To worry about passing on my “ugly” genes

[Cannotmakeadecison]

FIL made a comment recently that my 11 month old son had my teeth which I laughed off but clearly it was not meant as a compliment. I have straight teeth but with a fair bit of gum exposed when I smile (made peace with it now but very self conscious as a teenager and early 20’s) and my son also shows all his teeth and gums when he laughs which (in my eyes) frankly is adorable.

This happened a week ago though and I can’t stop thinking about it. It’s upsetting me greatly to think that my son may experience the same issues I had with my appearance growing up and now some overwhelming guilt that this is due to me and my genes that I’ve passed to him.

I’m early stages of my second pregnancy so I know I’m having overly anxious thoughts as I did with my first but has anyone else ever felt this or am I being completely unreasonable to feel this way?

Your husband obviously thinks it's adorable too or he wouldn't be with you!

Please don't feel bad. You haven't passed a life threatening disability to your son, this is a cosmetic issue and yes while some aren't a fan of the 'gummy smile' look many like it or don't care either way about it. It's also fixable. A child could be bullied for anything, I was bullied for wearing glasses and later for having curly hair. It could be anything.
Some are bullied for having red hair or freckles. By this logic 90% of the population shouldn't have children!
I'm sure you also passed many wonderful traits to your child(ren). At least if your son encounters any issues about it you will understand what it's like first hand and you would be able to genuinely empathise with him.. which feels great to be understood. It'll be ok! Enjoy your pregnancy.

Well I'm sure your DC won't have your FIL's bad manners and nasty streak. That's far more important than seeing a flash of gum when you smile. Honestly you FIL was a dick for saying it and clearly he meant it as an unpleasant dig at you. Thank your lucky stars that you can teach your DC to be kind and accepting of others etc.

Your FIL is a shit.

I've met thousands of babies and children, I've never met an ugly one.

I'm gummy but I'm gorgeous, just like you are your baby are!!!
Don't give a fuck what society thinks, your FiL thinks, anyone thinks. Gummy is cute. None gummy is cute. We're all beautiful in our own way and those who don't see it aren't our concern, what is, is we see it and celebrate it.
People will drag you for anything. Look at the most beautiful people in the world and read whats been written about them. Nobody's winning unless you get your gummiest, happiest smile out and stop giving a fuck.
I went on a night out once and there was a girl who had perfect, straight, white teeth. All night lads kept calling her Simon fucking Cowell. Cannot win. 🙄🤣

This resonates strongly with me. I have a large gap between my front teeth x was teased mercilessly all through my childhood. There have been comments as an adult too. It caused so much trouble for me and braces aged 11 to 14 failed to correct it. My beautiful first born inherited my teeth. He never experienced any negativity, we've spoken about it. He's 25 and currently modelling menswear! Your child will wear his smile in his own way.

Another gummy grinner here. I also hated it for many many years, and would only pose for photos with a closed-mouth smile.

Then dh2b came along. He loved my huge smile, called me his Wide-Mouthed Frog, and gave me cuddly frog teddies. I decided that if he loved my gummy grin he was weird but lovely, and I was happy to grin for him.

25 years later, during Covid, adult dd and I were on a Zoom conference call. At one point the videos of dd and I were side by side. To my astonishment, I noticed that our smiles and laughter are virtually identical! Dd is also a gummy grinner!

Dd is beautiful. She is gorgeous. She always has been. She has presence and poise. She is utterly un-self-conscious of her smile.

I had never even noticed that she has a gummy grin.

This huge big deal of showing 'too much' gum turned out to be complete nonsense, just another stick for me to beat myself with.

Look OP, there is no such thing as the perfect beauty. You made a beautiful boy. You passed on beauty and gorgeousness in your genes. Pop your self-consciousness in a box, tuck the lid down firmly and focus on the fact that you created gorgeousness - therefore you must be gorgeous, too.

The biggest compliment anyone can give me is to draw attention to dd and my similarity, because, frankly, I think she is utterly gorgeous.

(And TBH her siblings are pretty much carbon copies of their dad )

Not really sure how fil can tell who got who teeth when they’re 11 months with 1 tooth in the heads. ignore his claptrap and zone out when you’re there if that’s the garbage he trots out.

gums are a sign of youth - unfortunately you won’t appreciate this until you have lost the gummy smile. (I didn’t) on the plus side the teeth are still in so gums are doing there job. I’m sure you’re smile is beautiful.

