On Boys Podcast

Gemma Gaudette says “we don’t give boys enough credit.”Gemma, host of Idaho Matters & a mom of two sons (currently ages 11 & 15), knows (from personal experience!) that boys can be dramatic & sensitive, even though society has coded those traits as “feminine.” Yet many adults continue to insist on & impose so-called “masculine” expectations on boys, without recognizing the breadth of normal variation.Many adults also react to boys’ behavior based on their experiences with harmful adult males. “There’s an automatic assumption that boys are bad,” Gemma says. “There is an automatic assumption that a boy is a predator…I get very frustrated as a boy mom when we label all boys as ‘bad,’ ‘aggressive,’ as ‘having anger issues,’ because I think that when we do that, at some point, our boys believe that.”Helping boys navigate emotions & relationshipsLike most brothers, Gemma’s boys fight & bicker – often, physically. Given the age & size difference between her sons, she told her oldest son n