Is it normal for a 4 and a half year old girl to say she's a boy?

[Cali68]

My daughter is four years old and 8 months old. She love to play pretend, but she always like to pretend she's some male (and mean) character: Scar from Lion King, the horse from Tangled, Pong from 101 Dalmatians, the prince in Sleeping Beauty or LIttle Mermaid... the list goes on and on. She was a shy little girl until she started going to pre-school last year. She became way more outgoing with children her age (both girls and boys) soon after she started going to pre-school. At school she started hanging out with this one boy. They became best friends. The second half of the year she became friends with another boy and another boy. She will hang out with one boy at a time. She also had girl friends, but not at school. Just daughters of friends of mine, and she loves (still does) playing with them. This is her second year at the same school, with the same class and most of her friends are boys, but now she plays with a group of them and there are also a couple of other girls in the group. However, recently, my daughter has started saying she's a boy. She doesn't get mad when I tell her she's a girl. She's still wearing normal girls clothes but she doesn't like to wear dresses. About year and a half she was into dresses, but now she doesn't want to wear them. Two nights I had this dialogue with her:
Me: Are you a boy or a girl?
Daughter: I'm a boy.
Me: Do you want to be a boy? or are you a boy?
Daughter: I'm a boy.
Me: Why do you think you're a boy?
Daughter: Because I like boys.
Me: What do you like about boys?
Daughter: I don't know.
Me: Why do you like boys?
Daughter: I don't like girls.
Me: Why don't you like girls?
Daughter (sadly): Because they don't like playing with me.

Then I reminded about her girl friends who she used to play with during the summer and her face lit up. She asked me to go to  the house of one of them to play (which I'll be arranging for next week).

My question is, does my daughter have this Gender Identity Disorder (or something like that) people keep talking about these day? Or is this kind of normal? Is she saying she's a boy so the her boy friends at school keep playing with her? My native language is Spanish and I speak only Spanish to my daughter (she's bilingual. My husband is American and only speaks English) and in Spanish every adjective is either masculine or feminine. My daughter always uses the feminine form when talking about herself.

Once, when she told me she was a prince I said: You can't be a prince. You're a girl" And she said: I know, Mom, but I'm pretending to be a boy who's pretending to be a prince :-). What do you think?
Thank you!

[dclee81]

Ohhh, there is nothing wrong with her acting and pretending to be a boy.  She see's all these male influences on tv and movies and all around her.  She is just playing.  My little girl did the same thing.  Its called creativity...Play with her and let her know that there is nothing wrong with playing boys too...

[Cali68]

Thank you SO much for this comment. It really makes me feel better to know other little girls do the same thing. I have only one daughter so I never know what's normal and what's not :-). Thank you!

[ROSYouralright]

I have 3 daughters and believe me they pretended to be everything under the sun when they were little! Including boys or male characters! Its a normal part of growing up and she will be just fine!

[ROSYouralright]

To add to that my little boy who is all boy used to run around in my heels when he was little or pretend to be a girl when my girls were having girl only tea parties etc.,.. LMAO! Its so normal for kids to be imaginative....makes me look back and laugh now that I'm thinking about it....

[Cali68]

Dear ROSYouralright, thank you so much for your post :-). I'm feeling better and better about this whole issue. I'm a person who freaks out easily and the reason why I was PANICKING! is that a couple of weeks ago we had a meeting at work and the topic of discussion was transgender people. We had three guest speakers, and one of them was a 16-year-old boy... who was born a girl! He said that when he was little he always wanted to be the male character in the movies and he always wanted to be a male character for Halloween. Well, you can imagine how much a worried when I heard this because, even though my daughter chose to be Rapunzel for Halloween last year, this year she wanted to be a super-hero and, as I said in my first post, she's always pretended to be one of the male characters (person or animal) of the movies she watches. She also LOVES Spider-man (even though she's never actually seen a Spider-man movie or a cartoon) and during the summer we bought her a pair of cute Spider-man sandals... but we had to buy them in the boy section because they don't make Spider-man shoes for girls :-(. Recently, she refuses to wear dresses but that's okay. I don't like dresses either and I never wear skirts. I guess the thing that's worrying me a little bit at this point is the fact that she's been saying she's a boy.... I'm just hoping she's just PRETENDING to be a boy and not actually feeling she's a boy :-(.

