Maternal Dominance Hypothesis and Priviledged Daughter Hypothesis

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by medicrunner

So does a man being older effect swaying?? Also, Ive read through this article and it just makes me bang my head against a wall even harder. I AM that BOY mom, the whole thing is ME to a T. Yet I have three girls. Don't understand.....

---

I have an aunt who is exactly the Martha type yet she has two of both, (there is always a chance) the only difference for her was lifestyle. When she had her girls(they were both surprises) she and her husband had a lot of money problems and she was working full time and I know for a sure she wasn't eating much, definitely no breakfast and always had light luch at work and the only real meal she would've was dinner.
When she had her sons they were both planned and it was when things got better financially, so lots of healthy eating and she wasn't working anymore.
When I tell her the things that I read here she believes me. I'm too the Martha type and the reason I believe I have 2 DS has more to do with lifestyle (and of course eating habits) than my personality. :)

Sent from my SM-T210 using Tapatalk

that's the reason not one thing sways! and indeed there is always a chance.
it's like everything gives you 20% to sway one way or another. that's what I believe. I think excercise (or life style) and Diet are the biggest swayers. but then again diet and metabolism works together (metabolism is not something you can always control) so that's also something genetic wich sways. wich you can prolly try to influence with fiber or something.

so that's why it's the complete package. and this may sway a bit cause of T lvl's. but I also believe that when I'm getting in my "martha" eppisodes.. I'm stressed.. and fall back in to wrong habbits wich sways the other way..
I feel like setting myself up for failure.. wich happens then too.. cause I feel weak and that it's stronger then me... Now i've read this again.. I'm gonna try again! get back on track..

relaxing helps with the sway. specially with keeping myself on track.

Motherofboys....that's me too!! Except for the lists!! But I do worry over the exact things you do and always think the worst and always blame myself! I also don't think I "deserve" a girl cause I'm not a good enough mum, wife, daughter!! And after reading all about this theory, I am thinking the worst and going well no wonder I have six boys and that I'll never have a chance of having a girl and it's all my fault!! 😕

I'm trying to lighten up but it's also hard when the whole family are used to me doing everything and controlling everything and so if I don't nothing gets done and decisions don't get made. 😜


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Oh yes everything is down to me to decide on so it doesn't help.
I know where your coming from, after all the info I have read on this site I see that everything in my lifestyle, diet and personality all point to boy. But I feel like if I was a better wife and mother I'd get that daughter, or that the mother daughter relationships in my family are so disastrous I would completely mess it up so really shouldn't be a girl mum. It's hard knowing that I need to relax about it but end up stressing over relaxing. I even dreamed of swaying last night, not the getting a girl, but the actual tactics I could use. Obsessing much? Lol
Did you sway in the past? I only discovered this site around my 12 week ultrasound with ds4 so haven't tried anything before. I think once I've got my plan set, and we do start ttc, I will have to step back from the boards for a little while then come back after my bfp.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

No we have never swayed before now. We were actually thinking about it (reading the shettles book) when we fell pregnant with the twins! I said that's what we got for even thinking about it! Lol!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by medicrunner

So does a man being older effect swaying?? Also, Ive read through this article and it just makes me bang my head against a wall even harder. I AM that BOY mom, the whole thing is ME to a T. Yet I have three girls. Don't understand.....

---

Yes, we believe that older men father more daughters.

What you have to understand about Mary-Martha stuff is that there are OTHER things that affect swaying as well. We get signals from the environment about what gender has the best shot of survival to adulthood to pass down the genes and so it's tough when you look at one thing in isolation and say, well gee whiz that really doesn't apply to me. But there are a zillion other things that are coming into play - diet, exercise, muscle mass, and a bunch of stuff that isn't obvious and may date back to things that happened when you were a kid or even in your mother's womb.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by motherofboys

Oh yes everything is down to me to decide on so it doesn't help.
I know where your coming from, after all the info I have read on this site I see that everything in my lifestyle, diet and personality all point to boy. But I feel like if I was a better wife and mother I'd get that daughter, or that the mother daughter relationships in my family are so disastrous I would completely mess it up so really shouldn't be a girl mum. It's hard knowing that I need to relax about it but end up stressing over relaxing. I even dreamed of swaying last night, not the getting a girl, but the actual tactics I could use. Obsessing much? Lol
Did you sway in the past? I only discovered this site around my 12 week ultrasound with ds4 so haven't tried anything before. I think once I've got my plan set, and we do start ttc, I will have to step back from the boards for a little while then come back after my bfp.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

---

This just isn't the case and I know several women who have girls and want boys because they have poor relationships with their mothers and are scared of mother-daughter stuff.

