To ask why little girls seem to be preferred?

[foxtaildream]

Is it just me who has noticed this?

My preference was for boys and luckily I ended up with 2! I never wanted to have a girl and still don't. That said, I'm sure I would have loved a girl just as a boy much if I had had one.

I don't get the whole thing about girls looking after you in your old age. You don't own your kids. Your job is to raise them so they can live their own lives, not so they can look after you when you're old.

This thread makes for some bizarre and uncomfortable reading!

Parents need to treat their offspring as individuals, rather than as their gender stereotypes.

I have three boys, one is a tiny baby, one is quiet, sensitive and an animal lover like his mum, the other is fun, boisterous and loving like his Dad.

My boys love each other and us and rarely fight, bar the odd bickering over sharing.

We have a great relationship and I see no reason why this should not continue into adulthood (although we are yet to enter the fraught teenage years!)

I would have equally have loved a daughter and would not have treated her any differently or had different expectations of her due to her gender.

Aha so this is where all the stately home folks are raised.

I love that having a vulva makes me predisposed to fancying a latte in debenhams caff twice a week.

😂😂

Regarding shopping, going for a coffee in Starbucks etc. It’s not so much the Mother treating all her children the same, it’s the children themselves. Would a 20 year old male really want to do those things with his middle aged mother? I very much doubt it. But a daughter wouldn’t think anything of it.

My middle aged (well, 33 year old!) DH would happily go for a coffee with his mum. Why wouldn’t he? Do you need a vagina to drink coffee?

It really depends on the personality

I have femake friends who would take their own eyes out rather than shop

And my dad loves shopping...always has done (and you should see his ornaments he loves swarovski crystals )

If you need a vagina to drink coffee you are drinking it wrong

Both my dad and my husband had/have great relationships with their mums. Mil is ill, and dh does more for her than his sisters, including personal care

I'm guessing all these sons who can't be arsed with their mums were somehow raised to look down on women and make judgements over what activities are "not for boys" somewhere down the line

I think my 18 year old ds would die of embarrassment if his friends saw him wandering around M&S with me. We have a great relationship, but he’s young and going clothes shopping with his Mum, or wandering around a garden centre, isn’t his idea of fun. It’s not my daughter’s idea of fun either, but they’d be far more up for it than my son would.
I have treated them all the same, but that’s just how it is.
Maybe when he’s 50 & I’m 85 things will be different?

I think my 18 year old ds would die of embarrassment if his friends saw him wandering around M&S with me. We have a great relationship, but he’s young and going clothes shopping with his Mum, or wandering around a garden centre, isn’t his idea of fun. It’s not my daughter’s idea of fun either, but they’d be far more up for it than my son would.

When I was aged about 14-18 I, and all my friends, thought going shopping with your mum was the most pathetic thing ever. You went into town to mooch about with your friends - the thought of being seen with your parents was beyond uncool. Then we grew up. And now I go for coffee, or lunch, or a drink with either my mum or my dad or both pretty often. As does my brother.

A lot of the posts in this thread remind me of Amy Poehler's 'cool mom' character in Mean Girls - utterly convinced that their (mostly hypothetical) daughters will want to be their bestest friends that they go for lattes and prosecco with, apparently regardless of their daughters own preferences.

I'd be happy with either.

I did have a closer bond with my ex's son than I did with my DSD. But that's not necessarily because he was a boy.

I'd be ecstatic about a healthy baby regardless of sex.

I always remember being on holiday when my Mum was pregnant when I was a teenager. She didn't know the sex at the time. Chatting to another couple who were having a baby. The couple said they'd hate to have a girl and they're really hoping it is a boy and asked my Mum what she was hoping for. Her response was "a healthy baby"

I really don't get the whole gender preferences. You could have a girl who loves motorbikes, physics and hates anything girly (me) or you could have a girl who wants to transition to a boy. Sex doesn't guarantee interests, bonds etc.

All the boy vs girl guff aside, I'm afraid I have to agree that girls seem to be preferred over boys with many people. I don't think people mind having boys as long as they have at least one girl.

A number of posters have expressed that they have had people say 'what a shame' when they have another boy, yet you don't get people doing this when someone is having another girl. Indeed, people seem to congratulate them.

I've actually had a number of women I know (several so-called friends, and even a cousin) be really offhand with me, because I produced a girl and they didn't. One cousin of mine Linda - 7 years older than me - had 4 boys over 12 years, and actually cried when her 4th child was a boy.

She had an alie though - another cousin of ours (Laura,) who was also 7 years older than me. She had 3 boys. Laura seemed a lot more OK with it though, and loved her 3 boys.

Then my firstborn was a girl, (This was early 2000's,) and Linda went utterly batshit. Completely off the rails. She was 36, and threw herself down on the floor in a fit of rage, screaming and hollaring 'why does SHE get to have a girl? Why didn't I ever have a girl?' And she wished some nasty shit on my daughter that I won't repeat on here. I can only put it down to some weird personality disorder - or PTSD after having a 4th boy that she didn't want - but I will never forgive her, and never spoke to her after that. (Over 15 years ago.)

Linda clung to Laura like a limpet, and continued to slate me, but to her sheer horror, when my girl was 3, Laura had a 4th child; a girl. Linda was incandescent with rage and anger, and ended up alienating Laura too! She flat out blamed her husband for it all, saying he wasn't 'man' enough to produce a daughter.

