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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

AIBU - to have no sympathy for people suffering from "gender disappointment"?

212 replies

SilverBirchTree · 31/07/2017 04:41

I met a pregnant friend for coffee who shared that she had been crying on and off all week because she found out she was carrying a boy. I laughed because I thought she must have been kidding, and was told off for being callous...Confused

When I told this story to a friend at work, she said it was common and shared that her husband sulked for days when they found out they were having a girl. Hmm

Am I missing something? It seems really childlike to be disappointed over something that was only ever a 50/50 chance?

OP posts:
Piewraith · 01/08/2017 02:30

Piratesandpants

Well if parents should be 'bloody grateful' for what they get - why are are they all moaning like hell on other threads about having to (shock, surprise, horror) actually look after their kids for whole days iver the next six weeks?

Exactly. There is also a thread active right now about how having a baby is so shit, every of it second is horrible and life is ruined, and the OP actually had fertility treatment to have this baby. She is (rightly so IMO) getting a lot of sympathy and people agreeing. No one is telling her to be grateful.

Mummyoflittledragon · 01/08/2017 05:58

Street

Both of your posts are spot on. The explanation of gender disappointment and to being grateful. Dd is ivf. I'm very grateful to the gynaecologist, who treated me all the way through (not conceived in uk). Had dd been a boy, I would have feared my child turning out like my brother due to the abuse from brother and having to deal with the awful issues and things he did. It definitely wasn't about pretty dresses and sparkly shoes.

VikingVolva · 01/08/2017 06:03

Piewrath

That's because there's a considerable difference between an opinion of certain circumstances in the abstract, and what is needed when dealing with a person currently distressed. Especially when it's a mother of a baby and PND or psychosis are possibilities.

mrsmuddlepies · 01/08/2017 09:33

I always make the same points on these kind of threads so here goes....
The opportunity to 'limit' and plan our families today is bound to result in more single sex families. If you were to have 8 or 9 children, chances are you would have a mixture of boys and girls. With 2 or 3 there is a much higher chance of all boys or all girls and this can result in understandable disappointment (then acceptance).
It is interesting to look at famous cases of gender disappointment in the past (it's not new). The real Christopher Robin from Winnie the Poo was frequently dressed as a girl by his mother who wanted a girl. I think they also called him by the girl's name they had picked out. Not surprisingly he went non contact with both his parents as an adult.
LM Montgomery of Anne of Green Gables had 3 sons and no daughters. Anne became the daughter she never had. Ditto, Louisa M Alcott, of Little Women had no daughters( no children at all) and the March girls became her daughters.
I think gender disappointment is very common but hopefully for most parents is transient and parents quickly grow to love their 'real' child not the imaginary boy or girl.

SpottedOnMN · 01/08/2017 09:39

I was desperate for my second child to be a sister for my DD because my own sister is hugely important to me. We had a gender scan to separate any disappointment from actually meeting the baby. I was disappointed for about a day before I realigned my thinking. My DS is the absolute light of my life, wouldn't swap him for anything.

It's ok for other people to think about things differently from you, doesn't mean they're bad people or their children will suffer.

Willyoujustbequiet · 01/08/2017 10:10

Of course people should be grateful/thankful for a (planned) baby. No one has a right to have a child. Hmm

SatelliteCity · 01/08/2017 10:35

To those commenting that abuse as a reason for gender disappointment must be rare, given that close to a third of British women will experience some form of domestic abuse during their lifetimes, it's probably common enough it shouldn't be discounted as a very real possibility. And also one that I don't think people should be forced to disclose in order to justify their reactions.

With regards to commenting that people who are afraid or disappointed when they discover the sex of their baby due to past abuse ought to have therapy and sort themselves out before having children, that's fine in principle but ignores two things. Firstly, that not all children are planned or arrive at ideal times. Secondly, therapy is not a magical pill that removes all negative effects. People who have survived abuse will very likely struggle, to some degree, for the rest of their lives, and the things that will trigger those feelings aren't always predictable. For many, therapy will be the tool that allows them to process their feelings of fear or disappointment and ultimately overcome them, not the tool that means they don't experience them at all.

Finally, while I agree that having a penis or a vagina is no indicator of future interests or behaviour, gender roles are prevalent in our society, regardless of our personal attitudes towards them. My daughter is a baby. I can't predict whether she will grow up to enjoy sparkly princesses, football, science or sewing, but I can predict the kind of social pressures she will be more likely to experience, and it will be my job to help teach her how to respond to them in a way consistent with her personality and the ethical values I hopefully manage to impart. A person doesn't need to have experienced abuse in order to recognise that they may feel more qualified to deal with raising a boy or a girl in the face of those predictable social constructs. These are pressures we've all experienced so imagining how we'll help our children face them and how their gender will impact on that isn't a weird thing to do. Having an emotional reaction to that isn't necessarily avoidable.

The real issue is how you deal with this. I COMPLETELY agree that there are people out there who want a specific gender for really stereotypical, gross reasons, and that some of those same people let their future kids KNOW this and that has lasting, and awful results on those kids. That's awful.

Other people just like to process in public. I'm not a sharer. If I had experienced gender disappointment, I would have held close to my chest and kept it secret and tried to work it out on my own. Others are different.

In sum, the picture the OP has painted is pretty awful, and I would probably judge that specific woman, based on the specific circumstances outlined, if they are accurate. But to extend that to a judgement of all people who have ever experienced gender disappointment is unjust. Most either have strong, painful reasons, or just want to be able to vocalise some of their fears and talk it through.

corythatwas · 01/08/2017 18:25

There seems to be a lot of assumption that everybody will get over their gender disappointment at the birth and that children will never know. But from threads by adult MNers who know very well they were a disappointment to their mothers, it seems likely that quite a few of them will end up knowing.

JustDanceAddict · 01/08/2017 18:27

You have to expect to get one or the other, even if you wanted the other sex, there's a 50% chance of not getting it! Be disappointed for a day or so, having a healthy baby is so much more important.

greendale17 · 01/08/2017 19:16

YANBU- I don't have time for selfish people like that. They should be thankful for the baby, male or female

gluteustothemaximus · 01/08/2017 19:26

Laughing at your friend wasn't nice.

So she's disappointed. Why not talk to her (as a friend) about it. Why do you think you wanted a girl? Talking it through will help her understand her feelings. Laughing will cause her not to talk about it or deal with it.

I had a strong reaction to finding out dc1 was a boy. For personal reasons. But I got my head around it, and all was fine.

That's why finding out the sex is a good idea! Grin

FrogsSitonLogs · 01/08/2017 20:03

Two boys would be my WORST NIGHTMARE

What a twattish thing to say. Angry

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