No one is getting boys or girls because they "don't deserve them" or any such thing.

Logically I know that can't be the case, but it doesn't stop those thoughts from creeping into my mind.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

This all makes total sense! Explains my personality and 2 boys and why I cannot let go of not getting what I wanted...a girl. This pushes me towards GS with IVF as I don't know that I can let go enough to influence a sway for a girl. Can I change who I am? My two boys have helped me loosen up a bit for sure, but enough? Who knows. And if all of this is true, what will happen if I choose GS with IVF, get the daughter I always wanted only to realize I am not "Mary" enough to raise her right. What if the Martha types are best suited to raise men? Should I mess with my own fate?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I know atomic advised against taking that test, but I couldn't resist. I scored 15% boy 85% girl. Funnily enough, my answers were completely different to how they would have been back when my boys were conceived. Back then I was very confident. I believed I could do anything I put my mind to. But not achieving the very thing I wanted to achieve, i.e. conceive a girl, completely knocked he wind out of my sails. I would be interested to see how I scored back in my confident days...


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by 2boysJustOneGirl

This all makes total sense! Explains my personality and 2 boys and why I cannot let go of not getting what I wanted...a girl. This pushes me towards GS with IVF as I don't know that I can let go enough to influence a sway for a girl. Can I change who I am? My two boys have helped me loosen up a bit for sure, but enough? Who knows. And if all of this is true, what will happen if I choose GS with IVF, get the daughter I always wanted only to realize I am not "Mary" enough to raise her right. What if the Martha types are best suited to raise men? Should I mess with my own fate?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

---

YOU DON'T HAVE TO CHANGE WHO YOU ARE. That is not what I am trying to get you guys to take away from this. It is IMPOSSIBLE to do that and you only end up replacing one set of worries/anxieties for another, and then I end up seeing people freaking out because they feel a little stressed out or something, versus freaking out over tracking their temps or pH levels.

You are not going to be able to change the fundamental nature of your personality. That's not going to happen, and worrying about things that are of your essence and unchangeable, only feeds the beast. What I want you to focus on is the EASILY controllable side of it. The tangible stuff. Don't view swaying as a game you can win, don't make up flow charts or 10 point plans or test your pH 20 times a day, don't decide now is the time to take up roller derby or enter the Pillsbury bake off, that kind of thing. But also don't, don't, a thousand times don't, go over your whole entire life worrying about stuff that is just who you are.

Re whether you are "suited" to raise a daughter, I think that part of this theory is frankly bullshittery. I do think we may need to make some adjustments when we get an opposite but honestly, I've had to make adjustments to my parenting style for each individual boy as well. Every kid is different and comes with different parenting challenges regardless of what they have between their legs. the whole human race hasn't swelled to 8 billion of us swarming the face of the planet by being inflexible and unable to adapt to new situations!!

I love how you have pointed out that you had to change parenting style for each boy there atomic. I so often am told "you got it right, all those boys, girls are such hard work. Much worse than boys" or "blimey you got your hands full, boys are such hard work!" By people with 1 of each so have taken their child's individual personality and blamed all their differences on their gender. My boys all have to be approached in different ways and dealt with in different ways.
I am trying for patience, I find some of my biggest stresses come from things like the 356211689055 times I have to tell my eldest that if I can hear him singing then I know he isn't brushing his teeth and that everyone else still needs to use the bathroom and there's 10 minutes till we need to be out the door!



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

My mum and I were just chatting on Skype and she wondered whether there could be an issue with my husband's X sperm? We have now had two missed miscarriages and five healthy boys. Could those miscarriages have be initiated by defective X sperm?

Also, has anyone read this http://phys.org/news148226702.html before? Atomic? It talks about men inheriting their tendency to produce more boys or girls. It's very interesting...


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

There is no reliable scientific evidence that men can "only make boys" and in fact very sensible and sound reasons why it's highly unlikely. I have discussed that "study" in other places online and actually just discussed it in another thread, I'll see if I can dig it up and repost it here

Yes found it here

Long story short, this is a misleading study and the way it was reported on in the media is even more so (suggesting that there is a gene involved, when no such gene has been found).

