So scared to TTC - Swaying for a Girl

Can anyone help me or offer advice/positive view.
We have been thinking about conceiving our 3rd baby since about March and I have been swaying for a girl. This is all well and good however every month when the time comes I freak out and decide against even trying as I am so scared it's going to be a boy.

We already have 2 girls and not to offend anyone I can only see myself with girls (this is my issue) girls are all I know. What if I don't click with a boy and trucks and guns and all that boy stuff. Theres so many reasons why, like I want my girls to have that close sisterly relationship when they get older and if I have a boy will he be left out now? Also I keep thinking later on when they are older is a boy just going to find a wife and then distance himself from me (would break my heart) this issue comes from my own brothers, who found wives and don't really seem to care about their own family anymore and just do everything their wives want them to do and just push me and my parents out of the picture.

I have tried for months to try and get my head around and picture my life with a little boy in it but I just can't. It gives me so much anxiety to the point of feeling so sick.

Every month I put it off, the age gap just keeps getting bigger and thats not what I wanted.

Does this mean maybe I should just stick with two children? I love my girls so much and am so scared a 3rd will put them out and upset them. They (for the most part) play happily and gentle. Will a boy come in and wreak havoc? Or am I just stereotyping?

I just cannot get myself over the line to even try to conceive as I am so scared. I am also sick of thinking about it all and trying to work it out in my head and tell myself it will be okay.

Ultimately all we want is a healthy baby and I hate that I even have these thoughts. But the anxiety is killer and it won't go away no matter how hard I try.
I want to be okay before trying to conceive with the possibility that baby #3 could be a boy otherwise i'm so scared of falling pregnant and just being an anxious mess.

In many cultures all around the world, the girls go away and join their husband's family while the sons stay put. There is nothing set in stone that daughters are gonna be ur best friends forever and your sons aren't. In my and my husband's family alike it's always been the daughters following their hubbies all over the country and one or more of the sons take care of the older parents (and I suspect you're still pretty far from those days anyway. :)) As one of the few people on here who actually have adult sons I can tell you that they and I have always been the best of pals and still are, kind of like Gilmore Girls only with 2 boys instead of a girl LOL. They call me at least 2-3 times a week and we talk literally like for a whole hour every time. Sometimes they call me and I'm like OMG give it a rest I just talked to you!! LOL. I can't imagine being any closer with a daughter than I am with them (and in fact I am not that close to my mom visit her like 2x a year, and I know tons of people who are desperate for a daughter because they AREN"T close to their moms and want that relationship.)

My point is, please don't think that it HAS to be that way just because that is how you have it pictured in your head. It doesn't and all of us who have boys will testify that whatever you're picturing in your head is not what the reality is. (some) Boys can be hard chargers sometimes but honestly that's part of the fun of having them. And all the boys I know with big sisters are pretty mellow fellows - the girls set the example and the boys fall into line. Plus, for all you know, having a boy could be an entryway into things that you never even knew you liked. Frankly, some of the stuff out there for girls, I find, I do not enjoy at all. My husband turned on a Barbie show for my daughter this one time and it was literally the stupidest, most insipid thing I've ever seen. Seriously, give me Phineas and Ferb any day. :) So for all you know, you may enjoy aspects of having a boy that you can't even envision yet.

I do think you need to "get your head right" as they say because if you're feeling literally terror and fear at having a boy, you're going to have a hard time of it. But I promise that if you did end up with a boy it would not only be ok but it would be a wonderful and amazing thing. Your daughters would dote on him, everyone would be over the moon excited for you (this is one thing you have over the rest of us who have GD because we already have 2-3 of the same gender and get another - everyone in our universes acts bored and disappointed, but people would be SOO thrilled for you!) And the stuff they have for boys now, the clothes and toys are just flat AWESOME now!! They have such adorable things for boys and guess what - if you don't want him to be into guns and trucks, you don't have to buy them for him. Honestly, my daughter doesn't have tons of girl toys, she plays with the boys' stuff since we had tons already, and if you did have a boy you could do exactly that...he'd play dolls or whatever your girls are into and that would be normal for your family and perfectly fine.

This is not an insurmountable problem - just keep reminding yourself that no matter what, you win. You get another girl, or you get a new experience, a boy to love, and you will love him just as much as you do your DD's and he'll surprise you in all sorts of different ways that you can't even envision yet.

I have two boys and am TTC a girl. Some months I've freaked out and thought, what if it's a third boy, but the longer I've been trying to conceive, the more I look at my two boys and think 'wow, if this sway 'fails', I'll have another wonderful boy who I'll worship just like I worship them'. My boys are SO loving and sensitive and so close to me - my poor husband is desperate for a girl in the hope she would adore him in the way my boys adore me. They are total mummy's boys. I used to literally have panic attacks that my boys won't be close to me when they're older and will just go off with their wives but we are SO close that I just can't see a day any more when we won't be close. I don't think your future relationship with a child is about gender, I think it's about the relationship you build with them as children, how supportive you are of them and ultimately, their personalities. Girls can just as easily fall in love and abandon their parents OR just be independent and move to the other side of the world. IF your sway was to 'fail' and you got a boy, I bet you'd realise just how lucky you were that it failed because getting the chance to experience a son is a total blessing and a joy x