I have a friend with a gummy smile and I consider her beautiful- the smile being her greatest feature. I didn't know there was anything wrong with gummy smiles !

I used to work in the fashion industry and a lot of the models I got to know were bullied for their looks in school. Being bullied means zero about the value of
your looks. One person loves your looks enough to want to pass them into their offspring and that’s all you need to worry about.

How do you know he meant it nastily?

It might not happen. Your child has a lot of growing to do and will inevitably change. Lots of ugly parents have beautiful children, and vice versa.

Front gap is very sexy imo to a pp.
But yes, people will bully for anything, having confidence is the most important combatant.

Are gummy smiles considered ugly? I honestly didn’t know that was a thing. I have plenty of friends who have half teeth/half gum smiles and in no way think it makes them unattractive.
My DD thinks she has a big forehead and is constantly trying to cover it, she looks totally normal but someone said something once when she was younger and it’s stuck.

Presumably your Father In Law is George Clooney then? Pierce Brosnan? Harrison Ford? No? Well assuming he's not a Hollywood heartthrob who scores a solid 10, then maybe he should shut the F up? He has no right to comment on your appearance.

Seriously, if every woman worried about passing on a so-called 'flaw' to their kids, the world's population would take a nose dive. I'm sure you have many wonderful qualities both inside and out.

I remember practising how to smile without showing off my gums and got it down to perfection. I used to feel so embarrassed about it as no one else I knew smiled like me! I know what you mean I wouldn't like to have passed this down either. Personally I don't think it's attractive at all.

Appearance doesn't matter at all. It's a cliche but it is true. Beautiful people with shoddy personalities are much more unattractive and off-putting than ugly people with good character.

SweetBabyCheeks

I'm sure you also passed many wonderful traits to your child(ren). At least if your son encounters any issues about it you will understand what it's like first hand and you would be able to genuinely empathise with him.. which feels great to be understood. It'll be ok! Enjoy your pregnancy

This, with bells on!!

YANBU, try not to worry about it too much because your child will only have half their genes from you, the rest will come from the other parent. And whatever the child looks like now, it's not what they'll be like as they get older IYSWIM, traits they show when very young change. I had a mole that I inherited from my dad that was really noticeable when I was about 6, but by my 20s it had turned skin color and was barely noticeable.

You are obviously very self-conscious about your teeth, but there is no reason why your child will be self-conscious about theirs. I don't think most people would actually even think there was anything unusual about showing gums when you smile. A smile's a smile. Also, don't all kids have lovely big smiles like that when they're babies anyway?!

As others have said, clearly your DH likes your smile! And if you thing your son's smile is adorable, there's a good chance most people think yours is adorable too.

Passing on genes is fine; it's passing on our hang-ups or neuroses that's the problem. So that's what you need to try to avoid doing. We all have things about our appearance that we don't like but it does sound as if you're fixating on this a bit more than most would, if it's worrying you to quite this extent and making you genuinely anxious about your children. It must really hard for you to feel this worried about what, in the big scheme of things, is a really tiny thing - it does sound like maybe this is something more than just not liking something about the way you look.

Do you know for sure that your FIL was being mean? Has he mentioned your teeth in a negative way before? Does he know you're self-conscious about them?

Why do you think he meant it as a negative thing, are you sure you’re not just projecting because you are conscious of your smile?
If someone said he’s got your hair or eyes isn’t that just pointing out the similarities?

Wow, thanks for all the kind responses. I think it’s the hormones because I felt a bit teary reading some of them which is not like me!

Hello to my fellow gummy grinners! I feel better already reading your posts. It’s lovely to see how many of you have embraced your smiles! I thought I’d done the same but clearly it’s still somewhat of an issue.

To answer a couple of questions, FIL is not in the George Clooney league and should really know better. He has form for a bit of a nasty streak and has previously expressed relief that my son “inherited his dads nose” and not mine but usually it just rolls off me because, you know, he’s a bit of a twat 😅

Although, as a PP said, I may be projecting due to my own insecurities and I really don’t want to pass that on to my son so clearly some more work to embrace the gum is needed!

OP - LOADS of people show a lot of gum when they smile. I've never thought anything of it - neither good nor bad. I just thought it was pretty normal. Please don't worry - I'm sure your son is adorable!