Baby Gender: To know or not to know

wowimpregnant · June 26

Hi! My husband and I have been discussing whether we want to find out the baby sex or not. It’s the first thing EVERYONE asks when we tell them we’re pregnant, but we’d like to avoid as much as possible the whole pink is for girls blue is for boys. I want my child to be free to be who they are and like planets or flowers or dinosaurs…
The thing is, the more you wait the more people get anxious about the reveal. Also nowadays imaging is so good you have to actually avoid knowing. We just didn’t want it to be a big deal.

Any thoughts comments suggestions?

Also books that might help navigate this

caffeinatedandtired · June 26

Not sure if this is helpful, I'm a FTM and we found out the gender pretty early. I opted to not do a "big" reveal with family and friends, have just been telling people the gender when we see them in person in a very casual way. I also had a lot of friends that waited to find out until baby was born and a lot of people are open to that idea now.

We are planning on painting the nursery a light green color and a similar vibe is reflected in our registry selections, which should hopefully help a little with the girly versus boy norms. I registered for space-themed bibs because my husband really likes outer space and who cares if a baby girl has flowers or planets on the bib?

thatbaintforbetty · June 26

We found out with all 3, but I’ve always wanted to wait, it’s DH who’s impatient. lol. We’ve never done a big revel. I don’t like being the center of attention and would have opted out of a shower if I could have.

We did tell everyone with our first that regardless of the sex we didn’t want pink or blue, mostly because we planned to have more than 1 kid and wanted to be able use stuff for multiple children regardless of the sex. Totally logical.

No one cares. Not even a little bit.

They will buy pink or blue despite what you say. Despite threatening to literally burn it if you get one more pink freaking thing. < I did this, I hate pink but also had a valid point. No one listened.

If you truly want to receive minimal stuff that is gender specific, then do not find out or do not tell anyone. They will do it to some extent afterwards but by then you really can say “thank you but we don’t need anymore of whatever item, how about diapers instead?”

I will say that I ended up with a super girly girl whose favorite color is pink so the universe absolutely laughs at your desires/feelings/planning anyways. 🤷‍♀️

ETA-
ooohh!! Also I got annoyed with people when they asked what it is and started answering with “it’s a baby, we really wanted a velociraptor what can you do?” Most people have no response. It was the best. Apparently pregnancy makes me snarky.

bridgiebee82 · July 1

My husband and I have decided to tell certain people we are having a girl. I have one acquaintance who asks me every day what I'm having, and we haven't told her. She stresses me out when she talks about the baby. "Oh you're 17 weeks now. You're safe. You won't lose this baby too." She has special needs so I know she doesn't have the most sensitive way to say things in her repertoire, but she stresses me out. So we haven't told her yet because I don't want to be bombarded with questions about names for the next 23 weeks.

knottie6f55c2cdcd00affa · July 2

We found out but didn’t share the sex until birth, and it took some pressure off. People will be curious either way, but it’s your baby and your choice.

rebecksah · July 6

I'm having my 3rd and haven't found out for a single pregnancy. I've always had c-sections and the everyone in the room is so excited to find out along with us. I always let my husband reveal the gender to me by telling me the baby's name.

bridgiebee82 · July 8

@rebecksah I love that! I didn't want to find out with this baby, but it was just in my NIPT results.

dogmom5 · July 10

I never found out for my 5 kids and don’t plan to for this one. We bought a lot of our big stuff being gender neutral and you honestly could get away with buying a few things like clothes in gender neutral before and after having the baby getting more gender specific clothes. If you have a shower, ask for gift cards

I usually update the nursery a little once the baby is here with something more gender specific and then just get the tote of boy or girl clothes out but the more kids I have had,
the more I have realized you don’t need so much stuff. I also told no one about my pregnancy the last baby and made an announcement after I had the baby last time.i have yet to tell anyone about this baby. It has been so peaceful. Haha. This isn’t my first though so I understand the excitement of telling people but remember it’s your baby so do what you think is best and right for you and it will all work out.

knottie6f55c2cdcd00affa · July 22

It’s your baby, your call. People will have opinions no matter what, but I love that you’re thinking about this with intention.

rebecksah · July 24

@bridgiebee82 oops I didn't see your response til now! But here we can opt out of having the gender included in NIPT results! I do it every time.

iwantcookies · July 25

This is our first and we had no qualms about having a boy or girl. We aren’t into massive parties and we most likely won’t even have a baby shower (this is mainly due to everyone being spread out across the country) We told people very casually once we found out (although we kept it quiet for a week or so before telling folks) where are a very stem oriented/nerdy couple so a lot of things on our registry when it comes to clothing and stuff are things we find cute and or that are within our interest

knottie6f55c2cdcd00affa · July 28

That’s such a valid way to feel. A lot of people default to gender norms without meaning to, so wanting to keep it neutral makes sense. Your baby will have plenty of time to figure out who they are.

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