If you have never had a daughter?

[Justbecauseidid]

I was having a conversation with a neighbour earlier who has 5 sons and no daughter. She often expresses how she would have loved a girl. She then went on to say those who only get to experience the one sex will never get the chance to experience full motherhood. As in they would never know what is it to mother a daughter or vice versa.

It got me thinking...

Those of you with boys, would you like a daughter and those with girls would you like son?

I suppose she has a point about having a full rounded experience of motherhood.
It got me thinking.

Also, it’s been my third, who is a girl, who’s felt like a different child to parent and been the one who’s made parenting feel like a fuller experience. My first two (DD then DS) felt very similar and required similar parenting styles.

Oh I’ve known a couple of women like this and felt so sorry for the little boys who came before the daughter, it was made SO obvious who the favoured child was..

Well she's not wrong, you don't experience raising a girl if you don't have one, or a boy if you don't have one. Nor would you get to experience having whatever bond you may have had with a son or daughter.

It would be an occasional wondering maybe, but pretty sure both genders keep you happy & busy one way or another.

I think ladies who have an obsession with "having a girl" are not much different to men who are obsessed with having a son. I know a family where poor wife had to have 5 kids - all, unfortunately, girls - before delivering a required male child. Pathetic.

Yep exactly this. When I had my second boy the first thing my family said to me was “oh never mind, you can try for a girl next time”. Like WTAF? I have my beautiful healthy boy and you’re going on about how I can always try again as if he isn’t good enough or something? This is my baby!

Seriously piss off with that vile attitude about my child. I’m quite happy with my boys.

In the same way I am sure girl mums aren’t secretly seething with resentment that they never had a boy!

Two boys here. Done. Don't care I don't have a girl. Was never fussed. They're your children at the end of the day. But also years of infertility and being told you may never have children puts things into perspective.

What bollocks people chat.

How much exactly qualifies as the full mothering experience?

Do we disqualify people with one child? People with fewer than 4? Anyone who has not supported a child who excels is sports? What about women who have never given their all to fight for resources for their disabled child, they have only experienced partial motherhood, presumably?

I have a daughter and always prayed that if I were lucky enough to have a child (9 years infertility) I would just want a healthy child, however feel down I knew it I could only have one, I would want a girl.
I was blessed with my Dd through ivf and am very grateful, I can’t have anymore and I would dearly love a son, yes.
It’s a strange one as I’m a teacher and love all my students, but I often find the boys the nicest, I think the mother son bond looks very special and little boys have a softness about them in general that girls don’t

I’ve got 2 boys and our activities have been similar to yours, and as you say, now they just want to be with their mates and talking football. However I’m a single parent so I’ve had to embrace the football world, and now we’re all season ticket holders and we go together. They’re mid/late teens, so pretty selfish and possessive of their time, and won’t waste it just chatting with me!

I’ve got friends with girls who do the while shopping/lunch/Strictly thing together, but I’ve also got friends with girls who they never see due to them having boyfriends.

I have three girls and I only wanted girls! I don’t think I wouldn’t have been happy with a baby boy or disappointed I just knew I (thought) wanted at least one girl and then had three and I was delighted. I think my hubby thought our third would be a boy and when she was a girl I was delighted and I’m sure I saw a split second of disappointment although it was a split and he loves his girls and has embraced them in the same way any great dad would (as I would have done too).

Opposite for me - 4 boys😂 also didn't matter each time. They are all very different personalities and don't look alike. I love it.

Youngest is now 7yo so I don't get asked "are you having any more?".

I have a boy and I love him so much. We have a brilliant time together and I have never felt that I am missing something by not having a girl. In fact sometimes I (irrationally!) wonder if girl mums feel like they're missing out because I have such a good time with my boy, but obviously that's not how it works. 😅 I was pregnant with a girl before having DS, and the pregnancy ended up in a late loss, so I sometimes wonder what could have been, but I don't feel it's tied to the baby's sex.

Just boys for me and I'm perfectly happy with that and love them dearly.

The feminost in me does sometimes feel a bit sad that my female line ends with me, though, in the sense that I absolutely love the concept that I am (as are all women) descended from an unbroken line of women who bore and birthed and raised us (magical) and I won't see the next generation of that. However, I acknowledge that any daughter I had might herself not have daughters, or children, at all so it's more of an airy fairy wistfulness and not actual disappointment!

I have 2 boys 2 girls, and they are all so different!
I don't think motherhood is an experience about whether they are boys or girls, it's about their personalities and how you are with them.
I love them all to bits and never cared when they were born except that they were healthy.
There was some excitement in my husband's family when our first daughter was born because my parents in law had 4 sons, but that I think is understandable.

I'm so sorry! You are still young. I hope you get the have the children you want x

I’m an only child and always wanted a sister when I was growing up. I was desperate for one.