One of the cosmic jokes about gender disappointment (for many of us with all boys, anyway) is that we finally get a girl only to find that she actually prefers our husbands to us, and he also prefers her to us, too! o.O

I cried a lot when I found out I was having a boy (my first child). Honestly, even after he was born it still took me a month to get used to the fact that I didn't get the girl I wanted. He is now 22 months old and into hot wheels, dinosaurs and trains and I absolutely love all of it. He still has his sensitive side and loves his stuffies and hugs his favorite to sleep most nights and his dinosaurs love to kiss things, it's seriously the cutest thing ever. Boy clothes are so cute now, I have so much fun dressing him and shopping for him, I always get compliments on how well he is dressed (way better than me and my husband haha). As much as I so badly want a girl I would feel so incredibly blessed to have another boy too. If you are 100% sure you want another baby, do it, whether you get the girl you want so badly or the boy you're not sure about I promise in the end it'll be worth it..

Also, my brother is the one who stayed home and is super close to my mom and dad while I am the one who moved 8 hours away with my husband. We are still close but only as close as you can be living so far. My BFF and her sister both moved from Canada to the USA for their husbands. Just because he is a boy doesn't mean he won't be your best friend when he grows up!

Just adding my experience to how "stereotyped" boy isn't the way it has to be. So who knows if it's nature or nurture for our family, or more likely some of both, but none of my boys are rough & tumble hyper-alpha-masculine sports obsessed boys. Maybe it's because I exposed them to hobbies/pastimes/entertainment I favoured as they grew up, or maybe that was who they were always supposed to be. Not that there's anything wrong with the rough & tumble either, but gender doesn't play as much into that IMO as much as the individual child's personality and the environment/culture they grow up in.

Sure they all love trucks and super heroes and LEGO, but I'm a girl and I loved Star Wars, Trek, Transformers, and TMNT growing up lol. Not that anyone gifted me any awesome toys I actually wanted - I got stuck with Barbies that I despised and could never figure out what to do with. I danced ballet all my life but I've never had a tea party as a kid. I stripped my dolls naked to figure out how their plastic joints worked LMAO.

But my eldest is an aspiring aeronautics engineer who excels at academics, especially maths/science, and studies music. My middle son is now boarding away from home at a professional elite world class ballet academy (one of the top 2 in Canada). My youngest son is also into dance as his thing (ballet, tap, jazz).

They're all individuals and there's absolutely no reason that any child these days has to be limited by their gender in anything they do, which is wonderful and not something previous generations could say. I now have a little baby girl and I figure I have 3 years max to fulfill my fantasies of stuffing her in the princess costumes before she has an opinion....and we wouldn't be surprised in the least if she ended up to be our hockey player kid! Hah!

Also, just because they're girls doesn't mean they're meant to be mom's bestfriend as adults either. I have one sister and a narcissistic personality disordered mother. My mother was so toxic that as an adult I've cut her out of my life, and so has my sister. And I have no relationship with my sister either. Gender doesn't guarantee anything.

Yeah, I just want to shout out as another Star Wars/Star Trek/Hulk loving gal here that I was never a super girly girl at all and some traditionally female pursuits have always felt a bit foreign to me. Like, I don't do a lot of spa weekends and I'd rather have bamboo stuck under my fingernails than to wear high heels. I think we sometimes forget that every kid that comes to us will be an individual and while there are some stereotypical gender elements that come into play (I like makeup and cute clothes and cooking and stuff) at the end of it all, male and female we just aren't that different from each other. My adult sons are like Lace describes not manly men and my husband even had a weird kind of GD for a more boyish boy after we had them (and luckily he got that with our 3rd) and then our 4th boy is also a quiet nerdish type like the first two are. They're just people at the end of it, and every one of them has these cool unique qualities and I"m so glad I know each and every one of them! :)

I too want to echo what others have said about boys. I have 3 and let me tell you, they are all completely different! While they are all best friends, my DS1 is so unique. He isn’t your stereotypical boy- he is studying music and currently plays the piano, although he wants to add violin and flute to his list. He loves to paint and has many pieces of his art work in local museums and libraries in our town. My DH has 2 pieces of his framed in his office that my son created when he was 3 and 4 years old. People are shocked to learn that our son was so young when he painted them! He loves to make pottery and sculptures and wants to take a summer arts camp in New York next summer to learn more techniques. Science and math are also his strengths as well as endurance running and sprinting. He is only 7 years old!!! My DS2 is more of an empath and loves to paint and build sculptures too. I love the decorative plate he made for me last year and I use it for my lose jewelry (he was only 3 years old!). He loves anatomy and physiology, even before he had surgery last January. Ever since then, he wants to be a surgeon. We will see!! Only my DS3 fits the mold for a traditional boy, but even then, he is extremely nurturing and enforces the rules on his older siblings (which is incredibly funny to watch at times!).

You may have another girl or you may have a boy. I can tell you if you have a boy, he will surprise you! Boys aren’t rough, tough, truck loving kids all the time, or even at all! You may be pleasantly surprised!

I wish you all the best!


[emoji170]8/2010 [emoji170]6/2013 [emoji170]11/2015 [emoji170]
[emoji178]Baby Girl [emoji254]EDD 9/30/2017 [emoji178]

https://lmtm.lilypie.com/kIlmm5.png