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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

to think that actually a lot of women secretly think like this about having a boy?

238 replies

channing55 · 30/06/2014 09:16

I just read in the papers about this silly woman who had a boob job on the NHS, is now pregnant and said if she had known it was a boy she would have had an abortion and is drinking and smoking throughout her pregnancy because she doesn't care because it's a boy.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2673898/Im-drinking-smoking-boy-Pregnant-model-boob-job-NHS-says-shed-abortion-shed-known-wasnt-girl.html

I know most women who are pregnant with a boy wouldn't go to the extreme of having an abortion or smoking and drinking but I have heard so many negative remarks from mums pregnant with a boy about how disappointed they are and even when I was pregnant people made rude comments about (me) having a boy.

I actually think a lot of women are secretly disappointed when they find out they are having a boy and that this woman's horrible attitude is just an extreme example of how much prejudice and nastiness there is now towards little boys and the nasty cliches society now attributes to them?

OP posts:
stooshe · 30/06/2014 09:25

Rubbish. It may have been self hating or awareness of the fact that I am not an "easy" person, but I wanted a boy/boys. I had a girl, now a woman in her twenties. let's put it this way...she aint easy, just like me! Most of my friends wanted boys for this same reason. The same ones who wanted and never got, all have "strong women" for daughters!
As for the car crash that is Miss Boob Job, nobody with a smidgen of sense shouldn't draw any notion from anything that she says. She is an attention seeker, par excellence and a car crash waiting to happen.

BrianTheMole · 30/06/2014 09:25

Oh ffs, I clicked on the bloody link. Its that Josie Cunningham who will do anything to be famous. I hardly think she is typical of the general population.

OneLittleToddleTerror · 30/06/2014 09:26

She's an idiot. My preference this time is a girl, but that's just because my first is a girl. I have always wanted a little sister when I grew up Grin. But when I had my first, I genuinely had no preference.

And besides, deep down in my heart, I am happy for either boy or girl as long as it's a healthy baby. I'm sure most mums think that. Even those who have 3 boys and would like to have a girl for the next. We will love the new baby to bits once it's born.

sebsmummy1 · 30/06/2014 09:26

Wow. What a lot of absolute bollocks you write OP. I couldn't have been more delighted to be having a son and he is my total world. I won't be clicking the link as I know exactly who you are referring too and I assume she has signed some sort of contract with the Mail so she can keep selling controversial stories to them which I assume keeps he well stocked with fake tan.

JapaneseMargaret · 30/06/2014 09:26

I think there are a lot of people out there who would prefer a baby the same sex as them, it's just that men don't have the opportunity to talk about it, because parenting websites are so heavily dominated by women.

I seriously do suspect though, that if asked, on paen of death, many, many men (just as many as women) would admit to secretly preferring a boy - but obviously, like women - would be just as happy and delighted with either, when the baby actually arrived.

Also, you're deluded if you don't think that outside the cosseted confines of the western world, that the absolute preference for male babies over female is a much bigger problem.

Mandatorymongoose · 30/06/2014 09:28

I was pleased when DD was a girl and I was pleased when DS was a boy. If I have any more children I imagine I'll be perfectly happy with their genders too.

/shrug

Lucyccfc · 30/06/2014 09:30

She's just a bloody attention seeker. Could you imagine her having a girl and the poor child turning out just like her mother!

I wouldn't say that I hoped for a particular sex when I was pregnant, but was secretly pleased I was having a boy. I am sure I would have been fine with a girl, but I do struggle to 'get' my friends daughters and the stuff they like - it's all hair, nails, looms and flipping 1D.

I love taking my lad to the match and we are always out kicking a ball around and climbing trees. I know girls can do this too, but I seriously couldn't cope with some of the more girly things.

itiswhatitiswhatitis · 30/06/2014 09:31

Don't be so silly. I only ever wanted boys and when ds was born they said it's a boy and my first words were 'thank god!' and i wanted another boy when I fell pregnant with ds2.

