Before reading this, take yourself back to the 3rd grade. Remember how innocent love was and 
girlfriends and boyfriends came and went with out any love lost. I know some parents don’t allow their children to have “girlfriends/boyfriends” when they are young. It was never a subject brought up in my house. It was never said that I could or could not. So to me now as a parent of an 8 year old boy, it’s no big deal to me however we do talk about it.
What did it mean to have a boyfriend or girlfriend in the 3rd grade? My answer is fairly close to my sons. So you don’t look like a looser! Come on admit it, even though they might have been cute and they were nice when it came down to it, everyone else had one so you should too! The title of boyfriend/girlfriend was pretty much just that, a title. They may hold hands and chase each other on the playground but that’s about all that happens.
My son had a girlfriend for almost 2 1/2 years, Emily, he adored her. He wasn’t like all the other boys that had a new girlfriend every week. Emily was sweet and if you know Bailey, they don’t come much sweeter than him. They were perfect for each other in his words. He was sure to marry her someday. She just recently broke up with him, she didn’t tell him why and he didn’t ask. He said he didn’t want to know why. His heart was broke and the why wasn’t important.
Just like I told Bailey he would, he got over her. He had a sleep over with his best friend a couple weekends ago. I heard them talking about this girl named Kiara. So I chimed in and asked, “who’s Kiara???” Apparently she’s liked by all the boys. Right now she’s “going out” with Johny. Bailey and Johny are friends and Johny knows Bailey likes her. So what does Johny say to Bailey? Not what you might think, he says to him what one day will become a #1 rule of friends that you make and vow to never break. He says to him, “write her a note asking her if she likes you, and if she does then I will break up with her so you can ask her out.” My first reaction was, “YOU DON’T DO THAT!!!”
I have to say after that conversation I felt a little refreshed by the whole thing. As we get older we develop more intense feelings, we develop jealousy and greed, resentment and a love that is more deep than we even thought possible. What Johny said to Bailey will one day become a rule you just don’t break, a vow that one makes with a friend that if broken the friendship too is broken. I’ve gone through it, I lost a best friend in Junior High over a boy. The innocence of a bunch of 8 year old kids is priceless and I hope someday when they are my age they look back and remember how that felt, no expectations, no love lost. It makes the petty little arguments seem so useless.
Do you remember how that felt, your first young love? Were you allowed to have a boyfriend or girlfriend? Did you allow your children if you have any to have had or have now a girlfriend or boyfriend? I think it may be different with girls. Dad’s and their daughters are different I think. Still I think it’s all innocent and I’m soaking it all up, soon Bailey will grow up and develop those feelings and things get so much more complicated!!
Us Girls..Our Views 
I was way too shy to let anyone know it, but I had crushes. I didn’t dare let the boys know because I’d be horrified if they rejected me, and I didn’t dare mention it at home because my parents and older brothers would tease me.
I think it’s cute now, but when I was young, I didn’t think the boyfriend-girlfriend thing was that desireable. I felt most classmates were doing it just to prove something, to look more “mature,” not because they really had any feelings.
Ah, young love! Basically having a boyfriend/girlfriend at that age means you’re allowed to be friends with the opposite sex all of a sudden, after years of thinking the opposite sex is “gross.”
I had a boyfriend for all of third and fourth grades – I was a one-man woman! But basically all it meant was that we hung out a lot with each other and with the other “couples.” I think that it was truly the first time we all learned to appreciate that we could have interests in common with the opposite sex.
I remember having a boyfriend in first grade (and then not again until 7th grade!). I don’t remember anyone else having one. I don’t remember why we called each other that except that one day we decided and we just stayed “together” until he moved away. We used to eat lunch together. It was really sweet and innocent, but now I wish I could go back and spy on me and see what it was all about, because I don’t remember it much!
The earliest memory I have of having a “crush” is 5th grade. I remember he asked me to a movie and my dad said NO! Those crushes were really harmless but I was very shy and wouldn’t have let a boy know I liked him for the most part. I started to seriously like boys more in jr high.
I didn’t encourage my boys or discourage them from having a girlfriend. I didn’t take it seriously either. Jason was very quiet and didn’t say a lot and Toby was very clownish but he was also very shy so we didn’t have a lot of “girlfriend” issues when they were really young. I know they liked girls but that was as far as it went.
I pity the poor soul who asks Trinity out. Daddy will be home cleaning his gun!!
I had crushes on boys but I never “went out” or dated anyone until I was in high school.
My daughter’s are not allowed to really date until they are 16. With that being said my oldest daughter, 16 now, “went with” guys before the dating age. But it was just an at school thing. My youngest daughter, 9, has crushes on boys, but that is it so far. But then again she goes to a Catholic School and the whole dating thing is not tolerated there.
I remember having crushes also in elementary school, but didn’t have a “boyfriend” until 5th grade. I think at this young in their lives, having a boy/girlfriend means you hang out at school and say hi to each other in the hallway! It is very innocent, but am glad I’m not dealing with it yet!
Has anyone else thought of the boys we liked when we were young, were harder to forget? I so fell for a boy in 8th grade that I’ve never forgotten about and it was the most “innocent” kind of love. It was long talks on the phone and lots of kissing but that was the extent of it. To this day I can’t hear The Doors or Cat Stevens without thinking of him yet when I was older, I can’t even remember all the boys I dated. Why is those very innocent ones that stick with us?
Maybe it’s just me.
Mine was in the 6th grade Joy. His name was Stephen and since I was his girlfriend I got to wear his jacket. Maybe that’s why I secretly like the Raiders. That was the cool thing…if you wore another boys Raiders jacket (that’s all they wore) that meant you were his girlfriend or he at least liked you. I’ll never forget him though, and I’m not even sure if we kissed that much. Once we got into Junior High everything changed. I swear the summer I went into the 7th grade…nothing was the same!
I remember wearing the “jackets” too Nikki. That’s so neat to remember. We all had crushes on each other all the time. I think of our group of friends, at one time or another, we liked each other. I think when you start not letting your kids do something, they just want to do it all the more. I plan on just playing it cool when it happens because I feel it’s very normal. My husband on the other hand will probably be “cleaning his gun” with Toby when Dani goes out with a boy!!!
LOL about the gun cleaning Jane.
My dad always said he’d be cleaning his gun, but where was he when the time came? My first date was at age 17 and this ugly guy at college asked my MOM if I could go out with him and SHE said yes. Yuck. All my dad did was eavesdrop on our good-night “conversation” (BS excuses for why he wasn’t getting a kiss – blech) so he could embarrass me with it later. No wonder I was afraid to glance sideways at a boy when I was little.
well for my bff and I it meant detention. We both had a crush on the same boy. Why the teacher sat us all three together I still don’t know..but we all 3 got busted pushing notes one day. THEN the battleaxe played a nasty trick on us. We all had to stay over and were in detention TOGETHER! Ok that should have been a red flag but of course we were high fiving and thinking…COOL! Nope we sat in there and messed around and then we started bad mouthing her….well she had turned on the speaker and her AND the principal were up in the office listening to us! Our butts were in the sling for a week. AND our desks were moved. We each got a corner.
My bff and I are still bff and we still laugh about that to this day!
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