Alamy
I am so sick of stupid women longing for baby girls. From writer Esther Walker whining about her disappointment that her new baby is a son to the tragic case of the Irish mother of two sons who killed herself when she discovered she was expecting twin boys.
But sadly this is a sentiment with which I am all too familiar. I have four sons and invariably when I reveal this to strangers I am met with the response 'Oh poor you, are you going to try for a girl now?'
'No I am not!' I long to rudely shout in reply. I am eternally grateful that I don't have any daughters. I come from a family of girls, growing up with one sister, a mother and a father who spend most of his time steering clear to avoid the clouds of hormones rampaging around the house. When I discovered that my last two children were male twins I whooped a loud hurrah.
Of course I was curious about the idea of having a daughter, but I never longed for one as so many women appear to. I didn't mourn for the opportunity to buy little pink babygrows or to unearth my vintage Barbies for my daughter. I don't care if my wedding dress ends up in the charity shop rather than on my little girl on her special day. In fact I think that by escaping having daughters I have had a lucky escape.
I will never have to go through the agonising trials of buying a training bra for a painfully self conscious pre-teen, I won't have to explain periods in anything but the vaguest of detail and I will never have to mop up oceans of tears shed over caddish boyfriends.
On a recent night out with friends who have girls I was quick to excuse myself from the conversation about when was the most suitable time to introduce tampons and what brand of sanitary towel would work best for a first period. Dealing with my own periods is enough of a pain, without having to cope with my daughters'.
It's not just the physical side of femininity that I am glad to have dodged. When my boys get dressed in the morning, it is in whatever I put out for them. If I didn't put anything out then I suspect it would simply be the clothes they left lying on the floor the night before. Boys are not neat and tidy, but they are so blissfully straightforward.
My twins started nursery recently and they are content to wear the standard issue tracksuit uniform every day. But the three-year-old girls soon cast this off as sartorially inferior and now insist on wearing their own entirely unsuitable sparkling pink outfits for days spent finger painting and digging in the sandpit.
I am particularly happy that I will never have to deal with that special brand of scorn reserved by teenage girls for their mothers. I am sure I will embarrass my sons, after all that is a mother's job, but I doubt that they will ever look me up and down, their lips curling and declare that I can't possibly be considering going out looking like that.
A friend with an eight-year-old girl whispered to me at a school concert that she's had to change three times before her daughter deemed her suitably dressed to be seen by her friends. All my son had said to me before we left was did he really have to wear a coat?
Boys are so gorgeously simple; I can't understand why women are so thick that they long to endlessly deal with a mirror image of their own contrary complexity. I know how horribly difficult and unreasonable girls can be as I am one.
Judging my mood in the morning is like sticking a finger into the wind to see which way it blows. On the other hand my husband is generally pretty even tempered, unless my moodiness winds him up too much.
The boys are the same. Of course they have tantrums and arguments with us, but they are instantly forgotten and I don't think they could hold a grudge if their lives depended on it. Not so those 'lucky' houses packed with the coveted pink princesses. These girls could sulk for their country, as their mums constantly bemoan.
Girls can be petty, spiteful, cruel and unpredictable in ways boys simply can't be bothered with. So for all those women who so long for girls, I pity them, in fact I vow to stop the next woman I see pushing a sugar pink pram, tap her on the shoulder and ask if next time she might try for a boy?
More on Parentdish: The joy of boys
And a retort: Stop stereotyping boys and girls!