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On Friday we posted our latest ultrasound video. Being 15 weeks, we thought we could possibly find out the sex, since with the right shot, you can take a really good guess at it. But as you saw in the video, our nurse went back and forth, initially thinking girl, then suspecting girl, and ending the appointment with her best guess, "boy...but we'll have to wait and see." Our IVF clinic is still giving us ultrasounds (just being nice) so we're going to sneak in one last one on Thursday before the baby doesn't fit on the screen, with the hope of finding out the sex.We got a lot of comments on the video saying that being surprised was the way to go. And I felt the same way most of my life. I always thought I wanted to be surprised. In fact, when I played out my baby's birth I envisioned hearing "It's a ____" out of the doctor's mouth and being so shocked. However, since getting pregnant, my perspective as changed. I figured I'd put together my top 10 reasons for wanting to find out the sex. So here is goes:
1. I hate calling the baby "it". We call our baby Peanut as much as possible, but sometimes there are contexts where he, she, or it is necessary. And something about calling my sweet, precious, totally-loved baby "it" feels cold.
2. I constantly am running my own movies of the future, and having a gender would help my movies along. I want to know if I'm picturing a little boy playing with trucks and begging his daddy to play catch in the yard, or a little girl feeding a bottle to her baby and wearing around mommy's high heels (How's that for fitting your child into gender-specific roles? I just realized as I was typing that that I don't quite have to force my children into stereotypical roles. And I will say, a little girl of ours will be a complete tom boy...but these are my made up movies - so that's what I envision).
3. I don't want a gender-neutral nursery. The nursery is one of the best parts of pregnancy. You get to put together your child's space and make it a place that suits the baby, while still being a room that you'll enjoy in the wee hours of the night. I want a nursery that is perfectly-suited to a little boy or that is girly for a girl. Plus, I'm not that into yellow or green - two of the go-tos for gender-neutral nurseries.
4. Gender-neutral clothes are hard to come by. My friend recently had a baby and in shopping for her little bundle, I found that the girls' sections and boys' sections are huge, but you have to search high and low for cute gender neutral clothes. And being the advanced planner that I am, I know I will want quite a few outfits on hand before baby comes home.
5. Narrowing down the name game. We've started playing the name game since finding out we were pregnant. But we have a tough time narrowing it down to less then 5-10 names. Once we know the sex, we can really start to focus on just the boy names or just the girl names, and finally reach a conclusion. Otherwise, we're constantly churning names for both and I have a feeling we'll never get there by D-day.
6. Bonding. This one sounds a little silly, but I will say it anyways. Something about knowing the sex of the baby seems like it will help me bond while the baby is still in my tummy. When I feel Peanut kick, I want to be able to picture who it's coming from. It kills me that I have to wait another 6 months before actually seeing this little nugget's face, but being able to at least picture a little boy or girl helps - who knows why.
7. Hand-me-downs. We have cousins and friends who have kids of both sexes. And they are generous enough to pass down some things they're no longer using. However, it seems like our house could become a giant store unit pretty quickly if we're collecting both boy stuff AND girl stuff. And then, what do you do with all the stuff of the wrong sex? So knowing the sex will keep our selection limited at least by 50%.
8. Ronnie needs at least 6 months to prepare if it's a girl. Ronnie has ben very honest since the beginning that he wants a boy. "Why?" you ask. Because he knows that a little girl will have him wrapped around her little finger. So he needs some time to strategize how he will remain THE boss-man, while he would be melting inside when she simply looked at him. The joke is on him though, I think a little boy may have the same effect on him :)
9. I'm impatient. I LOVE surprises, but I have always had a tough time not peeking at Christmas gifts before their wrapped and under the tree. It's the same way with the baby. I want to be surprised, but I just can't keep myself from peeking!
10. Ronnie needs to plan exactly what the tattoo will look like on his bum...
KIDDING! There will be no tattoos in this household.
So let's hear it! Did I forget any reasons? Do you TOTALLY disagree? There's still time to change our minds...so let's hear what you've got!