What the study found was that yes, there are some families that seem to be more boy or girl heavy than the 50-50 expectation would have us believe. WELL DUH. That could be down to lots of different things - llifestyle, social status, other genetic factors such as height or muscle mass, and to jump to the rather shocking and utterly unproven conclusion that this is down to genes, is silly and not supported by the facts.

It makes the most evolutionary sense for people to be able to make both boys and girls based on cues from the environment about which gender has the best odds of survival to pass down genes to future generations. If there were some gene that made people more likely to have sons, firstly it puts those families at a huge genetic disadvantage right at the start because of all the men who ever existed, only 40% have surviving descendants whereas 80% of all the women who have ever existed have surviving descendants. And secondly, whenever there was a war or other conflict where predominantly males were killed which has happend again and again across time, people who had all their "eggs in one basket" and had only sons, could easily have had their entire genetic contribution wiped out in one fell swoop. Evolution does not favor genes that put you at a 50% disadvantage from the start and then run the risk of being total dead ends at any time.

So just to share our family history, my husband's grandpa was one of three sons and those three sons did happen to go onto have quite a lot of sons. But DH's grandpa (had 5 boys, 4 lived, and then one girl), his kids all had 50-50 boys and girls. And then those kids (my husband's generation) all had 50-50 boys and girls. They all had pigeon pairs and my husband has a little sister, no brothers whatsoever. Except us, who had 4 boys and then one girl. So that would be one hell of a selective gene, that affected two generations, then skipped two generations, only to settle on just us, yk? But if a researcher looked at this family and counted up B vs. G, it may very well be the case that on paper it appeared to be more boy heavy than girl heavy (and it is, in terms of numbers alone) but that doesn't mean that there was any such gene involved.

Sorry to but in again but your hubby's family sounds like my hubby's family. His grandad was one of 6 boys. He had 3 boys. His eldest son (dh dad) had 1dd and 2ds, dh uncle had 1ds and 2dd and his other uncle had 3ds. Of the 9 grandchildren, all the boys had only daughters, except BIL who had a pp and dh who has 4 ds.
In fact it's a point of pride with FIL that out of all the grandchildren, only his boys had boys to pass on the family name. Guess someone had to do it.
I love hearing about families that are boy heavy and then get a girl though.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Actually out of my my grandFIL's 4 sons, only my FIL had two sons. Two of his brothers have one of each and the youngest brother has 4 daughters.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

I am a mom to four boys and my name is actually Martha...I guess I should be expecting to hear another boy in 8 weeks :)lol

Hey, Mary can be a nickname for Martha! (both Martha Stewart and Martha Washington had daughters!!!)

This came at a good time. I've been spending too much time reading other's sways. My attempt is in a week or so. Time to go relax, watch the bachelorette, and paint my nails.

OMG - I am SUCH a Martha!! I can´t belive it :bigsmile:

I really have to relax and stop thinking of my perfect swaying plan.

How incredibly interesting!!! My DH kids that I am OCD because I want to be able to understand everything that is going on around me, and to be able to manipulate it as needed.
I have two sons, and both were conceived when I had high stress jobs in very male dominated industries. I was making a higher salary than my hubby at the time, and I always tried to be the "alpha" in our relationship.
I am really hoping that mellowing out and being a happier, less stressed person will help me get my pink ;)

Ya I'm a Martha. But not with my day to day but with DH. I don't directly try to control him but I get stressed out and irritated (maybe even disappointed) in him/by him - all the time it seems.



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

This is a great essay! Thank you!

Hitmebaby - I can totally relate to that!!

This is so interesting! It will be neat to see how this theory progresses over time. I think I fit the profile of a boy mom when it comes to anxiety and worrying about every little thing, and then some.

Great atomic i recently started reading you here


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

To do daily exercises really helps me a lot to be more relaxed and to stop Martha habbits.

(actually is it common in the USA to call sb "Martha" or "Mary"? Never heard about this bible story.)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Dynazyme

To do daily exercises really helps me a lot to be more relaxed and to stop Martha habbits.

(actually is it common in the USA to call sb "Martha" or "Mary"? Never heard about this bible story.)

---

No, it's not common at all. I think I probably made it up LOL. I was trying to think of any story that had two dissimilar women in them that many people around the world were familiar with, and who were the right type of people that I think of as being boy/girl mom types. That story and the Ferris Bueller movie both stuck out in my mind as being good examples that many people might be familiar with.

A little late to finding this fabulous set of essays....