Several years ago, she and her husband split up, and all four boys have left home now; 2 went to uni and stayed in their uni town, and the other 2 just left and moved in with their girlfriend. Not surprising really after having a batshit mother who blamed them for being male!

I know this is an extreme case, but it's just to illustrate how some women are a lot more upset and badly affected if they don't get the daughter they want, than the women who don't have a son. No idea why, as boys are just as valid as human beings as girls. It's just some women need to have a daughter, even if they have 3 sons, they don't care, as long as they have at least ONE daughter.

In addition to my cousin Linda, I have had friends in the past, (who have boys only,) who distanced themselves from me, once I had my girl. They were resentful and bitter, and made some really rude comments about little girls. Yet I never once - EVER - said anything negative about their boys. Some friends with boys were fine and never said anything bad, but yeah, a few of them couldn't handle me having a girl.

I had a boy too by the way, 5 years after my girl, and I love him just as much, they get on brilliantly, and he is amazing (like she is!) However, I have to say, I did want one of each. I would not have been devastated with 2 boys, but am very happy I have one of each.

I do have to agree with a pp sadly, that brothers are less likely to get on well than sisters. (or a sister and a brother.) I know many families where brothers either have very little to do with one another, or they have not spoken for decades. It doesn't seem to happen so much with sisters. (Or a sister and brother.)

I also have to agree that adult daughters are much more socially active with their mothers than adult sons. As a pp said above me, many young men are quite embarrassed to be seen with their mother shopping and 'doing lunch.' Maybe when they are older - like 40-odd, but daughters are far more likely to want to socialise with mum! (and dad!)

Finally, I also agree that many men want daughters too. (And they don't all secretly want sons only...) I think many want sons, but they want at least one daughter.... The excitement was paramount in a few men I know when they and their wife produced their first daughter. I guess there's something about a daddy/daughter relationship that is quite precious. My cousin Laura's husband was delirious with glee with their little girl, after having 3 boys. And even over a decade later, they are inseparable. He ADORES her.

And like me, my husband thinks the world of both of our kids, and like me he is glad to have one of each. We love our boy, but must admit, we would not have wanted 2 boys.

• linda and laura are not my 2 cousins real names.....

All I wanted was a healthy baby when I was pregnant, really didn't care if I had a boy or a girl. BUT once I had given birth to a healthy baby, I was over the moon that she was a girl.

Fwiw, I’d rather go shopping on my own.
And I do not see my daughter as my best friend, I have friends my own age who I have far more in common with. My children are my children, my friends are my friends.
I’m just saying daughters are more likely to do the ‘frivolous’ stuff with their mums than sons are. Of course there are always exceptions.

hamishbamish your post is spot on. I echo it 100%. Some of the stuff on here is really And the only person who is definitely 'protesting too much' is petbear with her SHOUTY CAPITALS and bloody minded insistence that everyone with children wants what she has! Utterly bizarre.

Jesus wept petbear what a loaf of absolute bullshit 😂😂😂

I don't want to see my mum as my best friend, she's my mum! I do spend more time with her than my brother, but in his defence he lives 200 miles away while I live round the corner. But DH is far more likely to go out for coffee or lunch with MIL than I am with my mum.

Load

Ffs 🤦🏼‍♀️

Aren’t you a delight gladiola

Glad my two boys have a Mum who loves and appreciates them instead of getting saddled with a witch like you.

And I don’t go for coffee on a frequent basis with my mum either, and neither does my sister. Too busy living our own lives rather than her fearfully clinging on to the apron strings ;)

But yes me and my sister are pretty amazing and marvellous people pet so maybe there is something in what you’re saying after all x

I go for coffee once a week with my dad

And sometimes we go out for coffee at the weekends as well

Yes and it drives me batshit. I have 3 boys. With the second and third I was constantly asked (often in front of my other boy/s) if I was “hoping for a girl”. No, actually, I’m hoping for a baby.. I have several friends who have had stillbirths, sick babies, or who’ve been unable to conceive. The idea that I’d be upset over my child’s gender is appalling. I think I’m so bloody luck to have my 3 fabulous boys. I’d have been equally as happy with 3 girls as well but we don’t get to choose (unless we do gender determination assisted conception).

A loose friend of mine has just had a beautiful baby girl and actually messaged me to tell me that she “got the girl” I was at that as if it was the first prize in the baby gender competition. Very odd.

FWIW - I’m a HCP. The belief that it’s women who are the most “connected” and involved with their parents is nonsense. I see first hand everyday just how caring and supportive men are. My cousin has 3 grown up sons and they drive her nuts with their fussing over her!

The negative attitude toward boys is horrid.

I get so frustrated with all of this nonsense.

I've read time and time again that for mothers having a son is much more better than having a daughter because of some mystical special relationship full of amazing hugs that girls could never ever possibly give their mothers and other such crap.

Then you get the girls are quiet, calm and amenable while boys are boisterous and destructive bullshit.

I have three little girls. Sometimes they're calm, sometimes they're incredibly active, sometimes they're snuggly, sometimes they're standoffish, sometimes they're well behaved, sometimes their behaviour is mortifying. It's almost like they're individuals with their own personalities or something.

More the other way around, IME, though hasten to say have known no bias in my own family - just happy with healthy babies.
Right after dd2 (2nd child) was born, Dh bought me a lovely ring - I'd never had an engagement ring.

First comment from a (non Brit) friend, was, 'You got that for a GIRL??'