TheTravellingLemon · 30/06/2014 09:31

Personally, I always wanted a boy. Once I fell pregnant, I couldn't have cared less what gender the baby was. I had my little boy in the end and he's amazing.

That said, I kind of agree with part of what you said. I have had a lot of negative comments or strange comments. Along the lines of 'hopefully next time you'll get your girl' 'at least your husband must be pleased' 'boys leave you when they get married, girls always stay with you' Hmm

People don't believe me when I say that, if we are lucky enough to have a second, I wouldn't be hoping for a girl.(I wwouldn't be hoping for a boy either, just a healthy baby)

AnnieLobeseder · 30/06/2014 09:31

YABVU, and I think you are very misguided if you think that mothers who find themselves pregnant are anything less than overjoyed at being pregnant, and love each of the their children with every ounce of their hearts. You are being unbelievably insulting to mothers of sons.

Sadly in some parts of the world, sons are still seen as infinitely preferable to daughters, to the extent that an estimated 100 million women are estimated to be "missing" from the world population, either aborted in the womb or killed at birth, mostly in India and China.

TRIGGER WARNING - don't read the following paragraphs if you're upset by sensitive content.

"XINRAN XUE, a Chinese writer, describes visiting a peasant family in the Yimeng area of Shandong province. The wife was giving birth. “We had scarcely sat down in the kitchen”, she writes (see article), “when we heard a moan of pain from the bedroom next door…The cries from the inner room grew louder—and abruptly stopped. There was a low sob, and then a man’s gruff voice said accusingly: ‘Useless thing!’

“Suddenly, I thought I heard a slight movement in the slops pail behind me,” Miss Xinran remembers. “To my absolute horror, I saw a tiny foot poking out of the pail. The midwife must have dropped that tiny baby alive into the slops pail! I nearly threw myself at it, but the two policemen [who had accompanied me] held my shoulders in a firm grip. ‘Don’t move, you can’t save it, it’s too late.’

“‘But that’s...murder...and you’re the police!’ The little foot was still now. The policemen held on to me for a few more minutes. ‘Doing a baby girl is not a big thing around here,’ [an] older woman said comfortingly. ‘That’s a living child,’ I said in a shaking voice, pointing at the slops pail. ‘It’s not a child,’ she corrected me. ‘It’s a girl baby, and we can’t keep it. Around these parts, you can’t get by without a son. Girl babies don’t count.’”

YAalsoBU to read the Daily Mail.

MaloryArcher · 30/06/2014 09:32

I was disappointed when I found out DC2 was a boy.

I'm 36 weeks pregnant now and can't wait to meet him and have no doubt whatsoever that I'll love him just as much as I do his sister.

But I was disappointed. If that makes me a monster then so be it. I know from other threads on MN that I'm not the only person to have felt that way.

HoneyDragon · 30/06/2014 09:33

Every time I've read on here or heard of people being disappointed in the gender of their child it's been for another reason than being a female. Often family set up, some people are terrified they are having a boy. My friend was as she had all sisters and female cousins.

It's ridiculous to state that women feel this way about sons secretly because they are women.

KarlWrenbury · 30/06/2014 09:34

HOW BIZARRE OP
i thought you were going to say " oh that I wil never have a bride' or something.
To suggest that male babies are unwanted is horrendous and no time should be given to this stupid article

ILoveCoreyHaim · 30/06/2014 09:34

When i was pg with 3rd dd i got so sick of people saying do you know what your having and when i said a girl i got comments like

Oh never mind, better luck next time
another girl, 4th time lucky
are you going to try for a boy

most of my family on either side have kids of he mostly one sex. I am the only girl with 3 brothers. Exp is the only boy with 5 sisters. I know loads of people at the school with 3 or 4 of the same sex. The parents of 3 or 4 boys also got similar comments the same as i did when they told people they were having another boy.