But - OMG Atomic!! I am DYING laughing because I am so true-blue that's it's ridiculous. Under 'Boy mom prototype' you might as well paste my picture in the dictionary, because I am THIS ALL OF THIS. I am a Martha dammit! I even have diagnosed OCD. SNORT!!

Ah but I am at a stage where I am making myself let go and LIVE. Just ....leave it all in the hands of God. Healthier and wiser and less miserable all around. It's not easy, but I sure am sick of missing the forest for the trees and missing out on REAL HAPPINESS because I'm so obsessed with the nitpicky unimportant stuff and catastrophizing everything.

I'm doing better, but it's a two steps forward, one step back thing for sure. Ironically if we conceived naturally now I'd probably end up a girl mom, I'm being so zen these days, LMAO. But I'm out of time to sway so we're going HT. But I hear that being relaxed helps IVF anyways, so I'm doing my best to leave it in God's hands and accept that I cannot control what happens. I can just go for the ride, hang on and ride it out, and believe that one way or another things will happen the way they were meant to be.

Hehehe it's funny. My personality really HAS changed. I know how I obsessed years ago, and now I think about TTC and just go 'meh, too lazy to do all that work and planning again'.

Then I took that test and scored very high for boy if I ticked off my personality traits from years ago. And then I did it again ticking off how I tend to feel about things now. And scored 85% girl! hahahhaha!

Awesome but I'm still not risking it, LMAO. Good to know that my trying to be more laid back philosophy really has changed me. Either that or I'm just burnt out exhausted and beat up from life with 3 boys, LMAO. Frankly I'm not even OCD much these days because it's too exhausting!

This is fascinating! I'm not done reading it all yet but I find ti very interesting. I am not here to sway one sex or the other (trying for twins) but I imagine I will be more likely to have boys according to the maternal dominance/ testosterone theory.

I can't work out if I'm more Martha or Mary :D

I have girls so assume I must be a Mary somewhere but reading the two I would have thought myself a Martha :think:

Random thoughts I had reading through these:

I read these with a grain of salt as in "gee that was a fun read but i will not allow these 'studies' to cause me to beat myself up since i have sons"

Trivers willard study:
Only beautiful social butterflies get daughters

Brainiacs with too much testosterone get boys.....i felt this was a boys are monsters mindset study...gonna let that slide off my back like water off a duck ;)


Rashi thought he only had daughters because he couldnt please his wife in bed...or so i read in a book once

My mom loves red meat and sweets

Strangers walk up to me and tell me im beautiful.

I fear these 'studies' could end up Just another mommy war subject to speculate if these things ring true in whether pink or blue...

but both are bundles of joy. And i am blessed to even have children seeing as how im so subfertile.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by skillet04

Trivers willard study:
Only beautiful social butterflies get daughters

Brainiacs with too much testosterone get boys and promiscuis...was this a boys are monsters mindset study

---

That one study that said attractive people have more girls really pissed me off. On the one hand I don't give it much stock because it wasn't very scientific--attractiveness was rated by the participants' third grade teachers, not by something measurable like the golden ratio or facial symmetry. Still, it really stuck in my craw because it came out right when we found out we were having a second boy. I felt like people would read about it and start considering me less attractive (which is of course stupid because people could always see and evaluate how I looked). Also, I look like my mom so somehow she was good-looking enough to have a girl but I'm not? Hmmmmm, doesn't sound plausible.

That beautiful people study isn't very significant IMO. Not a well done study IMO and very overhyped.

I don't like that either and don't put much stock in it.
What worries me is that I have OCD tendencies...eekkkk...did I just say that. But mildly. I like my house run a certain, esp with 2 little boys, it can get outta control easy. And I am always on time. It annoys me! LOL. I need to work on these things and relax more about some stuff.

I have full blown OCD. Not mild either. I was medicated heavily for many years.

That must have been really hard on you maiden. Has it gotten better?

I am wondering if we may be having some language or cultural issues going on here because I am not totally following all this. I get an "offended" vibe from your post, skillet, and I am walking away with an offended vibe myself which may or may not have been your intent.

