Gender Disappointment Forum

[Jug Band Baby]

On 11/9/2017 at 12:48 AM, Milly-Molly-Mandy said:

Absolutely they need professional help but it’s an actual condition. I wouldn’t snark on someone with depression. 

If my second baby hasn’t been a girl I probably would have had gender disappointment for a little bit too. I have so many friends who are desperate for a daughter. It doesn’t seem unusual to me. 

I just feel the world is so judgemental & desperate to shame women, can’t we just accept some people feel disappointment at things that don’t bother others?

 

Maybe I just feel sensitive about this post because I probably would have had it too, and having 2 friends with it who I know love and adore their sons but would still love the experience of raising a daughter. I don’t feel they should be judged for that? 

If depression is sparked because you're sooooooo disappointed that you have a baby of a certain sex, then don't get pregnant.  Adopt.  It's absolutely cruel to be more than mildly disappointed.  How do you think it will affect those children to know their mothers are disappointed as fuck that they exist because they have the wrong genitals?

 

On 11/9/2017 at 7:25 AM, ViolaSebastian said:

I noticed a lot of the posters talking about symptoms of post-partum depression: they can't stop crying, can't connect with their babies, express anger and irritability at the baby and other children. I'm not discounting that they're genuinely disappointed, but it makes me wonder if they're interpreting these difficulties as the result of not getting the preferred gender, instead of as the result of a mental health condition. 

I thought about that, then realized that many of those posted have other children of the undesired sex, and have never felt love for them.  That's well outside of PPD.

[Jug Band Baby]

On 11/9/2017 at 4:36 PM, anjulibai said:

I had gender disappointment with both of my children, both boys. I could go into all the reasons why, but frankly most of these responses just show a massive amount of judgment, so fuck that. I'm not going to try to explain it to people that act like I'm a horrible person for having these feelings.  

There's a big difference between mild disappointment and getting over it, and such extreme depression over it that you need professional help to deal with how devastated you are over your child's genitals.

[BabyFactoryClosing]

Whoo I feel like this is a dangerous one to dive into but what the heck. For the record, before I say anything else, I openly admit that many many of the women on ingender do indeed need help. I won't for a second condone treating your existing children like garbage for any reason, especially their sex. That said though, gender disappointment is actually a thing, and is more common than most people care to admit (largely because it is often wildly misunderstood and therefor harshly judged as we see here). What I've found is most women (again we're talking otherwise healthy individuals here, not ingender) are not in any way disappointed in their existing baby or who that baby is as a person. The disappointment is usually in the fact that they will never experience raising a son or a daughter, particularly if that is their last baby. The grief is not for having gained another daughter or another son but having lost the other. I used to want 7 kids and just kind of assumed that there would be at least one of each in there. My first pregnancy made it really clear that 7 kids or anything close to it was never going to happen and that I wanted to be done as soon as possible. So at the ultrasound with my second, they said it was another boy and I sobbed hysterically. Not because he was a boy, I LOVE boys and would happily have ten, but because it occurred to be then that if I wanted a chance at the likelihood of having a daughter (because yes, transgender individuals obviously exist) I would have to experience a third pregnancy and a third traumatic delivery etc etc. It didn't last long, and of course he was born and we adored him as we still do and when we did get brave enough to have a third by that point I genuinely didn't care about the sex  but still, I get it. And had I come across this forum in the weeks immediately following the ultrasound it would have destroyed me to think that I bunch of strangers assumed that I didn't love my boy or wasn't grateful that he was healthy.

[Carm_88]

I honestly think that there is a huge difference between mourning for what you will never have (son and/or daughter) and hating the now born child for what they are. 

[Ali]

@BabyFactoryClosing There is a huge difference between what you are feeling and a woman who wants to give her children up for adoption behind her husband's back because they are not her preferred gender. You want more children to love instead of hating the ones you had.

[BabyFactoryClosing]

@Carm_88 and @Ali Oh absolutely, like I said, the ingender ladies get nuts. They really do. My point is USUALLY on most forums or facebook groups for people who have several kids of the same sex, gender disappointment is used to describe the loss of an experience, not hatred for existing kids so I think that's where some of the disconnect with other posters being upset is at.

[mstee]

Sounds like even if these women get the preferred gender, they may find other reasons to be unhappy (“my daughter hates pink!” Or “my son won’t play with trucks!”). I️ don’t think that any child will be good enough for them. It’s way past wanting a boy or girl. 

[Ignorance Bread]

Mom of multiple boys here. I'm most likely never going to have a daughter. It is not what I pictured when I imagined my future family, but I love my boys to bits and would not want it any other way.

It strikes me as super odd that so many, if not most, of the women on the gender forum have children of both sexes. If I (very hypothetically) went on there to gripe about my lack of girls, the last person I'd want commenting or comforting would be someone with both genders.

It's like if someone made a forum for people under the poverty line, but there were also millionaires on there commenting, "ho hum, I'd like more money too,"

[BabyFactoryClosing]

@Ignorance Bread yes I've always found that odd too. There are a few that have, say, 6+ daughters or sons or what have you but a good number have an older boy then 5 girls or vice versa and that's a little strange. Usually groups where it's largely discussed are explicitly moms of ALL one sex and most of the time those ladies have a statistically unusual number in a row. Ingender is strange that way.  

[laPapessaGiovanna]

I too noticed a lot of gender stereotyping. It seems so stupid. The stupid product of a strongly gender stereotyped society.

[Shiny]

On 11/14/2017 at 5:47 AM, Carm_88 said:

I honestly think that there is a huge difference between mourning for what you will never have (son and/or daughter) and hating the now born child for what they are. 

I totally agree. I’m in a lot of special needs groups and health groups. You see parents mourning a life for their child or a relationship they will never have. But you also see those same parents being fiercely proud and protective. They love all the things their children are and will get to do, even if there is sadness over the other things. 

[Grimalkin]

On 11/11/2017 at 9:00 AM, StepMonsterInLA said:

I agree you don’t know what your kid will be like. My sons have all been rangbunctious, no interest in painting nails.  My first son, before he was born, I bought him a lovely little baby doll. He never even looked at it.  We still have it and it’s a joke like ha mom thought we would play with dolls!  

 

         Before school this morning my 9yo son was painting his nails with clear polish. I didn’t make a big deal of it. Later he asked if there was boy nail polish and I just told him I think boys would just use the same nail polish as girls if they wanted to paint their nails.