How to prevent gender disappointment when we have our scan? 8 weeks now.

[Visje]

No matter how much I try to fight it, every inch of me wants a daughter so badly that it hurts. I've been crying most of yesterday and today about it. Most people think we're having a girl, but when someone does say boy, it hurts. This is our first child, but we're also both in our 30s, so it's not likely we'll get to have more than 2 children. Which means that if this one is a boy, then the odds are 50% that we'll never have a daughter, and that right there is the hardest part for me. It's not the only hard part, but the hardest.

My husband and I had our girl's name picked out since we had been together for a month, and we've still been back and forth about boy's names during this pregnancy!

Also, most of my experiences with men have been horrible. In my experience, they have been rapists (yes, literally), womanizers, porn-addicted, violent, or a combination of the above. This includes most men in my family. My husband is my best friend, and I could even justify moving to another country and learning another language to be with him. Our connection is amazing, and in my book, 1% of men are OK and 99% suck, so if you find a guy who is part of the 1%, don't let him go. It paints a pretty dim picture of what our son is likely to be like.

Even if we give the best parenting out there, there is so much societal pressure to be a "real" man that he's likely to cave into, understandably so that he doesn't get bullied, but still. I keep hearing that it's all down to the parenting you gave them, but then again some particularly nasty ex-boyfriends of mine had nice mothers.

Also, what's unfortunately a part of the baby stage is that nudity is required to take care of them. My father sexually abused me, and is thankfully dead, but it's still beyond me how I can breastfeed a son, change him, or bathe him without crossing the line into abuse. We also don't believe in circumcision, so his man bits will require extra care until he knows how to clean them himself. I figured at least it would be easier to start with a daughter, so that it could register to my brain that there is nothing sexual about the nudity required to take care of a child. I'm still paranoid about crossing the line into abuse though, and for example, I will not be naked in front of our child or allow nude pictures to be taken of them, regardless of the gender.

It also really infuriates me when people say it's best to have a boy first so that he can protect his younger sister(s). For one thing, this attitude that women should depend on a man to protect them needs to go, that's how me and countless other women have gotten raped. Girls need to learn how to protect themselves. Also, I have an older brother, who I was constantly afraid of. He thought that it was funny to pick me up by my ankles as a little girl and swing me around, and when I complained to my mother, she just brushed it off as "boys will be boys", which only ever gets used for, um, boys.

If anything, I would think that having a girl first would mean that she would be much more enthusiastic about being an older sister than a boy would about being an older brother. My oldest nieces are twins and were amazing with their younger siblings, I've already mentioned my brother, and my husband's older brother was more interested in his toy cars than he was in my husband when he was born. Not this outdated attitude of teaching girls that it's best to play damsel in distress.

And I look at boy's toys vs. girl's toys, and obviously, there's an agenda to make boys aggressive and girls a doormat who put other's first. I would rather take my bad experiences as a child and use it to give a girl an advantage in life. I could care less whether she has normal girly interests, rather that she's happy. And no one will ever tell my daughter that she's "too smart for her own good" like I was told so many times just because I have (gasp!) a brain and even (gasp!) did better in school than most of the boys! I know this probably sounds shallow, but it doesn't seem like it has the capacity to be as fulfilling if we have all boys. Boys have an advantage just because they're boys.

So it would be really helpful to know some good points about having boys, even if we have all boys. Not generic ones though, but ones that apply particularly to a woman with my history. I'd like to be equally psyched about all boys, all girls, or one of each when we go into our gender scan this August.

To be honest though, we talked about swaying and would have if we had any idea that we were going to be this fertile. We did conceive our first cycle off the pill, but for all we knew before, swaying could have slowed us down a lot. Instead, we made love at least ever 2nd day throughout my cycle so that we could catch the egg, and I did eat a healthy vegan diet like I've been eating for the last few years, except maybe a little bit lighter on the salt, and I ate lots more spinach for the folic acid.

I do have a couple scan photos I'll attach, as the sooner I know the gender, the better, so that I can cope with this. I am definitely not going to be team yellow, as it's much better to deal with this before the birth than at the birth. I've already dealt with PTSD, so not willing to risk postpartum.

