This may not come as a surprise to most boy moms but having a son will age your brain quicker, according to a new study.
And the researchers found that the effect also increases the more sons you have.
An international study of thousands of people over 50 found that parents with at least one son experienced faster cognitive decline, compared to those without one.
Sons vs daughters
Their analysis also revealed that the downturn in parents' mental abilities was faster if they had multiple sons, compared to parents who only had daughters.
Parents with sons experienced a more rapid cognitive decline than parents with daughters.
And although the effect was clear, the researchers did not investigate the exact reason for the increased mental decline in parents of boys.
The reasons
But they did speculate a few theories.
For instance, they suggested that the effect may be down to daughters being more likely to look after their parents in their elderly years and offer more social and emotional support.
Another theory is that parents of girls tend to have healthier lifestyles, and are less likely to smoke, take drugs and drink alcohol.
Cognitive tests
The team of researchers from Charles University in Prague and Columbia University in New York gathered data from an ongoing study, and over 13,000 parents were then followed for 14 years.
The parents were questioned about how many children they had, and the gender of the children.
Parents also completed regular cognitive tests which assessed their mental skills, such as memory, concentration, thinking and understanding.