I am simply talking in generalities and not specifics based upon years of research that I have done. I think I am being exceedingly fair and even handed with it. I went to great efforts in that regard. If anyone thinks I am trying to incite mommy wars they are either coming at this from a totally different worldview than I am or we are speaking two different languages (literally)

Beautiful women and daughters, I actually need an essay on this since it got so much attention. The study was a bit hinky (I would much rather they had had a different kind of setup where they had pictures rated by attractiveness by bystanders and not people rated by researchers, I've heard that it was because there is more to beauty than what is represneted on a picture but I still feel it was too biased)

BUT also it was misrepresented in the media because in the study itself, it found that it wasn't that beautiful women have girls, ugly women have boys. The results were actually much more interesting and absolutely in line with TW. Both the most beautiful and the least attractive group had daughters, while the "very attractive, attractive, somewhat less attractive" categories had more sons. This goes along with TW because the idea is that the women/females in poorest condition (and being unattractive can sometimes be a result of being in poor condition) can typically still find a mate, at least for long enough to get pregnant, while a very unattractive, poor condition male simply cannot compete.

Editorial note, if any all-girl moms get mad at me for reporting on this, which has happened once before and this woman was all like "you boy moms can't even let us have THAT!" Please note, I am simply reporting what a study found. If you want to go around happy and superior in the knowledge that "beautiful women have more daughters" please feel free. The boy-mom vs. girl mom crap that used to fly on IG doesn't fly around here so let's everyone don our big girl panties if possible.

Re "smart women have more sons" it wasn't intelligence per se that was measured, it was the types of careers that they picked and I know some VERY savvy women who understand things about interpersonal relationships that would confuse the hell out of Bill Gates or Stephen Hawking so I tend to think that it's more women who are "smart" in a way that is more likely to be recognized by males may have more boys. I think intelligence can be a hard thing to quantify, after all both Michelle Obama and Hilary Clinton are pretty darn smart gals but have girls.

Re boys are monsters mindset - I do not include studies that are obvious anti-male hit pieces. Any study that I have read that seems interesting and possibly to be in some way informative, I mention. Does it mean that every aspect will be true for everyone all the time, NO. I am and always have been one of the biggest defenders of boys and men since I showed up on InGender in 2007 so anyone who is accusing me of being antimale has completely misread what I was saying. As for who my daughter will marry, I think that is a totally out of order thing to say and really not appreciated.

Grant's study was simply that women who were more likely to be trying to influence the actions of others tended to have more boys. THe OCD observation is mine and based on my experiences with hundreds if not thousands of women at this point. Something may not be true for you but could still be true across the general population. That one I believe with every fiber of my being. My house is a mess too but I am OCD in other ways.

Being a pushover has absolutely nothing to do with this. I find moms of boys are often very indulgent of their little guys. I do not think you are understanding what I am saying. You can be a very sweet person but are still working to influence the actions of others by being sweet and kind to them.

Woman married to partner has been shown in studies dating back to the 1800's to be more likely to produce sons.

RE promiscuous - I'm not sure I am quite sure what you're even referring to. No one is calling anyone promiscuous. I do find that ON AVERAGE moms and dads of boys tend to have higher sex drives but at the same time more boys are born in monogamous relationships so I do not see how that is calling anyone promiscuous. I don't know who Rashi is, I'm sorry.

I am not saying either Mary or Martha was wrong. They are two different approaches to life, two different strategies. One may work in some cases, the other may work in other cases. NO ONE is really a Mary or a Martha, we both have elements of each in us. I'm sorry you read it that way. Please try to keep in mind that MANY moms of all girls are constantly treated as if they are "less than" because they have no sons, and because of the way Valerie Grant made her argument. I was putting a humorous spin on that not to make boy moms feel bad, but to make girl moms feel good about themselves.

Research has shown that the females of the species have a say in the gender of the baby that they conceive. This has been well documented by science for decades. REgardless of Henry the 8th or what anyone's mom has to say about it.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by trifecta

That one study that said attractive people have more girls really pissed me off. On the one hand I don't give it much stock because it wasn't very scientific--attractiveness was rated by the participants' third grade teachers, not by something measurable like the golden ratio or facial symmetry. Still, it really stuck in my craw because it came out right when we found out we were having a second boy. I felt like people would read about it and start considering me less attractive (which is of course stupid because people could always see and evaluate how I looked). Also, I look like my mom so somehow she was good-looking enough to have a girl but I'm not? Hmmmmm, doesn't sound plausible.

---

I would have liked them to take pictures and have them rated by people who were not involved in the study in any other way, and then they could have gone and seen the gender makeup of the ffamily after the "attractiveness" had been rated.

But, like I mentioned above, the media did not report the study accurately anyway because both "beautiful" and "very unattractive" people had more girls and then all three groups in the middle had more boys.