Horrible dilemma- please help.

[beclev24]

I have had many years of fertility treatment and through a combination of IVF and frozen embryos now have three wonderful DS's including a 6 month old baby. I am incredibly grateful and lucky to have them but Life with a baby and two rambunctious older boys is VERY VERY full on and exhausting. i often feel totally overwhelmed.

it's awful to say, but I have always craved a girl. This obviously doesn't mean that I love my boys any less- just that I have always wished I could raise a daughter and felt very disappointed and sad that I haven't had that chance. I've really tried to work out why I feel this way. I am not a gender essentialist. I don't believe htat there are hard wired differences between boys and girls and I have brought my sons up to believe that boys and girls can and should pursue any interests they enjoy. But still....I think bringing up a girl is a different experience from boys- mainly navigating a different set of social expectations and ones which I feel personally way more comfortable with. I adore my boys but a lot of their interests bore me senseless. I know this may also be true with a girl but I think that it would be easier to share old toys/ games/ interests with a girl growing up without constantly feeling as though you are making a point or fighting the tide of the whole of society etc etc. I would dearly love to share my experience of being a girl with my own daughter. But I just assumed that we woudl have no more children and so was coping wtih the fact that this would never happen.

Anyway after a lifetime of infertility, at age 45 while breastfeeding and using contraception I am unexpectedly 10 wks pregnant, wiht a girl (found out thro harmony test) a! I have no idea what to do. on the one hand, having another child may push us over the edge (DH feels this even more strongly than me)- we are exhausted, are boys are full on and very demanding, my career would never recover, my last pregnancy was risky, this one likely will be too, Im old etc etc. everything points away from having another child but yet this would be my longed for daughter, WWYD?? Ay advice/ perspectives welcome

RailReplacementBusService

That must’ve been a shock! However the test is 99% accurate, compared to 85% accuracy of gender scans, so I don’t think it’s a good example to use statistically for OP, as it’s so unlikely to have been wrong for her. You were that one percent! 💙👶🏻

Surely if your Harmony test gives you the wrong sex you should get your money back as the only way this could happen is either human error in entering the results (more likely) or they actually tested your cells not fetal ones (less likely, but more upsetting because it means the test wouldn't have told you about a serious abnormality either).

The early years are really hard, but they do go in a flash seems like it will be forever hard at the time though Don't do anything that you will regret when life inevitably becomes easier.

MargaretCavendish

You are completely correct in theory, but obviously they make you sign something to ensure you can’t claim anything back! The 1% is absolutely human error though.

I don't think the desire for a daughter will go away with time. I am the 'daughter' my great-grandparents always wanted but they had three sons and five grandsons instead.

I think it could just as easily damage your marriage if you feel pressured to abort as it could having the strain of a fourth child.

The fact that it happened naturally after it sounds like it took IVF for each of you three sons, would for me at least make me think she's meant to be.

I can understand you wanting to know gender too as well as if it's healthy, we had to have CVS testing because of a genetic condition my husband has and asked for gender to also be checked. We just wanted all the questions answered at once.

I get quite irritated with the way people go into overdrive if a woman is upfront about wanting a daughter.

For the vast majority of women on here, I think there's a lot of doublethink.

Straight away piling into the sneering and head tilting about wanting a girl to dress up and someone to go girly shopping with - 'I'm closer to my boys than my girl, you can't generalise' basically reducing it to simple sexism. To be fair, your average OP rarely manages to articulate what having a DD means to her and also tends to trot out cliches about understanding better, etc.

What I believe it boils down to is simply wanting to have someone else who shares your own sex in your own immediate, nuclear family. And I think that is totally understandable, and in no way detracts from the value you place on other family members who don't share your sex.

Why are most of you here, on Mumsnet? Ok, I know there are male posters. But it is - as we proudly say, from all kinds of threads from Feminism Chat to Relationships - generally a female space, and we celebreate the value of that. Here you are, on MN, and not on Reddit, or indeed (mostly) Pistonheads.

Look at your friendship groups. Who do you chat with? Who do you feel close to? Who do you confide in? Are they mainly other women? Do you feel that yes, your female friends are people you would, most probably, share some things with that you would not tend to share with male friends? The answer will be yes, even though some of you here will shout the opposite, for the purposes of this thread. But it's rarely true. It's also true for me that those female friends run the gamut from ultra girly to never owned a lipstick. It isn't about gendered behaviour, it's about lived experience... that's what we're all busy trying to get across on all the billionillions of trans threads, isn't it?

Children are different. Individual children are just individuals, and they are not your friends, and you interact with ans support them in an enitrely different way which does not derive from any perceived 'having stuff in common.' But, family life. Family dynamics. Yes, I do think that the sexes of the people in the family go some way to determining the dynamic of that family. I have people of both sexes in my family. I think if I were the only member of my own sex in my nuclear family, my family might feel quite different. Especially as my children grew up, and became adults to whom you do start relating as individual, adult people in their own right. And let's not go any further along that route... MIL thread, anyone?

Yes I know. Stereotypes. A bit. But also - what I think OP means is that she would like to not be the only person of her own sex in her family. That does not equate to wanting someone to put nail varnish on with. You all know that, really.

@FizzyGreenWater I love your posts, you so often go the extra mile to say something well thought out and helpful. Thanks for articulating this, as a mother of two girls, I entirely agree with you.