[ROSYouralright]

It really does sound like make believe... Does she enjoy wearing and doing "girl" things as well? I know its easy to panic as a mom but RELAX, BREATHE, just ENJOY her! These will be things ya'll laugh about later...

[Cali68]

Thank you, thank you, thank you! Well, does she like "girl" things? I think so. She plays with her princesses as well and yesterday morning she was pretending she was giving birth to her teddy bears :-), she was the mommy. It's just that two things have happened all of a sudden: her saying she's a boy and her refusal to wear dresses.... :-(. I'm on a roller coaster of emotions. One day I feel everything is going to be fine, and the next day I start panicking again :-(. Thank you for your support.

[ROSYouralright]

Kids begin to assert independence around this age... At least mine did... My middle daughter was the biggest tomboy ever until she was about 14 and the she switched overnight into a girlie girl...

[Cali68]

So, ROSYouralright, your daughter refused to wear dresses and pink? Was she actually wearing boys clothes? or just girl clothes in colors like blue? My daughter has decided her favorite color is blue and wants to wear a lot of that color. Yet, her favorite shirts are orange, pink, red and, yes, blue :-). What kind of toys did your daughter prefer? And thank you SO much for talking to me :-)

[ROSYouralright]

Oh God yes... She would pitch a fit at the mere thought of dresses! She was my lil Rambo! Jeans and tshirts! LMAO! She loved all sports, rough housing, tree climbing and always made her sisters barbies go to battle ufc style. She even wanted her hair short in a "skater" style for awhile. She just liked frogs and rocks more than barbies and butterflies!SHE GREW OUT OF IT! She's now a cheerleader and one of the girliest of girls! I've found that if you make a big deal out of it they will do it more! You push, they pull! As long as they aren't being destructive and hurting themselves or others, I say give her wings and let her fly. You'll see... It will all work out!

[allmymarbles]

My middle daughter said she would grow up to be a man. She stuck with that for some time. I asked her what she would do when she got breasts. She said she would push them in.

My children are now grown. This daughter (I have three) gets on best with her brother. I also had two sisters and got on best with one of my brothers. I think there is such a thing as a male mentality and a female mentality, having nothing to do with gender. Men seem to me to be more abstract in their thinking and less territorial.

The daughter I speak of has been hired to manage a program that involves group of 100 specialists, all of whom are male. She had no trouble with her job (which involves a certain amount of danger). She is, by the way, completely female both in appearance and sexual orientation.

[ROSYouralright]

Great post AMM!

[Cali68]

Dear ROSY, you post made me smile. I can't believe your little one went for "Rambo"  to cheerleader!! :-) How did you handle it all? Where you ever worried? I took your advice and I told my little girl that it's perfectly okay for a little girl to pretend she's a prince, a king, a super hero or whatever she wants.Yesterday, she pretended to be my little doll :-). Thank you SO much for your support! :-)

[Cali68]

Dear allmymarbles, thank you SO much for your post. I read it last night and it totally helped me sleep better :-). My question for you is, how did you handle it all? Were you ever worried? Does your daughter talk, these days, about her wanting to be a man back then? Does she laugh about it? Does she have some kind of explanation why she wanted to grow up to be a man? When I was a child, it was way easier for me to get along with boys than with girls. I wasn't into sports at all but I found I didn't have much in common with other girls. It was easier to talk and play with boys. It wasn't until I was an adult that started to get along better with women. Yet, I don't remember ever actually wanting to be a boy. Thanks again for sharing :-)

[Ecologic]

I was a tomboy as a child, dressing in pants and playing with boy toys, climbing trees. I think society shows boys to be stronger than girls and girls to be very girlish with makeup. I am an adult now... and still a girl, married (to a man) with a son. I started to wear skirts as an adult only, I do not wear make up often and I hate having long hair but who cares?

