Scared to be disappointed with 2nd boy

[nmhermione]

Hi everyone.

I just had my 12 week scan, and was extremely relieved to hear that baby is healthy and growing well. Of course that is my main concern.

I already have a son, and this will be our second and last child. My husband definitely doesn't want more than two.

I've always wanted a daughter. I felt some disappointment finding out we were having a boy the first time around, but also knew there'd be another chance at a girl.

Now that we're getting close to find out whether I will be a boy mum or if I'll have one of each, I'm terrified. I really, really want a girl. All the reasons seem trivial, but I can't stop thinking about them:

• I've had a beautiful girl name in mind for years and would be heartbroken not to use it. We've tried and tried but can't think of a boy name we like as much as our first son's name (which is Elliott).
• This will be the 8th and final grandchild, and the other 7 are all boys. So my entire family is rooting for a girl, and they don't do so quietly. So I feel like I'll have to deal with my own disappointment as much as with theirs as well.
• Then there are all the obvious reasons for wanting a girl: the cute dresses, doing their hair, doing girly things... My boy is absolutely wonderful, but only enjoys playing with tractors and climbing things and he's very loud and 'boy-ish' - which I love, but I can imagine two boys together being a bit rowdy. Of course, girls can be tomboys too, and a second boy could be a quiet artsy child who just wants to do colouring, but I'm just going by the most likely scenario.

I don't even know if it's going to be a boy yet, but I'm fully preparing myself for it to be a boy, so I hopefully won't feel that pang of disappointment when I do find out. I know that if it's a girl, I'll be absolutely overjoyed - so I'm trying not to expect it.

Again, I'm extremely grateful to have a second healthy child, and I know I will love him to bits if it's another boy. I'm just preparing myself for the feelings I will have (and my family) and I'm wondering if anyone is or has been in a similar situation.

Thanks for reading.

We get exactly the children we are meant to have, and if the second is also a boy he will be just as lovely as his brother.

What is this? You get what you get and get on with it, surely? Millennials, another day another invented issue to whine over. Get over yourself.

I had a girl first then a boy. Baby dresses are a total pain, constantly riding up, they look uncomfortable, you keep them for best and then don’t have anywhere to wear then and in the blink of an eye they’re too small. My DD is feisty, talks back like a teenager (she’s 6) and hates her matted hair brushing. She runs rings round us. We never do mother and daughter things because she’s wild, moans a lot and can’t sit still. She’s incredibly funny but in small doses.
My DS is a little bit of a terror at 2, but he is so loving. If I could choose a third I would choose another boy and I never thought I’d ever say that considering I’m from a family of girls. Girls can be great but so can boys.

Oh don’t be so flipping melodramatic in a response.

It is shameful. A person should feel ashamed to be disappointed in having a boy. I stand by what I said .

I felt exactly like you! I cried for hours when I found out I had a second boy and would never experience having a girl but I would not swap my son at all! However, I still grieve for the girl I never had and it took ages for me to be able to walk past girl baby clothes and not feel a stab of pain. Many people will never understand this feeling! Sending hugs!

I didn’t find out the gender of my DCs but the sonographer obviously wanted to know if I would be happy with the genders of my DCs. She said to me ‘everything is healthy all is well. Imagine I can give you whatever gender you’d like today - what are you choosing? That really put it into perspective for me … and forced me to say the gender I was hoping for out loud 😬 I seen her for DD1 & DD2. And she did the same thing both times. I wanted two DDs but I also know that if I had two DCs I’d have been just as happy. I hope you have a DD OP 💐

@SpiritOfEcstasy that sounds unspeakably unprofessional on the part of the sonographer.

Then there are all the obvious reasons for wanting a girl: the cute dresses, doing their hair, doing girly things. - I have 3 girls and they could not be less interested in all that junk if they tried!

Now my wee GS loves dressing up in his sister's gear!

I know right? When I was pregnant with DD2 and she asked what I would be choosing, she asked if it was my first. When I said it wasn’t she asked me the gender of my other DC. When I said that I had a DD she asked if I wanted a DS this time … she did the whole thing again about both are healthy, you can choose etc & I said that I would like another DD. She then launched into how wonderful DDs were. Saying that she had three of her own … I seen her three times with DD2. She didn’t appear to remember having had the conversation and did it each time … on the third occasion I was full sure I was having another DD as I felt it would have been awful for her to always say how amazing they are … if I was having a DS. So yes. Pretty unprofessional but I did think the highlight of a sonographers job must be delivering the gender reveal and watching the reaction. This woman had figured a way to get around being deprived of that when dealing with us weird ones who would have preferred a surprise …

@SpiritOfEcstasy I'd hope the highlight of a sonographer's job would be confirming the baby appeared to be healthy. I can attest, however, they aren't too good when it isn't and shall never forget the bitch sonographer who told me I'd had an MMC at the 12 week scan. As I fought back tears "oh did you want it" "It" indeed.

