl. There are things I have to worry about with Felicity that I didn't have to worry about with Cooper. Her feelings are more delicate and her temper more hot. She is more opinionated, but also needs my approval far more than Cooper does. And I have to worry about society in general and its views on her.

Cooper is a boy, so he already has life 50 percent easier than Felicity does. At age 2, Felicity is already judged at day care for the outfit she wears. She is already judged at restaurants for how much she eats, and she is already judged at the playground for how she looks. She was bullied because she didn't wear red on "red day" and picked on because she likes to play cars with the boys instead of pretend with the girls. And she is only 2!

I have 16 more years of dealing with the petty girl fights, the tears and the drama. These are things I thought I was done with when I became an adult. When I graduated high school and moved away, I thought I left those things in the past, but being a parent of a girl means I have to worry about them all over again.

I also worry about other things that didn't cross my mind as an adolescent girl, but I'm sure crossed my mother's mind. Did you know girls shorts are at least 2 inches shorter than boys shorts? It's true -- I measured. Cooper's shorts all reach to the middle of his knee or a bit below. Felicity's shorts all reach well above her knee, usually to her mid-thigh, and they are tight. They are not loose basketball shorts like you find in the boys department -- they are form fitting.

I have to worry about my daughter getting bullied because she doesn't have the same princess shorts as the other girls, but I also worry about her being sexualized at a young age because those shorts are precariously short for a toddler. Why are we making "booty" shorts for 2-year-olds?

Being a parent is hard enough without having to spend three hours in the toddler girls department at Kohl's or Target just to find clothing I deem appropriate for my daughter. I now have a greater respect for all the tears my mother shed in my youth while shopping for clothing for my sister and me.

Parenting is difficult, but I believe we are making it more difficult. We are allowing department stores and other parents to tell us what is OK for our children to wear instead of stepping in and making the decision ourselves. Well, I'm making the decision that my daughter will be wearing a burlap sack from now until age 30, and my son will, too, in a show of solidarity. Think of the money we will save!

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About Kristen

Kristen Pind, a native of small-town Gower, Missouri, never dreamed that by her 20s, she'd be married with two kids and living in Cape Girardeau. Kristen invites moms of all types to find her "Baby Steps" page on Facebook.