Tell your girl she can become a strong girl without having to be a man. Maybe show her role models of strong women who do not look like girlish?

[Cali68]

Dear Ecologic, thank you for your post! And I love your advice!... Thank you!

[Cali68]

So, I took my daughter to a play date with this little girl. They've known each other since they were babies and even though they don't see each other often, they've always played well together. Yesterday, however, things didn't seem to work out. This little girl has a little brother, so there are lots of boy toys in this house. My daughter only wanted to play with the cars. She gather all the cars she could and was happily playing with them, organizing them, etc.. Her friend asked: "Why each she playing with cars?!" in a tone that seemed to say "that's so weird!"... I simply said with a smile: "Because she LIKES cars". Her mother, my friend, had a lovely reaction and reminded her daughter how they had been talking about how girls like different things, and how some girls like playing with cars. She then told me about this book she had read to her daughter: " Not Every Princess Wears Pink". I looked at the book and I loved it! Even though the situation was handle properly when I went back home I was so mortified that I had a hard time falling asleep :-(. Am I over reacting? I'm perfectly fine with my daughter playing with cars. I used to play with cars as a little girl. It's when I hear comments like this that freak out :-(. Any thoughts?!

[Cali68]

Sorry, I just looked it up and the title of the book is: "Not All Princesses Dress in Pink"  by Jane Yolen :-)

[ROSYouralright]

Hey, their is no end to a mothers worry however I think in this particular case your stressing needlessly! Consider yourself Blessed that your only worry is that your daughter likes playing with"boy" toys.
I honestly believe you have a wonderful, normal daughter! A pretty princess that prefers jeans at this stage in life. I say "Let go, & ENJOY"!

[Cali68]

Thank you so much ROSYouralright. You made me smile. You're so right!! :-) I just freak out so easily in general, and when it comes to my daughter, well.... When she was a baby I was convinced she was autistic because she was not smiling at the time books said she should be smiling. When she was a little bit older I thought she had ADHD.... I can laugh at myself now when I think back and remember those fears. I hope soon I'll be laughing at this one, too :-)
Have a wonderful day!

[ROSYouralright]

I think our parents and grandparents were way less stressed BC they didn't have all the books to tell them what could go wrong... They had to wait til something actually happened! Lol. I think as parents we are in information overload and its so easy to get freaked out by the "what it's." I also think the anxiety lessens with each child! For example... When I had my first child no one could even hold her unless they had thoroughly scrubbed up to their elbows with soap and water! By the time my son was born (my 4th and last) my attitude was more like Heck, germs help build resistance! Lol. My point is that we seriously can save our worry for the big things.... Wait til she's a teenager and falls in love with MINI SKIRTS .... You'll look back on the "nothing but jeans" days and miss them. :-)

[allmymarbles]

You (and I) have the advantage of having larger families. We are more experienced and, like it or not, parenting is a learned skill. The more children you have, the greater your ability to see things in perspective, and the less likely you are to reach for a book or speak to an "expert" to handle minor problems. As for child psychologists, I would not grant a degree until they had at least two children of their own.

[Cali68]

You ladies are SO right. First of all, my daughter is my one an only. I had zero experience with babies before she was born because I don't have any siblings. So, I never know what's normal and what's not. It's so true that here in the States there's SO much information that it's easy to get scared. I was perfectly happy with my daughter pretending to be a prince and playing with cars until my workplace decided to educate us on transgender people. It was after I met and heard this 16-year-old boy (who was born a girl) that I started to freak out big time!! I'm trying my best to calm down and let go. I have good days and bad days. Yesterday was a bad day but, thanks to you and your wise words, I'm feeling much better by the minute :-) Thank you SO much!!

[ROSYouralright]

Your absolutely right and their is nothing worse than an "expert" that has no children of their own! I agree with you 100%! I am also the eldest child of 11...So although I don't have a degree I have certainly learned a few things over the years... :-)