Gender Pressure-- agh!!

chalima · January 2013

Hi,

I'm a bit of a lurker on this board. As I've been getting further along in my pregnancy, I've been getting more and more questions about the sex of the baby.

Q: What is it? A: A baby. (Usually followed by blank stare or follow up question.)

Q: You haven't had an ultrasound yet? (I don't even know how to respond to this. Having an ultrasound obligates me to find out the sex??)

Q: You're not gonna find out the sex? How will you buy clothes? (Seriously?)

I'm already having enough trouble with the idea that when the baby is born, I have to give them a name that gender codes them. Why does everyone need me to color code the baby too? Why do people have to be so uncomfortable not knowing? I just want Baby to be a baby for a while, with the ability to wear any clothes, any colors, play with any toys.

Does anyone have experience or ideas about how to navigate this?

Manada · January 2013

I have spent a lot of time thinking about this one because I both work with kids who are "gender creative", or nonconforming, and have a couple people in our circle who are trying to allow their kids more genderfreedom....

I think we, as a couple, will definitely avoid revealing the sex of our baby before birth, mostly because a lot of the really gendered baby clothing kind of makes me feel a bit pukey inside, just not my style.... And I think gendering toys seems just silly. Not knowing or telling people the anticipated sex is my not.so.secret way of trying to prevent super gendered baby gifts.

That said, having witnessed, first hand, some of the comments and the social struggle thrown at families who make a really big deal out of keeping their baby's sex a secret after birth I also don't feel like that's a battle I care to take on either, and have no problems letting people know our baby's sex assigned at birth. That said, I hope not to let that be the BIGGEST piece of information and know that my partner and I will both try to downplay that upon our baby's birth.

Otherwise, I think we will just try to make space for our kids in our home to explore gender in their own ways, advocate to our families and care providers that it is part of our parenting philosophy both before and after birth, and then just see what happens. Both my partner and I come from critical academic backgrounds with queer feminist politics though, so I guess our people will anticipate those discussions from us! :

Manada · January 2013

PS. I also have been engaging with a group of awesome people trying to explore democratic parenting and their philosophy is "democracy isn't real unless you know ALL the choices and can choose freely" so for them, with their kids, it's about makig all sorts of clothing choices available. They have boxes in their house that just say "shirts for xxxxx" on them with all sorts of colours in them, and the kids just chooses whatever colour they want, whether it be pink, blue, orange, femmey or boyish or whatever... I thought that was a pretty awesome idea for older kids.

healz413 · January 2013

As Manada mentioned we aren't pregnant yet next IUI will be in about 10 days but I anticipate we will get many of the same reactions you do, if not from our immediate social circles, then from family and strangers.
I like your response to "what is it?" or "what are you having?" A baby, duh.

What I have said to people when they have asked if we will find out the likely sextobeassignedatbirth of our future baby is something along the lines of, "No, we really want to meet our baby and let them have every opportunity to figure out who they are and tell the world that and we believe that the earlier people focus on the sex the midwife or doctor is going to decide at their birth, the earlier the world is going to start suggesting limits for who they can be." Most people without a queer/feminist background won't really get it because they can't get past the idea that sex or sex assigned at birth is the primary thing that divides our world into two "opposite" groups of people. It is something that is considered to them to be apolitical and biological rather than constructed and social. So I know I won't convince many people to see things my way. But at least it gives me something to say at the beginning of those discussions and something that allows me to put the focus on my future baby instead of my politics or my decisions.

As for having to gender the child with a name, you could choose to go with a gender neutral or unisex name. There are a number of online lists of such names. Manada and I have figured out two unisex names for future children. One is a name we made up from a family name and the other is an old name that is very rare but sounds like it could be a current name and while it was somewhat gendered long ago, no one knows it now and it sounds to us like it could fit anyone.

2MamazInSeattle · January 2013

Yesterday, I had a great conversation with the 3-time mom owner of my yoga studio. She is straight, but she said something really beautiful on this topic. She said "I didn't want to know because I wanted to connect with my baby simply as a little 'being' - and to focus on the being and not start assigning my own gender prejudices and expectations on it, and on myself." I just thought this was a really lovely stance that no one can 'argue' with. I agree though, people are very pained when you don't want to know for whatever the reason...

A lot of our genderqueer friends too have had grave concerns that our names are actually gender specific, especially the friends who have changed their names as adults to be gender-neutral. We just like these names and figure our kid can change it if they want. It was a little troubling for us to be getting so much pressure that we were being bad lesbians/queers but not giving our child a gender-free name! But we stood our ground.

My partner is hardcore that she wants to know, and know as soon as possible. I told her the above story and she said in a wry tone "that's nice honey, but we're not doing that." Well, then - I am ok knowing or not. But it looks like we're going to know, and we'll tell people too. For her, it's that she feels she will be able to connect to the baby more, and since it's in my belly, I'm feeling pretty dang connected - and so anything that helps her feel closer is ok with me. So that is my reason as to why we are finding out. People seem to nod and smile when I say that anyhow, fwiw.

