It's A.... Baby!

Peggy at Perfectly Happy Mum has asked for posts for the next chapter of her parenting blog, A Mother’s Secrets. This time she wants to know if, when you were pregnant, you wanted a boy or a girl and if you found out what you were having before he or she was born.

I’m going to be controversial here, or certainly in the minority. I didn’t want to find out the sex of my babies before they were born. This is my personal opinion. I don’t want to offend anyone who wants to know what they’re having, it’s your choice. This post is about how I feel and about my choices.

So why didn’t I want to know what flavour my babies were before they were born?

You don’t get many surprises in life, why can’t you wait for him or her to make an appearance to find out if you have a son or a daughter? How much nicer for the birth announcement to start with ‘It’s a Boy!’ or ‘It’s a Girl!’, rather than ‘He/She’s here’.

I loved choosing a boy’s name and a girl’s name. We kept both names a secret, even from our parents. I loved buying vests and babygros in neutral colours; creams, whites and lemons.

Your birth partner doesn’t really have much to do on the day, so before they cut the cord, they can identify the sex of the baby. Then they can sit down again.

The scan at around twenty weeks is called an anomaly scan for a reason. Most people say ‘we’re going to find out if it’s a boy or a girl today’. They’re actually going to find out if the baby is developing as expected. When I had my twenty week scans my first question was ‘is it okay?’, and certainly not ‘what is it?’. The sonographer commented that I was a rarity. She said that normally couples ask ‘what is it?’ way before she has finished checking that the baby is okay.

I understand it is exciting to find out what you’re having, but I promise you it’s just as exciting – if not more so – to find out on the day of the birth. I’ll never forget Andy looking at the brand new Presley and saying, his voice choked with tears, ‘we’ve got a boy’.

I had loads of scans with Cash. He was a small baby and the hospital were concerned about his development. I had at least one scan a week from twenty eight weeks. I saw a few disappointed faces leaving the sonography rooms. One man stormed out shouting ‘ it’s a bloody girl’. Charming.

I thought Presley was going to be a girl all throughout my pregnancy, until the last two weeks when I changed my bet. If I’m being honest, I think I secretly wanted a son. Gosh, that sounds terrible now I’ve typed it. It wasn’t a desperate yearning, I just liked the idea of having a son. If he had been a girl I wouldn’t have been disappointed. I believe I wouldn’t have given it a second thought.

When I was expecting Cash I thought he was another boy as the pregnancy was so similar. Again I thought another boy would be lovely as they are only a year apart in age, they will play together. If he had been a girl, I know they would have still played together. Again, I wouldn’t have given it a second thought.

If we try for baby number three, and that’s a big if, I still wouldn’t mind what sex the baby was so long as it was healthy. A lot of people have said to us, ‘oh, you must want a daughter next’. Of course, that would be lovely, but so would another son.

All children are lovely. If you get pregnant in order to have a boy, or a girl, you may end up extremely disappointed. If you find out at twenty weeks that the baby is the wrong flavour you will be disappointed for a lot longer. Once the baby arrives, it really doesn’t matter what it is so long as it’s well, so why put yourself through it. Also, these scans aren’t always accurate.

A new baby is perfect whatever the colour babygro.

Photo credit: www.ecotopia.co.uk