A pregnant mum has admitted she was disappointed after discovering that her third child is a boy.
Nikki Jurcutz has opened up about her 'sadness' in a bid to tackle the taboo and normalise 'gender disappointment'.
The Aussie - who founded Tiny Hearts parental education company - conducting a poll on Instagram, which showed that many parents had also experienced gender disappointment.
"It's a taboo topic for sure," she wrote in an Instagram post. "But last night 11k people admitted that they experienced it, whether it was a slight ohh or severe disappointment, and another 6k said they only didn't because they got what they wanted but otherwise would have.
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"Thats more than 65 percent of people who answered, proving that it's a very real thing."
Opening up about her own experience of gender disappointment, she explained why her family hoped her third baby would be a girl.
"We wanted a little girl, for many reasons and that's ok, and it's ok to feel sad that we are saying goodbye to that idea," she said. "The sadness you feel can coexist with excitement.
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"We were sad that our little girl didn't get the dream of a little sister, that we couldn't give aunties, uncles and grandparents a girl, in a sea of boys.
"This disappointment absolutely coexists with love, joy and happiness to welcome a boy to our little gang in June."
Of course, the received wisdom is that parents should be happy whatever the baby's gender; and while Nikki was keen to emphasise her excitement and gratitude, she argued that women shouldn't be told how to feel.
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"Above all, all we truly care about is a healthy baby and we feel blessed," she explained.
"Remember, we all walk life in different shoes, we have different life experiences and this forms the people we are and our perspectives. Some are more privileged than others, I acknowledge that.
"So for some it's completely incomprehensible to have these feelings and that's ok. I certainly got some heated messages through last night but I'm not about to tell those people not to feel their feelings, because that would be hypocritical of me but what I will say is that just because you didn't experience it or don't understand it, doesn't mean you have the right to minimise how others feel."
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She continued: "We have to stop telling women that we should or shouldn't feel a certain way. We don't always feel what we expect or want to feel, that's life.
"I learned as a paramedic that the 'expected/accepted norms' of emotions are actually often the opposite of what we see.
"I've seen people silent, when you'd expect hysteria, I've seen people laugh when you'd expect crying, I've seen people disassociate when you'd expect euphoria.
"Humans are complex and if we all aim to be accepting and allow people to feel their feelings without judgement, we are doing important work towards modelling emotional intelligence for our little ones.
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"Gender disappointment is real, it can affect partners and kids, it's ok and it will pass."
Jake Massey