DD looks nothing like me. Feeling a bit sad about it

[hamburgers]

Can anyone else relate?

I know it sounds so silly because I love DD (9 months) with all my heart but she has dad written all over her. She looks nothing like me apart from our eye shape and colour. For example I've got dark eyebrows and hair, oval face; DD has round cherub face with very fair hair and eyebrows.

I don't know.. I guess I thought if I had a daughter she'd be a mini version of me 🤷🏼‍♀️ Sometimes I look at DD and think how can she even be mine, she looks nothing like me!

I have a theory, totes unscientific. Babies look like dad at first.

My dd is 16 now and has looked the spit of her dad since she was born. Everyone's always pointed it out, and as she's got older they also say she looks exactly like her dad's sister when she was the same age.

No one ever says she looks like me because she doesn't! We have completely different skin and hair colouring, different body and face shape, different eye colour etc etc.

BUT she's so exactly like me in temperament and personality and that's completely different to her dad and his sister that there can be no doubt that she's taken that all from me, and her looks all from her dad.

We get on like the best of friends and can read each other like a book. I quite like the fact that she doesn't look like me because it's not like looking at myself at her age (which could be quite depressing as I'm now much older and fatter than I used to be!)

Kids take all different parts from both parents, some visible and some not. Don't feel upset because she doesn't look like you. You'll find a million things over the coming years that will make you think 'she's just like me'

Sorry flibberty but my daughter was a mini-me right down to the shape of her fingernails. I'd never noticed the shape of my fingernails - or lips or chin etc - until I first saw her and was blown away by the overwhelming feeling of familiarity.

Both my two looked the image of their dad and his Mum when babies and younger but now they are older look a mix of both of us. Genes are there and there is nothing you can do about it!

It helps massively with bonding to have the sense of familiarity.

What a load of nonsense. If you could only bond with people who looked like you, nobody would love anyone ever.

Mine look more like their Dad than me. I'm relieved to be honest.

My eldest looks just like me - youngest looks like my mum!
You don't know which way the genes will scramble!

What a load of nonsense. If you could only bond with people who looked like you, nobody would love anyone ever.

Yeah had to lol at that! A little bit insensitive also.

I’m sure I read somewhere that babies are genetically programmed to look like their fathers. She came out of you, there’s no doubt she’s yours. But the father doesn’t have that reassurance so to keep dad around, baby looks like him to start with. Could be total bullshit but I thought both my children look different from each other but also both like their dad. When they got to about 3 I started seeing my own features in their little faces. They change so much, don’t be despondent OP.

Have you got baby photos of yourself? I see more similarities there but both of my DC look like their Dads. Now DS1 is older people say he looks like me more. But the older he gets the more I see my ex in him.

I think my twins look exactly like DH, I don’t see me in them at all. But then I see photos of me as a baby / toddler and they really do look like me as well.

My eldest looks exactly like DH and my youngest looks more like me. It's no biggie. They change all the time anyway!

Both my daughters look nothing like me but have my personality which I'm pleased about because I'm so much funnier than my husband 😎

Someone gave my oldest the book Monkey Puzzle when she was little. Best book ever because it explains not all children look like their mums, it really made me realise its not a bad thing....... Yes it's a kids book, brought a little tear to my eye though

this happened to me - I’ve got dark hair, green eyes, heart shape face - DD popped out fair, blue eyed and big square forehead just like her dad!

tbh the only time it ever annoyed me a little was when DH’s side of the family would make a big deal of it ‘oh SORRY Second chuckle she’s a “DH’ surname” through and through!’ ‘gosh she really looks NOTHING like you’ etc

now she’s nearly 3 and she looks a lot like pictures of me at that age too - they change so much and from my experience all the little babies I know looked more like the Dads until they were at least 1yr old

Do babies really look like anyone? Both of mine looked nothing like me as babies, now one looks very much like me and the other like her dad.

My DD was the spitting image of her father when she was born and for a good couple of years afterwards. She is now my double. Everybody comments on it.

They can and do change in looks. Isn’t looking like their father at birth an evolutionary thing? Before DNA tests were a thing? So that men could be sure they were the father??

My DD and DS both looked exactly like DH when they were babies. Blonde hair, blue eyes. I am dark brown hair, hazel eyes and have 3 sisters and a mum with the same colouring so I never imagined my children would be very fair and have striking blue eyes. DD has got more like me as she gets older, to the point that people now call us two peas in a pod, and tell me that she's the spitting image of me, albeit with different colouring. Not that I cared whether they looked like me or not just that they were happy and healthy.

My DDs are mixed race. I'm the palest person I know.

It's never once fazed me that they're drastically different in appearance at first glance - that's what you sign up for when you have children, you contribute just half of your DNA.

But she's 9 months old, she's tiny. Most babies have chubby round faces. What she looks like now is little reflection on what she'll look like as she grows.

None of my three children look anything like me at all. I have quite unusual colouring, slightly olive skin, blue eyes and dark brown hair. All DC have blue eyes, but they're DH's blue rather than mine and none have dark hair.

Does it/did it bother me? Maybe slightly, but there are bigger things to worry about.
Your DD may well change to look more like you as she grows anyway.

We all turn into our mothers one day, whether we "see it" or not.

Focus more on her personality rather than her looks, surely this is more important anyway?

Thanks everyone. I'm sure she will change over the years.

I do have baby photos of myself to compare with and we look nothing alike. I'm not necessarily complaining, DDs dad (my DH) is a good looking guy and we get many comments from strangers how beautiful DD is (though I'm sure it happens to every baby) I just pictured DD to look completely different, more like me, don't know why!

Not only do children change as they grown, different people see different things. So, I've very recently had people taken aback at how ds is the spitting image of my dad, and others saying he is a carbon copy of dh!
Dd, always used to look just like mil, but now people say she's more me. I can see both, actually.

She probably does look like you but you can't see it. Every now and then I see my sister in my DD, but what I'm actually seeing is me! Your own face is too familiar.