Quite. What if you have a girl who doesn’t like any of that. Will you be “disappointed” with her, too?

When I was pregnant, I really wanted a girl (though already had a boy name picked out and would have been excited either way), but my preference was definitely a daughter.

When I truly sat and thought about why, for me it was about female connection and sharing womanhood. I love being a woman. I love the bonds I have with women in my life. I love being part of a sisterhood. I genuinely think women look out for each other in a way men just don't. Being a woman isn't about what you wear etc, it's about your collective shared life experiences and the way the world treats you (as well as your biology ofc). I've just never related to a man in the same way. I'm also a lesbian, so practically we just wanted a girl as I was worried about giving a boy positive male role models, as in all honesty I just don't hang around many men. I often find men alien to me lol, due to vast differences in the way we've been socialised as different sexes! I would also have felt a lot of pressure to raise a good man and not have my son to grow up and become an incel or something like that.

I think there's an element of women wanting girls based on some kind of primal desire to share womanhood with your daughter. A lot of men want sons too, I think probably for similar reasons.

That being said, I think these kind of things are better just being discussed in person without an online record. I hate to think of young boys coming across these kinds of posts.

Hopefully the op imagines her dd may become a physicist, geneticist or composer.

Oh that’s just awful. I’m so sorry that happened to you. The sonographer I seen was self employed in the private sector and I put it down to that …she made the rules 🙁

Again this is nurture not nature.

I have 2 sons, then a daughter. When I was thinking of TTC a 3rd child, I became quite obsessed over wanting a DD and joined some gender swaying boards, and did lots of crazy things to sway the odds. I did have a DD and was delighted. 18yrs on though, i’m no closer to my DD than my son’s, and as adults, i’m still close to them. My son’s were never rowdy etc. I have enjoyed having a DD, but I know i’d have loved a boy just as much. It’s ok to feel the way you do.

My daughter only ever wanted a brother and, for her sake, we were exceptionally relieved when I gave birth to a boy. They are in their fifties now and have always been the very best of friends. DD says she never wanted a sister and has never felt that she has missed out.

I had a boy, then a girl. He is lovely, the girl is evil. Be very careful what you wish for

That's interesting. DS only wanted a brother. 27.5 years on I can still see him peering into the bassinet, being askwd what he thought of his baby sister and piping up "a boy would have been better". After that he adored her and they are the best of friends and always have been.

These threads always go the same way. Any woman experiencing a strong sense of desires/need for a child of a particular sex is berated and shamed - both fantastically unhelpful.

For most women that sense of “need” for a particular sex is a passing thing which disappears when the baby is born. For some women it takes a little longer but still passes. However it can also be a factor in PND development and become serious - please discuss the feelings with your midwife if it persists and preys on your mind, with a view to checking up on your feelings during the post natal period.
One of my own family suffered from this - like the women posting on MN she was told not to be silly, to be “grateful” for the baby whatever it was, that she was selfish for thinking about the sex. Nobody picked up in those days that her feelings were well beyond the norm and they persisted into what became severe PND. This was at a time when women were told either to pull themselves together or that they were bad mothers if they had the “baby blues". It affected her mental health lifelong.

Hopefully for you, like the majority, it will disappear and you will wonder why you worried about it. Hopefully IRL and in 2025 you have people around you with a bit more awareness than most on this thread.

Shame on you.

I disagree. My DC have been brought up exactly the same, we were very conscious of imposing gender stereotypes and all toys were passed from DD to DS. I love and adore both of my kids and cuddle, play with, read to both of them. Both bake with me, do crafts, ride bikes. DS is already quite little and already his energy is off the charts and his personality is much more goal and energy driven. DD is less energetic, more interested in animals and ‘caring’ type games.

No doubt you’ll rush to say that’s just because children are different but I think a national survey would reveal boys are far more likely to be like my DS and girls more likely to be like my DD

This does not mean it's nature!

You are not the only influence on your children.

You will never find a world with zero external influences whereby you can study the sexes in a vacuum. Even in nature males and females are different, no toy vacuum cleaners involved. Are they ‘socially conditioned’?

It really isn't. There truly are biological and hormonal differences between boys and girls, which result in different behaviour patterns. Of course everyone knows exceptions, the girls who love climbing trees and the boys who prefer sitting quietly and reading. That doesn't take away that the majority of boys and girls do follow the stereotypes.

That absolutely doesn't mean that nurture doesn't have a role to play. Society sadly still expects different things from boys and girls. But it's wrong to say that it's all nurture and no nature.