TalcumPowder · 30/06/2014 09:34

A slight desire for a child of the other sex might be understandable in a family where there are already several children of one sex, purely for the experience of parenting the other sex, and I can think of one friend who worried about having another boy soon after her older son was diagnosed with autism (as I gather it is commoner in boys). But I can think of several friends who were relieved to have only sons, and felt that pressures on young girls are at an all-time high, or worried about replicating the poor relationships they had with their own mothers. (Not, obviously, that boys lead a charmed life...)

I genuinely had no preference, and was surprised and then angry to find my SILs condoling with me on my beautiful newborn (who they knew would be my only child) because they assumed I was disappointed not to have a girl to dress and go shopping with etc etc. (This is even more baffling as I absolutely loathe shopping, have zero interest in clothes, and am the last person in the world to want to buy frilly princess frocks.)

Both SILs have two boys, followed by a girl (they are both open about only having had a third child 'for a girl'), and while all four sons are fabulous, intelligent, funny, independent types (between mid-teens and mid-twenties), it's noticeable that both daughters are similarly spoilt and whiny. I think both SILs indulged them to their detriment, while parenting their boys far better.

I've no idea how widespread their preference is, but I do get hints of it from people from time to time, eg as I'm only having one child, isn't it a pity it isn't a girl, because all mothers really want hurls etc etc.

nicename · 30/06/2014 09:34

I think this woman is a bit like the 'cooool girls' when I was a teen. They would spout any amount of crap to get attention, no matter how stupid/crazy it made them look - as long as you looked!

I'd say that in there 'ere planet, over all there is far more wailing and gnashing of teeth when a girl is born. There have even been cases in the UK of doctors offering sex-selective abortions to asian mums.

Why do you think China, with its one child policy, has far fewer females? Luck? God? Aliens?

lljkk · 30/06/2014 09:35

Loads of MN threads where women say how irritating it is that someone assumes they want a girl. It's a very recurring theme. Not so much mums of girls being asked if they want boys, but heavy for the mums of boys being told "too bad" they didn't get a girl.

And heck, we've even coined the phrase (SMoG) to indicate the modern girl-preference.

Why all the threads about that experience if OP is wildly off the mark? I'm leaning towards yanbu.

KarlWrenbury · 30/06/2014 09:35

oh and WELCOME TO MUMSNET

Hmm

the author of the piece

TalcumPowder · 30/06/2014 09:35

Mothers want GIRLS, not hurls. Fgs.

DeWee · 30/06/2014 09:38

Maybe only Dail Mail Readers?

atticusclaw · 30/06/2014 09:38

My SIL cried for days (and then moaned for weeks) when she found out she was having a boy. She couldn't bear the thought that her DD would never have a sister to be with her at her wedding.

At that point I lost the ability to relate to her.

ILoveCoreyHaim · 30/06/2014 09:39

I cant really ever remember being desperate for a boy. I always wantee a sister so 3 dds were fine by me being brought up in a house full of boys. I was gutted when my mam had a scan with my youngest db and said it was a boy as i wanted a sister. I soon got over it. I do sometimes feel a pang for the kids dad havkng 3 dds and 5 sisters. He says he loves having 3 dds but i often think it might have been nice for him to have a son. His sis has had 2 biys so he has 2 nephews and seems happy with that

he did say he would love to get up on xmas mornig and have loads of boys toys though when ge got up to prams and dolls

NerdsRUs · 30/06/2014 09:39

If she is honestly deliberately harming her unborn baby by smoking and drinking whilst pregnant, social services should look closely at her ability to care for the child after birth. If she would harm it now, what else would she do next time she was disappointed in one of her children?

MrsWinnibago · 30/06/2014 09:39

I have two girls. If I were to have a boy I'd be happy...if another girl...equally happy. How can people be so awful as to distinguish so much!?

Boys and girls are both beautiful and any is a blessing.

RedPony · 30/06/2014 09:40

My preference was for a girl, when I found out I am pregnant with a boy I was over the moon and would not change anything. I would still like a girl at some point in the future (about to have my first any day) but have never felt disappointed I am having a son and I doubt I would be if I got pregnant again and found out it was a boy