Preschoolers Often Act Out Sexual Roles
Q. Just the other day, I caught my 5-year-old daughter and the boy next door, also 5, playing “married.” They had been playing in her room for quite some time when I went to check. There they were, laughing and giggling with nothing but their underpants on. When I opened the door, their reaction told me they knew they weren’t right.
To be honest, I didn’t handle it very well. Please tell me - and other parents who may someday find themselves in similar situations - how to deal with this kind of thing.
A. To begin with, what your daughter and her friend did is not at all unusual for children that age, even give or take a year or so. Older preschoolers have lots of questions and very few inhibitions, which can make for some exciting moments, as you’ve already discovered.
Five-year-olds are fascinated by the beginnings of life. They want to know where babies come from, what pregnancy and birth are all about, what newborns are like and so on. Sooner or later, they begin asking questions that deal with the sexual aspect of this whole mystery. Parents should answer these questions with an emphasis on the general and simplistic because that’s all their minds can grasp.
Five-year-olds are concrete thinkers, which is to say they need more than words to understand transcendental things such as sex and death and fly-fishing. They need pictures and demonstrations and other audiovisual aids. But when words are all adults will provide, and vague ones at that, they are left to their own creative devices. They feel compelled to translate the words into something concrete they can relate to. So, at the first possible opportunity, a child this age will approach a playmate - who undoubtedly has similar questions - and say, “Hey! Let’s act out this whole ‘Where do babies come from?’ thing. Then maybe we’ll understand it better!” They shift their gears into full-pretend and away they go, to the chagrin of parents who catch them at these truly innocent sports.
Low-key is the secret of success in these situations. Simply say something like, “You may not play this game, or games like it, until you are much older. Please put your clothes back on, and Billy, I think it would be best if you and Laura-Ann didn’t play together for the rest of the day, so I’m sending you home.”
In most cases, a cooling-off period of a day or so is advisable, but it shouldn’t be put to the children as a punishment. In fact, there’s no reason to punish them at all, unless one or both of them have already been told the game is forbidden. You should let the other child’s parents know what happened and how you dealt with it. Under normal circumstances, and most of these circumstances are normal, there’s no need to give the children the third-degree or rush off to the psychologist’s office. However, if this kind of behavior begins happening with some regularity and is fairly graphic, I’d strongly recommend that you consult a professional.
One funny story, related to me by a single mother: One day, she caught her 6-year-old daughter and an equally young male playmate out behind the garage pretending to be “married.” Obviously, the game had got a bit out of hand, so she brought her daughter inside for the rest of the day.
In the ensuing discussion, the mother asked, “Did the two of you pull your pants down?” A look of panic froze the little girl’s face, and she quickly answered, “No, Mommy, we were just thinking about it!”
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The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = John Rosemond The Charlotte Observer