Q: Should boys be boys? Or am I paranoid?

I have another question that has troubled me for a while and I thought I'd get it off my chest. It is about the way my nephew is turning out - if I may be blunt, there is one aspect of his behaviour that I find very disturbing. The boy is... groan, I am struggling to find words that are not offensive. The boy's not tough, not rugged, not sporty, not brave and does not adhere to many of society's expectations of what a boy should be like.

Let me give you an example. When I took him to Wild Wild Wet last year, I thought it would be a great day out, a treat for him - which kid wouldn't enjoy a great water theme park like that? I remember the good old days of Big Splash from the 1980s when I had so much fun as a boy then. Then guess what happened? The kid was afraid of everything. Alamak, like there was this girl who was at least 3 years younger than him who saw how utterly terrified he was and she was being so nice, "never mind, come with me, you can see me go first then you can follow behind."

Wild Wild Wet Singapore - are you afraid of the water slides? 

Even then, he just ran away. I looked at the girl  and in embarrassment said, "sorry, but hey, thanks for trying." The was no judgement on her part - just puzzlement that a boy who is older than her could be possibly afraid of a water slide where she had been playing and having such fun. Groan. He was only willing to play in the area reserved for toddlers and when I tried to challenge him to try the slide "for the big boys", my sister and parents almost jumped in to protect him from me, "he's autistic, leave him alone, you just don't understand him."

I'm like, yeah like duh, I know he is autistic but he has to eventually serve national service in less than ten years - shouldn't you start preparing him for the army, toughening him up, making him braver? But of course, I am just the uncle - I don't get a say even if I am the only one amongst them who has served NS and actually knows what awaits my nephew when he enlists. I have seen how the those who were perceived to be weaker become targets of bullies in the army - it is the survival of the fittest. My autistic nephew lacks the basic social skills to make new friends - couple that with his unmanly behaviour, I fear that the adults caring for him are really letting him down.

How would my nephew cope with NS?

Listen, I don't want you to think that I'm discriminating against anyone who may be gay or 'sissy' per se, look I've been through NS myself. I knew loads of 302s (openly gay soldiers) who were perfectly happy being out and proud and were perfectly capable of taking care of themselves. One can easily be effeminate and tough at the same time. There is no correlation between sporting ability and sexual orientation and there are certainly many outstanding openly gay athletes Matthew Mitcham. Being good at sports doesn't make you straight and by the same token, being crap at sports doesn't make you gay. I am simply dealing with the very practical aspects of nurturing a boy who would have to serve national service - my parents and sister simply are not thinking about that aspect of his development and wrapping him up in cotton wool because of his autism. It's not the kid's fault - but the adults are setting him up for disaster and I blame the adults.

Indeed, if he was able to engage in sports and other physical activities, that would enable him to participate in activities (eg. basketball, football, rugby) that would put him in a social environment where he could socialize with his peers whilst enjoying sports. Instead, he is given 1-on-1 swimming lessons with a very patient swimming instructor because they don't trust him to socialize with other children during swimming lessons. Cue palm to forehead. Groan. When I was his age, I was already doing a range of sports, taking the bus on my own and hiding my sports injuries from my parents because I was afraid they would stop me doing sports if they thought it might interfere with my studies.

Yup, I used to get these buses back in the 1980s.

I suppose there are two things going on in my head right now. Firstly, there's just this... unspeakable sadness and disappointment whenever I compare myself to my nephew. Secondly, I worry about how misguided my parents and sister are when they wrap him up in cotton wool.

I remember when I was my nephew's age - I was playing with my neighbours and I fell into the drain. There was this horrible gash on my knee and blood poured out. My neighbour gave me some tissue paper to stem the flow of the blood and I merely stood up, walked home and then washed it in the toilet. I didn't say a word, I didn't shed a tear, I merely put some plasters over the gash - it took several plasters and I had to keep changing them because the plasters kept getting wet with blood. There is still a scar on my knee from that fall on my knee today. That was the kind of boy I was - I was tough as nails. Playful as hell and lazy as well, but I was tough - that was a necessary virtue which helped me excel in sports. It made me the person I am today.

It is necessary to be tough to excel in sports. 

And my nephew? Groan. We were in town when we needed to cross the road, my nephew tried to dash across the road without looking. I grabbed him in time, just before he disappeared under the wheels of a bus. I then said to him, "Don't you ever do that again, that is so dangerous!" He burst out crying and then my parents got so angry with me for "making him cry"- oh cheers, maybe next time I'll let him get squished by the bus - would you prefer that hmm? Not a word of thanks for snatching their 宝贝 grandson from the jaws of death - that's my parents for you. I swear the kid is a cry baby and my parents and sister don't even discourage it. Groan. What do you think is going to happen when he cries like that when he is in the army? What did they think would happen eh?

As humans, we reach a compromise with ourselves at times of crisis. It's not like I didn't feel the pain when I fell into the drain, I just reasoned that crying wasn't going to undo any of the damage I had done to my knee.  Sure there were times when I felt alone, isolated, frustrated and upset in the army, but I reckoned that crying wouldn't resolve any of that - but learning to get along with those around me (no matter how awful they were) was the most important thing I had to do. Is my nephew being trained to think things through like that in his head? Like I know he's autistic - but at some stage he is still going to have to learn to do this instead of just crying?

We do what we can to compromise with our emotions in life. 

I just feel so helpless when I think about it. But then again, he's not my son - he's just my nephew. Should I just stand by and do nothing? If you are a parent of a son, would you expect him to be sporty and boyish? Or am I simply too old fashioned to have such expectations of a boy? Should boys... be boys? Please let me know, leave a comment below, thank you so much my readers. And if you think I am wrong, please be honest with me.