When I was pregnant I secretly wanted a girl. I’ve ended up with 3 amazing boys, my youngest is 3 and I can honestly say although toddler girls are super cute - that’s about the only reason I’d want a girl.

I didn’t wear a wedding dress, I didn’t go to prom, my mum wasn’t at the birth of my children, I’m not particularly close to my parents, mum & I don’t go to spa days, or shopping or lunch or text very often. I didn’t do much of the stereotypical ‘girl’ things. I see the gender stereotypes as a load of crap tbh, it didn’t stop me wanting a girl (literally the clothes are so much better, the little pineapple hair styles or clips in girls) but that is such a ridiculously fickle reason 🤣

The ‘I got what I wanted’ smugness does annoy me though. And those that seem to despise little boys. I’m typically biased but my children as so different its bizarre to put ‘boys’ into one unwanted box. A woman once said to me ‘oh I didn’t find out as I really didn’t want a boy’, and another has said ‘no I don’t want boys I want girls’ … to me, a mum of boys. It’s the smug attitude like you are looking down at somebody for having boys which is the worse part of actually having boys!

@otravezempezamos You have time, I was pregnant at 39, had Dd at 40 after 9 years of many struggles

3 boys here, which is exactly what I hoped for, DH would have loved a DD.
We have 5 nieces who are all similar ages to our boys, and were all close growing up and still are.
I'm glad I missed the teenage girl dramas etc though.

I have 3 girls and never desperately wanted a boy, life is so much easier with the same sex! If i ever had another child(never going to happen) I would want another girl, I have friends with all boys who feel exactly the same.

You could say the same for people who have 1 girl and 1 boy. They’ll never experience full motherhood until they’ve experienced 2 boys, close in age, wrestling at every opportunity from the minute they could stand up until they are grown men (and still it continues). It’s just not true. If you have 1 child of any sex you have experienced proper motherhood.

I never wanted a daughter. My niece put me off girls as she was hard work and quite naughty. She’s 30 now and still hard work, but for her husband, and he loves the challenge 😉

I’m not a girly girl and I’m no good with hair, clothes, nails & make up.

Always feel sad I didn’t have a 3rd son but youngest DS wouldn’t have made a good middle child and, of course, you can’t pick the sex.

I always thought I’d have girls but my DC are both boys, we have a good relationship. I wouldn’t change them at all. I used to get asked are you going to have a third and get your girl? We couldn’t afford another child, there’s no guarantee we’d have had a girl and it would have been a really bad expectation to take into a third pregnancy. I have goddaughters, nieces and nephews. I don’t feel like I’ve missed out.

I have two girls, and never had a longing to have a boy, other than occasionally just wondering what "he" may have looked like, or been like. But that's irrelevant really, as I have two girls who act and look nothing alike, so a third whether it would be a boy or a girl, would be completely different again. I think my husband would have liked a boy, and sometimes I do feel slightly bad that he hasn't got to experience the son/dad thing I know he'd enjoy, but he loves the girls and the eldest is a complete daddy's girl.
When I was younger I always thought I'd have boys for some reason, that's just how I pictured my future life, so both my daughters were a surprise, as it wasn't what I ever imagined when we decided to start a family. But I couldn't imagine life any differently now, and I love having my girls. All our pets are male though so the husband doesn't feel so outnumbered 😂

I have one boy and it's perfect. I'm not girly at all and have always been a bit boyish so it suits me and I like being the only female in the house!

She often expresses how she would have loved a girl. She then went on to say those who only get to experience the one sex will never get the chance to experience full motherhood. As in they would never know what is it to mother a daughter or vice versa.
What a load of nonsense 🙄
I hope you told her she was talking out of her arse.
I have expierenced a full 'motherhood' twice.

I have 2 sons and if I'm honest I had a slight preference for a second son rather than a daughter, just because I thought 2 brothers (10 years apart) would maybe get on better than a girl and boy. This might be my own childhood experience manifesting itself. I am extremely close to one of my 3 sisters and, while I love my brother we are not that close. No one has ever asked me if I'd wished for a girl (everyone stops asking about children when the first one turns 5 anyway!).

I don't feel any sadness about not raising a daughter, but what I do sometimes envy is the relationship between mothers and their adult daughters. My sons don't share my interests in books, theatre and dance and I think a daughter would have more more likely to share those interests. I have lots of nieces and love being an Aunt to them and they're happy to join me at the ballet.

Just thinking about my peers (we're in our 50s so our kids are late teens/young adults) and until this thread I hadn't consciously thought about who has girls/boys/both. In my book club of 6, I'm the only one with just one sex, all the others have both. Another of my friendship groups (4 of us), 3 of us have 2 boys and the other a girls and 2 boys.

I do know of peers who got all the daft comments when expecting child 3 after 2 of the same sex, and people who've been told they've got 'the perfect family' when they have 2 kids, one of each sex. Yawn.