In any case, just some perspective. I think - like sooooo much around parenting - it's a really personal decision that can be rooted in many different causes/reasons. It's can be so hard not to judge when you're passionate about your own stance on something, and I think when I feel that kind of energy coming at me, I just try to be as kind and honest in my response as possible. While you don't owe anyone an explanation per se, giving one does tend to quiet people down.

p.s. Our nursery is blue. Already painted. Boy or girl. Let the record show...

Two*True · January 2013

We didn't find out the sex of our first child for several reasons, one being I didn't want a bunch of pink sparkly stuff if the child was a girl (which she is). We also shared some of the similar reasons/opinions here but I think for the majority of the world the easiest answer is just "We want to be surprised at the time of delivery." For most people that shuts them up. And if they mention buying clothes, I just said something like "there are plenty of colors that boys and girls can wear and if we need to buy more, we will."

2moms2twins · January 2013

You do not have to name your child that gender codes them ... no matter what its your child name them what you want ...

who cares what other think and if you do WHY ?????

we were pregnant with twins and choose not to find out what we were having and when asked or prodded our answers were as follows.

Q: Do you know what your having -

Answer; OH I HOPE HUMANS, or I hope babies, or yes I think at 5 I'll have dinner with a skinny vergin pena colada ( typically people just walk away with this response)

How will you prepare and buy clothes:

Answer: I will buy with my visa unless you want me to use yours... or you can just send us a check - we really would appreciate that ...seriously

Manada · January 2013

2moms2twins:
nbsp;nbsp;Q: Do you know what your having nbsp; nbsp;Answer; OH I HOPE HUMANS, ornbsp; I hope babies, or yes I think at 5 I'll have dinnernbsp; with anbsp; skinny vergin pena colada typically people just walk away with this response nbsp;nbsp;How will you prepare and buy clothes: Answer: I will buy with my visa unless you want me to use yours... or you can just send us a check we really would appreciate that ...seriously nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;

2moms2twins:
I love your answers! They made me laugh.

chalima · January 2013

2moms2twins:
You do not have to name your child that gender codes them ... no matter what its your child name them what you want ...
who cares what other think and if you do WHY ?????
we were pregnant with twins and choose not to find out what we were having and when asked or prodded our answers were as follows.

Q: Do you know what your having -
Answer; OH I HOPE HUMANS, or I hope babies, or yes I think at 5 I'll have dinner with a skinny vergin pena colada ( typically people just walk away with this response)

How will you prepare and buy clothes:
Answer: I will buy with my visa unless you want me to use yours... or you can just send us a check - we really would appreciate that ...seriously

LOL. I love these responses. I usually don't give a crap what other people think. Maybe it's just the hormones. I used to have a really great, supportive feminist/queer community. I guess I still do, they're just really far away. Where I live now is oppressively heteronormative. I'm more closeted than I've ever been in my life. I worry that I would lose my job if I came out at work. There are no legal protections here to speak of. I think it's just made all of the pressure that much more intense.

I know that people are well intentioned. I'm sure that a lot of my parenting choices will seem like poor decisions if not outright dangerous/harmful from their perspective. It's just so frustrating because they don't realize how harmful their attitudes are to the invisible queer people in their lives. At least I won't be living here for that much longer. Another year at most. The micro agressions are too much.

The names we've picked out are fairly gendered, but could be adapted to be a different gender name pretty easily. If I had my way, I would let the baby pick when they're older.

2moms2twins · January 2013

chalima:
2moms2twins:
You do not have to name your child that gender codes them ... no matter what its your child name them what you want ...
who cares what other think and if you do WHY ?????
we were pregnant with twins and choose not to find out what we were having and when asked or prodded our answers were as follows.

Q: Do you know what your having -
Answer; OH I HOPE HUMANS, or I hope babies, or yes I think at 5 I'll have dinner with a skinny vergin pena colada ( typically people just walk away with this response)

How will you prepare and buy clothes:
Answer: I will buy with my visa unless you want me to use yours... or you can just send us a check - we really would appreciate that ...seriously

LOL. I love these responses. I usually don't give a crap what other people think. Maybe it's just the hormones. I used to have a really great, supportive feminist/queer community. I guess I still do, they're just really far away. Where I live now is oppressively heteronormative. I'm more closeted than I've ever been in my life. I worry that I would lose my job if I came out at work. There are no legal protections here to speak of. I think it's just made all of the pressure that much more intense.
I know that people are well intentioned. I'm sure that a lot of my parenting choices will seem like poor decisions if not outright dangerous/harmful from their perspective. It's just so frustrating because they don't realize how harmful their attitudes are to the invisible queer people in their lives. At least I won't be living here for that much longer. Another year at most. The micro agressions are too much.
The names we've picked out are fairly gendered, but could be adapted to be a different gender name pretty easily. If I had my way, I would let the baby pick when they're older.

I am very off the cuff some think brash or crass... but we have twins and you would not believe what people try to get out of us or imply or propagate... so my DW sits back and I just barf up all kinds of stuff ... some i wish I could remember. I have been this way since i was a kid...tho...

I am an open book and willing to shar our story and journey with most but i have a limited attention span for DUMB, IGNORANT folks.

But most my answers are pretty tame i think it actually makes the questioner think to themselves... so i feel better - I have had 2 people apologize after my answer and they said they were wrong for assuming or implying blah blah blah..

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