Is there such a thing as ONLY being able to make boys/ girls or is it complete bollocks?

[Snowboarder]

Following on from a previous post. I have been told with great authority by my MIL that her family (my DH) "can only make boys" ergo my DC2 (gender currently unknown) is "definitely" a boy. Can this possibly be the case, or is it total bollocks? DHis one of two boys and we already have a beautiful DS which would seem to bear this statement out...

Crock of shit.

My DH is one of three boys, his two brothers have 2 boys each.

We have 2 DD's, the first girls in over 100yrs in his family. Tell your MIL and her great authority to stick that in her pipe and smoke it

Quite unlikely, I'd have thought. Mind you a good friend of my mum's (who had 7 boys) was convinced that she could only carry boys and that the 2 miscarriages she had were female embryos...

Scummy - i do actually believe that some women can only carry certain genders, but not that men can only 'make' certain genders

My DH's paternal grandfather is one of two boys, DH's father is one of two boys, DH is one of two boys, his brother has three boys and I am 37 weeks with a boy

I was not expecting to be told we were having a girl at the 20 week scan as the sex is determined by the male and his family just do not seem 'to do' girls!

Very succinct onlywants

Wow sharkbite the first girl in 100 years!! I bet THAT was a shock and a half.

Interesting about only being able to carry certain genders. I know that the sex of the embryo is determined by the male partner so presumably that means it's possible for there to be an incompatiblity between a certain gender embryo and the mother? I've never heard that but it would be interesting to know if there's some research to support it rather than just anecdotal evidence.

It is probably a crock of shit but both mine and DH's family have shedloads of granddaughters and only one grandson. It's becoming a bit of a family joke now.

My friend's dh is one of 5 boys. They all have 1 -3 children themselves. They are all boys.

There seems no scientific basis for it at all but Dh and I do have only girls. Dh on the other hand is one of three 2 boys and a girl. His mother is one of a boy and girl family and his father was the 4th in a family of two boys and two girls. Dh's cousins are fairly evenly spilt. At the moment mil and fil have 4 grandaughters and one grandson but with two babies due this year ( not me - I'm done) the balance could shift dramtically one way or the other. On my side my dad is one of a boy and girl pair. He had two daughters, his sister had two sons. My mum was in a family of two girls and a boy. Her mum was one of two girls and her grandmothers were one of three girls and a boy and 3 boys and two girls. My aunt had two sons. Again we have babies due on that side this year but at the moment it's one boy and one girl. So I would say catergorically that if you look at families properly you will see any sex bias is pure coincidence

here is a story suggesting that genders can run in families, as it were. So if you have lots of sister, you may be more likely to have girls, and if your DH has lots of brothers, then you may be more likely to have boys. If you have equal numbers of genders on either side, then you have a 50:50 chance of either!

I am sure I read somewhere about some men not producing sperm with X chromosomes, but no idea how believable that is!

men can produce more male than female sperm.

this is more common in dogs (in litters of 8+ a prevalence of males or females is fairly quickly noticeable) but it also happens in humans, and is hereditary also.

also male foetuses are more vulnerable so in cases of borderline fertility girls are more likely to make it to term...

there may also be chromosomal conditions where the males sperm or female sperm are faulty and only male or female sperm would effectively fertilise an egg.

without a full DNA report on his sperm, a crock of shite.

snowboarder I had 3 mc then when my dd was born the midwife said now you know what caused the mc you can't carry boys. My second child also a dd. Fact or coincidence don't suppose we'll ever know.

When I was ttc with my ex I miscarried every pregnancy after 12 weeks.

After we split up I met my now DH and had a baby girl followed quickly by another mc and out specialist said it was very likely my body was rejecting males. We then went on to have 2 more girls.

I believe all my mc's were boys.

Very interesting to hear everyone's stories, although shine and lovebeinganana , how awful for you both

I've just been having a poke about on google and found this report about the odds of families having all boys or girls

It makes pretty interesting reading. As far as I can gather the key points are that ALL men make equal numbers of X and Y sperm - therefore 'only' producing a particular gender is a fallacy (unless of course there is a maternal influence, although it doesn't mention anything about this). There should therefore be a roughly 50/50 chance of either gender in any pregnancy (51% in favour of males, so only slightly skewed). That said, apparent anomalies will exist in any sample (whereby families have 7 children of the same gender, or all the same gender in one side of the family), although that is just down to statistical chance rather than biological influence.

Maybe I should print that out for MIL

Another theory to add to mix is that male sperm are stronger and can swim faster but female sperm can survive longer in cervix/uterus. Therefore if you are or have ovulated the male sperm is more likely to get there first. If you have sex a day or two or three before ovulation it's likely that mostly female sperm will still be hanging around.

Total bollocks.

Imagine: 20 million sperm per ml of ejaculate, about 4-5mls per cum = 100 million sperm, and every single one of them will make a boy.
Humankind would die out if that were possible.
Your MIL is bonkers .

Yes, worldwide there is a slight oversupply of boys vs girls (51:49%), but single man can only make boys or girls. Some people just cling to strange beliefs to try and explain what they cannot.
Every single pregnancy is either a boy or a girl, so why should it NOT be a boy every time?? I worked with a woman who had 7 sons, I have 4. At least 1 of the pregnancies I lost was female, so DH is clearly 'capable' of making girls (not that he will get the chance to try again... ).

You're right pacificdogwood humankind would die out wouldn't it and MIL is bonkers as I suspected

I s'pose if you sit and flipped a coin all night there would be times when you would turn up heads or tails 5/10 even 20 times in a row - the same theory must apply to pregnancies then, accounting for those families who are very clearly gender biased one way or other.

Sat not sit

My dd's m-i-l says the same thing.My s-i-l has a brother and he and dd have two lovely boys. I dont believe it though.

You've goddit in one, Snowboarder - the flipping a coin analogy is perfect.

The slight bias towards boy-births is apparently to do with the fact that more male babies die in their first year worldwide and nature has a way of making up for that. How, nobody knows. Well, I don't know, anyway.
After the 2 World Wars the birthrate for boys went up as if to make up for all the young men who had just been killed. Spooky.