In the first photo, my cervix is right by the dotted line to the left, I asked the sonographer. I can stand to reason based on the positioning of the baby in the second photo, that my cervix is to the right. Both were transvaginal. The second photo was taken a few days after the first one, as I was in the hospital with a severe allergic reaction, and we wanted to make sure our baby was OK.

Thanks for your help everyone. I'm sure that regardless of gender, that considering it took 1 cycle to conceive this baby, that they are coming with a definite purpose. I just need to overcome the fear of being bad for our son, if he is in fact a son.

 

[Misscalais]

1st of all congrats on your pregnancy.
I hope you hear girl we are ttc a girl two as we have two lovely boys already.
I'm on of 4 girls in my family and we have one brother. He is the biggest softy you could ever meet, a pure gentleman and just a pleasure to have in my life. He's never been rough or violent in any way.
My boys are mummy's boys and are full of kisses and squishy cuddles. If I'm upset they know and ask me if I'm ok and tell me it's going to be ok and they are only 4 and 3. You don't need to buy them toys that will make them 'aggressive' girls are just as aggressive as boys can be, if not more sometimes ( I work in long day care with 0-6 years old and have been punched, kicked and scratched by little girls! ) I'm feeling your very not wanting to put a stereo type on girls but you're doing it to boys. I think if you have a son you will be able to use your experience to teach him to be a lovely sweet kind boy. Children are what you make then at the end of the day and if you teach a child to be rough and tumble that's what they are going to be regardless of the sex so take the gentle approach with him just like you would a daughter. My boys play with dolls, prams and tea sets. They have a play kitchen in their toy room and my 4 year old likes to bottle feed his teddies and put them to sleep.
How do you know your daughter won't be one of the ones that rebel and end up pregnant at 15? It can go either way with both genders.
I really feel for you
I hope this hasn't come out the wrong way because I mean no offence at all I'm just trying to stick up for the amazing young men out they and how truly wonderful baby boys truly can be. I've met some nasty men in my time so I can understand the frustration and most of them have been brought up the old school way where men are made to be better than the woman.
I've read though the older you are the higher chance of having a girl and there is a theory that if the placenta implants on the left its a girl on the right for a boy.
Good luck I hope you get your girly but if not a little man will bring just as much joy to your life
I've had two miscarriages this year and almost going on 12 mths ttc so I think you are super lucky and blessed with this little miracle and I know you will just love her/him to bits regardless make sure you let us know when you find out the gender, are you going to have a private scan at 16 weeks?

 

[Visje]

Thanks, and I do feel somewhat better today. I did come to an epiphany yesterday that if it wasn't for the way I was damaged, I really wouldn't care about the gender of our child. And the damage did expose me to mostly evil men. My husband and I are now together 2 years, and it took me a while to trust him. I still often have a hard time believing that things won't go bad eventually, even though we've never had a fight, and he always puts me first, and has been my rock while I've been fighting my demons. He really does challenge every preconceived notion I've ever had about men, it's kind of scary sometimes!

I am determined to focus on this, being equally happy with either, hard between now and the gender scan, which I'm having in the middle of August at 15 weeks. 1 huge advantage I can think of with a boy is that having more than 1 excellent man at home can help to change my view on men, which I believe is more likely now seeing as my husband pointed out that both the bullies and the kids who get bullied at school are usually the ones in a bad situation at home. Then if it's a boy, I'll be a much better mother to him and enjoy him more, if it's a girl, I'll also not be so damaged and also a better mother to her. And we have good solid names picked out for each child which helps, Xavier Sebastiaan (not a typo, the normal Dutch spelling has 2 A's at the end) for a boy, and Estella Simone for a girl. And my husband and I have agreed to not let anyone know that we're having the 15 week gender scan and not announce the gender until we've had our 20 week scan, then we can have more time to process the information ourselves without annoying comments like "Oh he can be such a good little protector" if we're having a boy.

And no offense at all. I've slowly but surely seen that most women have had good experiences with most men and boys, which hopefully will also be the case with any daughters we may have.

Of course we're not that old yet, I'm 31 and my husband is 34, but maybe that is comforting to know. The Ramzi method is also intriguing. Then again, the jury is out on how I feel about gender swaying for any future children, mainly because if we do end up with an opposite, I don't want it to mean that I have a harder time accepting them. We're definitely having at least 1 more after this one and maybe we'll go for a 3rd, which mainly depends on our finances and if the kids are spaced close enough together where they're all born so that definitely me and preferably also my husband are still in our 30s.

