She's a GIRL

[Cashewnutts]

I'm fed up with my 4month old being labelled as a boy. Near enough every time I'm out with her, someone will remain to her as a he: how old is he? Isn't he cute! Oh look at him etc.

AIBU to be increasingly rude to these people when correcting them? Of course it's always random strangers and never the same ones, I'm just hugely fed up with correcting people, especially when she is clearly wearing girls clothes. (Or at the very least, something that identifies her as a girl such as a girls sun hat or cardigan)

Just to illustrate, here are some of the outfits she's been wearing when people have assumed she's a boy. We also have a Cosatto pram with blue and orange pattern but IMO it's very non gender specific.

Dresses gender neutral but then gets annoyed at people going off what they see.

"Because, lets face it, Phil Mitchell in a frock is not a good look"

Snort!

When my boys ( aged 10 & 5) a gentleman in our line ,asked if l had any sons?

Aaahnd unclench. It's quite difficult to tell what gender young children are. Good! People then don't box them in with their expectations.

DD1 had lots of wavy hair from being one or so always so people rarely thought she was a boy. But they still did sometimes even when she was, on occasion, head to toe in pink. DD2 on the other hand people generally thought was a boy until she was three or four, as she is blonde, took ages to grow any hair at all and was (and is) very tall for her age. At 7 and with blonde ringlets now no-one ever thinks she is a boy, even though she tears around in clothes that shops may have put into the "boy's" section (her choice) as she prefers black, blue and green to pink, in general. She is VERY clear about actually being a girl, though.

I'm picturing him in a floaty maxi dress with spaghetti straps over his man shaped shoulders and neck

Heh, yes I had that conversation quite a bit when DD2 was little.

"He's a big strapping boy isn't he, what's his name?"

"Elodie." (not actual name)

" OH!"

You asked how I knew it wasn't a boy. I was giving you my reasoning.

Yes, and I'm pointing out that you don't know it's not a boy, or vice versa. You've probably seen tons of baby girls in other colours, and just assumed they were boys because the prams/blankets/toys weren't pink either...

Those clothes aren't gender neutral, they just aren't pink

A question; do mums of girls get more upset by them being mistaken for boys?

I always ask the gender, unless they are in a frilly dress, or, yes, pink

Those clothes aren't gender neutral, they just aren't pink

one poster pointed out they wanted one of the outfits for their Ds. So it's gender neutral. For girls or boys.

Who cares, really? My DD was mistaken for a boy 100% of the time when she was under 1 as she was bald and I prefer bold primary colours to pastels.

She's still mistaken for a boy all the time, still doesn't wear pink but does usually wear leggings and sometimes dresses. She has a mop of curly blonde hair but here in South London lots of boys do too. I can't be bothered to correct people, they're just being friendly.

Navy

Do you think that's because they really care about them not being mistaken for a boy?

My baby is 4 months old and at this age it's hard to tell if he's a boy, girl or potato.

Quite right, it's impossible to tell with all of them until about 4, unless they are given clothes and hairstyles that look very gender specific. It's not worth getting worked up about. Especially as girls tend to have much less hair in the first couple of years than boys, it can be an easy mistake to make.

When DD1 was a baby I took her out one day. She was dressed in pink. with a pink hat on a pink blanket. In the supermarket the till lady leant over and said. OHhh look how sweet you can see its a boy by how he sleeps with his mouth open..

After that I decided some people just wants to see what they want to see.

As much as we hate the idea that pink has to be a girl's colour and blue has to be a boy's colour (or just that babies clothes should be very obviously either feminine or masculine in colour and style) I assume this idea developed as a practical solution to people constantly addressing a child as the wrong sex.

We can't have it both ways, we either want ambiguity or we don't. If you dress babies in gender neutral colours and styles then the only way they can tell for sure is by peering in their nappy or calling him/her 'It' and you wouldn't like that either.

I doubt there are many mothers that would dress their girls in all blue clothes, blue blankets, blue pram, blue toys.

So all the babies you see out and about are either in blue everything or pink/peach/lemon everything? All prams, blankets and toys to match? That must be weird.

It would be interesting to see if there really is a default assumption of 'boy', in the absence of pink. I think, without any overt/stereotypical gender markers, most people just take a random guess. But this should be tested! We need 100 babies dressed in grey snowsuits.

DD often got mistaken for a boy when she was little. I think it's unfair to make people feel uncomfortable for this mistake when it is just a mistake, without any inane follow-up remark about long eyelashes being wasted on boys, blue clothes being all wrong for girls, etc.

How would we know? Love look a bit further than just what the baby is wearing I guess. Toys, pram, blankets etc.

You'd definitely have sexed my girl incorrectly then. I'm guessing there's quite a few more you are getting wrong .

Your kid looks like a boy, so what?

In another 4 months she may look like a girl, or maybe a boy still.

I couldn't get worked up about it.

Okay. To be clear: I do not think that being mistaken for a boy means DD is ugly/unfeminine etc. Similarly if she was a boy I would not worry that it meant she was effeminate/girly looking. That does not bother me in the slightest.

I am bothered by the assumption. What is so difficult about asking 'is it a boy or a girl?' It's really not a difficult question to ask.

I made this post because this has happened on numerous occasions (at least once a week) and NO I am not always dressing her in gender neutral clothes.
ONE of those outfits is a gender neutral piece. The other two are very much from the girls section of whatever shop I bought them from. One of them is a dress ffs.

Thank you to those of you who were a bit more constructive that just accusing me of dressing DD in gender neutral for attention.