Should you find out your baby’s sex or not? It can be so hard to decide!
As soon as you announce your pregnancy, people will be asking whether you are going to find out the sex of your baby. As the 20 week scan approaches, you might find yourself in two minds as to whether to find out or not. There are plenty of arguments made for finding out the sex, but here are a few reasons why you may want to leave it as a surprise:
Reasons Not To Find Out The Sex Of Your Baby #1: Surprise
In this day and age, with text messaging, smart phones, online chat, the internet, and 24 hour news, surprises are pretty rare. Everything is competing for our attention and it constantly feels like information overload! Most of the time, we either know about something before it happens, or find out straight after. Your baby’s sex is one of the rare surprises left in life, so why not treasure it and let the anticipation build before finding out at the birth?
Reasons Not To Find Out The Sex Of Your Baby #2: Expectation helps
Childbirth is a pretty tiring experience, and anything that might help you scrape together that last ounce of energy for that final push will be much appreciated. Some women claim that not knowing the sex of their baby encouraged them to push harder, because they were excited to finally find out the sex of their baby.
Reasons Not To Find Out The Sex Of Your Baby #3: “It’s A Girl!!!”
If you wait until the birth to discover the sex of your baby, you will get to live that Hollywood “It’s a girl!” moment when your new baby is placed into your arms. Finding out at a scan is exciting, but finding out at the birth is something else entirely.
Reasons Not To Find Out The Sex Of Your Baby #4: Reduces Gender Disappointment
If you feel very strongly that you would prefer to have a child of a certain gender, finding out your baby’s sex in advance may increase your risk of suffering from gender disappointment. With a lovely little baby in your arms, it’s much harder to feel disappointed about anything.
Reasons Not To Find Out The Sex Of Your Baby #5: You Can Avoid Gender Stereotyping
No-one could possibly know the gender of your baby during pregnancy – all you can find out is the sex. Once you announce the sex of your unborn baby, you will be inundated with gender-specific parties. You will have a wardrobe filled with a year’s worth of pink or blue outfits before you’ve even stepped foot in the birth room. You have the rest of her life to avoid gender stereotyping, why force yourself to start earlier than you have to?
Reasons Not To Find Out The Sex Of Your Baby #6: They Can Get It Wrong
Ultrasound scans are not a 100% accurate way to determine the sex of a baby. During the ultrasound scan, the technician will warn you that they can not say with 100% certainty either way. There are plenty of stories of surprised parents in the birth room, who have gone crazy buying lots of frilly dresses, painted a pink nursery, and picked out a name for a baby who turns out to be a boy. Avoid this risk by waiting until birth to find out the sex of your baby.
Reasons Not To Find Out The Sex Of Your Baby #7: You Don’t Have To Put Up With Insensitive Gender Comments During Pregnancy
If you don’t know what the sex of your baby is, you get to skip 20 odd weeks of random, insensitive comments from strangers and others, relating to your baby’s sex. For example:
“Wow, you’re having another boy! I bet you really wanted a girl!”
“So, are you going to try for a boy after this one then?”
While it likely won't prevent all of them, it will reduce the amount of annoying comments a great deal from people who don’t matter, especially when your hormones are raging and you’re biting your tongue from telling them where to go.