I feel good right now, but I'm scared about if that's going to go back and forth between now and the gender scan if it's a girl or between now and the birth if it's a boy. So main thing is keep getting myself pumped up about the possibility of either, even if hypothetically we reach 3 kids and still no girl.

And my husband and I are both equally enthusiastic about cooking, so that is an interest that is definitely likely to spread to a son or a daughter! As is being a sensitive animal person.

 

[Misscalais]

I love your reply I'm glad that that's how you will deal with things and I just love the names you have picked out they are amazing I've always loved Xavier ( it was on my names list with ds2 but hubby didn't like it lol ) I wanted Elijah he didn't like that so we settled for just Eli
A lot of men are horrible and it's really sad though, my sister was rapped by a so called school friend when she was 17. My nephews dad beat the life out of her and it took a long while getting her out of that relationship, and my nieces dad was exactly the same! It was very hard watching her go down that path but has finally found a man that dotes on her and treats her and her kids amazingly.
Your hubby sounds awesome all men should be just like him and if you have a son I'm sure he will be just like daddy
I understand the annoying comments that people make we had a few and I just ignore it.
Good luck with your scan can wait to hear an update when it's time.

 

[Pearls18]

I know it's a cliche but for me I am convincing myself it is a boy. I wanted a girl so bad I had almost convinced myself it couldn't be anything else, after my 12 week scan when my dates were adjusted and the nub looked boyish I just couldn't picture a boy and that was because I had thought too much about a girl, I felt deflated and confused because I couldn't picture a boy. I have spent the last few days telling myself it's a boy, calling him he, have his name picked out, picked out his nursery theme, I can now picture our family and feel so much better for it. If they tell me boy I am prepared, if they say girl it will be a surprise. There is no traumatic reason for me to prefer a certain gender, I am just greedy and always pictured myself having a boy and a girl, I'm not saying it will be easy being told boy because I will feel like I will need to mourn for the lack of a daughter (this is our last) but I HAVE to realise it is a possibility and I think you need to too, I know you know it is but you have to convince yourself it is 50/50 and there is a real chance it could be a boy and not that it can't be because you won't know what to do if you know what I mean? It's so tricky and makes us feel so awful, but I promise you, you will do a fab job no matter what it's all hypothetical right now and that is more scary than reality

 

[Visje]

I think that is the best therapy for this kind of thing, convincing myself that it could be either, and visualizing things either way. It's strange though, I do a lot of yoga and meditation, and I keep seeing a daughter, even more and more over the last week. I love the idea of connecting with our child before the birth, but if it is a boy, I keep getting scared that I'm connecting with a false image thanks to wishful thinking.

And there's definitely going to be annoying comments either way, about gender or anything else with raising a child. I'm bracing myself for that, as I haven't officially announced our pregnancy yet, neither my husband or I eat meat and we're raising our child accordingly, and we're expecting lots of unsolicited parenting "advice" on that and many other things. This is another area where gender comes into play, it definitely seems easier on a girl to be raised vegetarian than a boy, thanks to the perceived link between meat and manliness, though my husband is very manly and certainly not scrawny!!

And MarineWAG, you're so right, the hardest part is mourning for the child you didn't have. I don't see myself regretting any children we do have. So my big challenge (and probably your's too) right now is picturing my life with only sons, so that that possibility isn't so scary if it does happen.

 

[Ashla]

Hi Visje. I related to a lot of what you had said in your first post. I had fairly severe gender disappointment when pregnant with my DS (now 15 months old). I am the eldest of four girls and have had to watch some truly terrible things happen to them at the hand of teachers and other men who were supposed to do them no harm.

Sometimes the world is a really horrible place.

Although it took me until after my son was born to finally be cured of my gender disappointment, it was a process that started while I was still pregnant. Two things in particular really helped me.

1) I dreaded people asking "what was I having?" Because it seemed that whenever I told them it was a boy, they would simply say "oh." I kept feeling like the whole world hated boys! One day my hairdresser asked me what I was having. When I told him, he looked at me thoughtfully and said, "You know, everyone is always saying how there are no good men, well maybe you have one of them right there."

