Of course, we can give our children a squeeze or a peck - that feeling of safety and security - at home. "They still need that affection and warmth from us. They just need it to not be in front of their friends," Pungello said. With so many moms of boys weighing in, I wondered if I'd be back in this situation in four years, when my kissy-face daughter reaches the age her brother is today. To my relief, my friends told me, the girls keep on kissing a bit longer. That's true, Scarlett said, because a mom's kiss can be threatening to her son's developing masculinity. "Kissing by mothers is something that makes boys look childish, unmanly, babylike - not tough, as most boys wish to be perceived," Scarlett said. "Girls, on the other hand, can work out independence and autonomy while still being kissed - because being kissed doesn't threaten their being feminine." So the good news for moms of those burping and bathroom-humor-loving boys is that they will likely embrace a parent's public affection again when they're older teenagers or young adults, experts said. "Sometimes you have to turn your back on the past to get through the door to the future - and that's what happens when a child gets on a bus in the morning without kissing mommy goodbye," Scarlett says. I'm not looking to rush my son's childhood away. So these days, I'll happily settle for giving him a big goodnight kiss, right in the privacy of his room.
Kiss childhood goodbye: Mom deals with kiss diss
I called his name, and my not-so-little-anymore fourth-grader
turned to give me that knowing look, fully aware that we had
skipped the morning ritual.
So after trudging back into a quiet house, I did what any mom in
the modern age would do: I updated my online status to say the
missed kiss had gotten me down. Within minutes, I was comforted to
know I was not alone.
"That started last year for me. I'm sad about it too," Laura
wrote about her 9-year-old son.
"Aw-w-w ... hated when the boys did that," added Linda, the
wise mom of two sons, 14 and 12, who then warned: "Soon it will
just be a head nod in passing as a hello!"
With my son's ninth birthday quickly approaching, I figured that
he was embarrassed and that the dissed kiss was another sign of his
growing independence.
My instincts were right. The shunning of parental PDAs usually
happens sometime in grade school, when kids' social scenes are
expanding. That's when they're more aware of people's perceptions
of them and don't want to be seen as little kids, said Liz
Pungello, a developmental psychologist at the University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill.
"It's about them and their social scene and has hardly anything
to do with us," she said, making me feel marginally better.
My spirits rose further when George Scarlett, a developmental
psychologist at Tufts University, said children whose parents have
developed a nurturing relationship with them should be secure
enough around this age to tackle the outside world. Leaving without
the kiss is a sign that they are feeling confident and autonomous
and are making their own healthy friendships.
"Not kissing, then, means a parent has done his or her job!"
he said by e-mail.
Job satisfaction aside, it still hurts. But Scarlett says
parents shouldn't feel bad because their children's love, though no
longer visible in public, is likely to be just as strong - if not
stronger - than when they were toddling around clinging to their
pant leg.
"I strongly suggest that parents laugh at their feelings of
being jilted lovers and not act as if they are being rejected
because they aren't," Scarlett says.
It's just that the public smooch is "too threatening to the
wish to be big and independent and respected by peers," he said.
Still, parents should try to keep up the rituals of public
affection, but in a more low-key way, to keep the practice alive,
Scarlett says.
My friends had some solutions. "We do the 3 hand squeezes for
I-L-Y," wrote Melissa, of her almost 10-year-old son. Heather
reports that her 7½-year-old-son deemed a kiss "OK as long as I do
it before the bus comes."
Others are unwilling to give up the buss at the bus and resort
to force. My cousin Lisa, a black belt in karate, grabs her
fifth-grade son to kiss him on the head. "Sometimes, I block the
entrance to the bus," she wrote.
