Let me preface this post by saying, I am more grateful than I could ever put into words that our baby is healthy, growing and developing exactly as he should be. In essence, the gender is not what is important and it isn’t a case of me preferring one sex over the other because in the grand scheme of things it’s such a small thing.....
But yes, for the smallest time, I was sad about the result of our gender scan.
I already have one son and one daughter, so when I fell pregnant for the third time people were intrigued to know my preference. It was the first thing anyone asked me and it began swirling around in my head- what would I prefer? When I was pregnant with my second, people would say “you already have a girl, I hope you have a boy!” so that became the focus and hope- but with one of each already people want to discuss how the family dynamic would change with the “tie breaker”.
It wouldn’t have occurred to me to have a preference. Both my son and daughter are so different and wonderful and it has nothing to do with their sex, just their personalities. But as I said, with people seemingly only interested in what I would prefer, I did begin imagining either a son or daughter and names and bedroom sharing ideas... I decided I’d quite like another girl.
I didn’t believe this baby was a girl even once. I’ve been right twice before, and I had a strong lean towards this baby definitely being a boy. If you’ve been following me, you’ll know I was bang on the money and we’re super excited to be having a second boy!
As I discussed in my post “Am I excited for baby number three?” we’ve kept everything from newborn up from Archer, so my bank account is extremely pleased it won’t need to pay for a single wardrobe item besides a few token/seasonal items. Score right?
I was disappointed. I felt horrifically guilty for being disappointed. The sad thing was, I wasn’t even upset about the gender of my child itself, I was upset about all the materialistic elements which made me feel even worse! I wouldn’t get to buy a new wardrobe. I liked a million girls names, and not one boy name. I like silly gender stereotypical items like hair bows and frilly knickers. I liked having a sister more than a brother growing up and thought Isla would too.
Notice how all my reasoning was not related to the child itself? That’s how I’ve got through this. It was purely my own imagination and fantasy of what life may be like when baby came. Yes I imagined a girl and it was a little painful to suddenly lose this but after a little shake and a few days to “mourn” I managed to pick myself up and I’m thrilled.
I think mums are often ashamed to admit they have had gender disappointment. We’re made to believe we should always say “baby is healthy, the gender does not matter” and no it doesn’t matter but that doesn’t mean our overly hormonal and emotional selves can’t be sad for a little while if it is different to what we fantasised about.
Don’t be ashamed if you’ve felt the same, and don’t feel as though it makes you a horrible person. I felt that for a while, I felt guilty. Why should I though? Of course I love my son already and I will love him more when he is here. Now I know his name, and I’m getting things ready for him, I couldn’t imagine him being anything other than who he is and I wouldn’t change him for the world.
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