After imagining what your future will look like, navigating strangers’ comments and social norms, feeling downhearted about your baby’s gender doesn’t make you a bad mum — it makes you human Gender disappointment during pregnancy doesn’t mean you’ll find your baby anything less than perfect when they arrive. Photo: Getty Gender disappointment, or that feeling of sadness when you discover the sex of your baby is not what you expected, is real. I should know.
I felt it. I had a baby boy in late 2016 and when I became pregnant with my second child in 2019, I couldn’t help but imagine I’d have a girl. Be it from a cultural norm implanted by that often-perpetuated narrative of ‘completing’ my family by having one of each, or just imagining a future with a little girl in it, I never contemplated an alternative.
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