2) A few days later, I was listening to the radio and an Eminem song came on. As I listened to the terrible things he was saying about women, I realised that actually, while he hated women, he was also terribly scared of them. He must have felt that they had the ability to wound his ego terribly if he felt so insecure that he needed to reduce all women to 'sluts.' And that made me think about the early women in his life and the fractured relationship with his mother that he has often rapped about.

These two events made me start to think about raising my son in a different light. Before I had wanted a girl so that I could teach her to be tough, and as you mentioned, to fight back. I thought that if I taught her those skills, the terrible things that happened to my sisters wouldn't happen to my daughter. But I realised that I had been entrusted with an equally sacred responsibility: to raise a son who understood what being a man meant. I realised that if I treated my son lovingly, recognised his vulnerability and taught him what it means to do the right thing, I could help him to feel secure with his place in the world and to understand the responsibility that come with being stronger than 51% of the population. Because being a real man is about recognising how much your strength gives you power over women and choosing to use your strength to do them no harm.

And on the days when the gender disappointment was very bad, I tried to think about the moments when my DH was particularly vulnerable or 'little boy-ish' and to remind myself that my son would have those traits and would share 50% of his genetic material with the one of the sweetest, gentlest, most loving men in all the world

 

[Eleanor ace]

Congratulations! And for how you're feeling.
I haven't been throuh what you have and I don't want to make light of it at all so I'm really sorry if it comes across like that!
Anyway most of my favourite people are male. I have 2 brothers who I'm super close to, I'm a daddy's girl and most of my friends are guys. They are all awesome people. I had 1 bad ex who I wouldn't be in the same room with no but otherwise, I only know "good guys". On the other hand I knew a lot of very bitchy girls at school and university and have had the displeasure of knowing grown women who are malicious bullies (not to me, but to others in the workplace). I've known girls who drove a lovely girl to try to kill herself, which fuelled them even more so that they drove her to move schools and towns to escape their relentless abuse.
What I mean is that girls can be horrible too! And I think you've been EXTREMELY unlucky in knowing so many awful men, it's no wonder you are scared of having a son. But although it obviously won't seem like it to you after all you've experienced, most boys and men are good people, they really are! I'm really sure that if you do have a son/s as long as you raise them with love and respect they will turn out to be fine people .

I can totally understand your worries about accidentally crossing the line to abusing your son when trying to care for him but trust me, it won't happen. Abuse doesn't happen accidentally. When your baby is here you will see. It's something a lot of people worry about- my DH was nervous about having a daughter and having to touch her genitals as it didn't feel right to him- like most people he'd only touched the privates of members of the opposite sex in a sexual way. But once he'd changed DD's nappy for the first time he was fine (although he does still prefer to change DS's nappy but then so do I- girls are much messier ).

I'm a teacher and here at least (I'm in the UK) it's now girls who are expected to perform better and boys who get the comments "wow this is good work and it's by a boy!". Girls are perceived as harder workers and better performers.

OK, pros of having a boy. I really try to stay away from gender stereotypes but, in my experience (of teaching children) boys tend to be lower maintenance, less argumentative and easier to entertain! I have a son and he is just so much fun! He's very loving, especially to his baby sister. He loves to cuddle and give kisses and he's a very laid back child (which boy toddlers seem to be more than girls, but I only know about 10 toddler girls so it's a limited experience I'm basing that on!)

I hope you get your girl, but please don't worry if you do have a boy- I'm sure he'll restore your faith in men and make you proud everyday x

 

[tinkerbelle93]

Congratulations on your pregnancy! I have a little boy who is AMAZING, and I love him to pieces. I'm sorry you have had bad experience with men in the past but really they're not all bad.

I have a wonderful father who I love to bits, an amazing older brother who has always been there for me and is a good friend and plenty of other male relatives and friends who I love and admire.

I haven't come across many males who I strongly dislike but I have come across many girls who are bitchy/nasty/spiteful. I have found girls can be just as unlikeable as males!

If you have a boy you will love him just as much as if he were a little girl. Little boys are so much fun.. my little man is 18 months and he's such a fun, happy, smiley little boy and so loving and caring. He loves snuggles and cuddles and if I'm sad or crying he'll always put his arms up for a cuddle and stroke my hair! I really do think that, to a certain extent, you can teach your child good values and with boys, teach them about respect to women etc., just the same as you'd teach a daughter appropiate values. xx