What I believe it boils down to is simply wanting to have someone else who shares your own sex in your own immediate, nuclear family. And I think that is totally understandable, and in no way detracts from the value you place on other family members who don't share your sex

I agree. But that's a totally normal longing/preference.

Continuing that train of thought to the point you will abort your boys and birth your girls is what steps massively over the line and is completely fucking awful of the op and anyone that agrees with her.

Continuing that train of thought to the point you will abort your boys and birth your girls is what steps massively over the line and is completely fucking awful of the op and anyone that agrees with her. can hardly be applied to a woman who has already given birth to three boys, can it?

I also think most women desire a daughter. You don't speak for me. It was a relief for me to have boys. I'm not very girly.

Yes I do see what you are saying there Simon.

I would completely ,COMPLETELY agree with you if it were the case that OP had been trying to get pregnant in order to 'get her girl'.

But she wasn't. She decided she was done (and after three much-tried-for pregnancies where, presumably, she and her H were perfectly happy just ot have healthy babies).

OP's rather been thrown a curveball she didn't want.

Personally I believe that she would have found a termination difficult anyway. But the sex adds another dimension to the 'what if'. It isn't ideal. However, OP haas ended up here accidentally - I think that's worth bearing in mind.

I think she'd probably feel the same way if she had three daughters and the new pregnancy was a boy.

They say 3 is the tipping point, in my opinion based on what you've said, you'll regret a termination. In 3 or 4 years you'll be out the other side anyway in terms of the hard stuff.
Sounds like you feel some guilt in the fact that you'd probably have had a termination already if it were a boy but will possibly not have one because it's a girl.
I only have one child and I only ever wanted a girl so consider myself lucky. For me it's amazing and everything I ever wanted.
I don't think you'll regret it all if you feel anything like I did.

I sometimes feel that I am the only person in the world who honestly, sincerely, did not give a shit what sex my child was and just felt lucky and blessed to have a healthy baby.

@crispysausagerolls my point was really to highlight that the op is basing a very big choice in this test that is not always accurate in every single case. So there is a chance, albeit remote, that she doesn’t have the correct info.

@margaretcavendish the top consultant told us to disregard the whole Harmony results. Which was awful really as we’d had it due to Nuchal bloods showing up high risk for a trisomy and had relaxed when they had come back clear. For us the gender was a nice to know but not the main info - it required a bit of mental reframing having thought for two months we would have a girl but this was very much outweighed by the health concerns. Fortunately the baby was fine and without the trisomy issues.

@onalongsabbatical thank you, what a nice thing to say

You don't speak for me. It was a relief for me to have boys. I'm not very girly.

This is interesting, given the amount of anger at the op for having gendered expectations of a girl. By your comment boys are not girly, yet this is ok, on this thread.

Double standards perhaps?

^not that your boys aren't girly, but that as a woman who doesn't identify as girly, you would prefer boys. This is a way of not saying- girls need girly mums.
Trying to explain but failing.

This is interesting, given the amount of anger at the op for having gendered expectations of a girl. By your comment boys are not girly, yet this is ok, on this thread.

Double standards perhaps?

I think it's less that you've caught us all out in our terrible hypocrisy, and more that in a thread this long not every single post has got a response. For the record, I feel the same slight uneasiness about a woman saying she didn't want daughters because she's not girly as saying that she does want them because she is. In neither case am I outraged - it's clearly very common, and even if I don't fully understand it and think it's a bit sad to put gendered expectations on an unborn child, I don't think it's pathological. As I and many others have said, it's not that OP has a sex preference but how strong it is that's a bit worrying.

I agree with you Margaret. However had the OP deliberately got pregnant, done a harmony and been devastated at or wanted to terminate a boy, then yes, I see your point.
However she has had boys and loved them, great, but deep down saw herself with a daughter. She now has that chance.
Her initial thought was abortion-can't cope. However having thought it through and done the testing, it's a girl. Most people in that situation would pause for thought. It isn't that 'fuck it it's a boy get rid', but we are having a termination, oh but wait. It's different.
It isn't that she would terminate a boy, but that she would think about keeping a girl. I actually think OP will keep the baby and would have done had it been a boy, despite her dilemma. I think she's been very honest, much moreso than many women are, and should be commended for that.
I know a 19 year old with a baby boy who found out she was pregnant again very quickly whilst struggling with a baby. She terminated and said that had they guaranteed a girl, she'd have gone ahead. But another boy, what's the point. Not my words and not that I agree, but it shows OP isn't alone.

Fizzy

It isn't that she would terminate a boy, but that she would think about keeping a girl. I actually think OP will keep the baby and would have done had it been a boy, despite her dilemma.

What makes you think this though? She said she would've definitely terminated the pregnancy if it was a boy.

It isn't about pink frills and shopping, it's about a kinship and common experience you will share with her in the world because of your sex. My boys are no less dear to me than my girl, but their lives will be shaped differently as boys and men. I'm glad I have her.

This.

I'm not very girly People were saying that they wanted a girl because they wanted another female in the house. I don't. We had our DGM in our house growing up and my DM and her were never done with having rows. My DM and I didn't have that close a bond. Conversely my DSs and me are very close. They're lovely sensitive lads.

You're 10 weeks so how can you know the sex?