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Whether y'all're ready to know your unborn baby's sex (now!) or are waiting to find out in the delivery room, chances are you lot have your suspicions—hunches fueled, perhaps, past well-pregnant friends and family. Have, for example, first-time mom Arlene Bordinhao of Las Vegas, who was convinced she was having a girl. Folks informed her that because she was carrying high and her abdomen resembled a watermelon, not a basketball, it had to exist a daughter. The Chinese lunar calendar also predicted a girl.

• RELATED: How Soon Can You Find Out the Sex of Your Baby?

Plus, Bordinhao'south female parent didn't see any dark circles on her neck. "In the Philippines, where I was born, no rings ways a girl," she explains. Although her hubby wanted to await to find out the baby's sex, Bordinhao had to know for certain.

"Not being able to set for the biggest issue of my life fabricated me crazy," she admits, then she found out at 16 weeks during a routine sonogram. Surprise! "There was our little man, in all his celebrity," Bordinhao recalls. "We were in shock for 24 hours, simply now we're thrilled. Finding out helped the states ready mentally and stock the plant nursery. I can't look to meet him!"

"What Are You lot Having?"

That's ordinarily the beginning question expectant mothers and fathers are asked. Parents-to-be can—and well-nigh ever do!—reply information technology earlier than ever before, thanks to the latest imaging engineering. In fact, 9 out of 10 new moms polled in our MomTrak survey knew the sex of their baby prior to labor day.

"Past your 5th calendar month, around week 18 or 19 of your pregnancy, a sonogram tin prove you the sex of your unborn kid with most 95 percent accurateness," explains Daniel A. Potter, One thousand.D., a reproductive endocrinologist at the Huntington Reproductive Eye Medical Group in California. "From a medical standpoint, we do an ultrasound to check the historic period, position, and wellness of the fetus, just most parents want to know the sex activity also. That's truthful if it'south the first infant or the fourth."

Expectant parents are especially nosy creatures: If y'all Google "predict baby's sex," yous'll notice more than 1 1000000 results, including gender predictor kits you tin purchase at your local Target. Nonetheless, if we all agree that having a healthy, happy baby is paramount, why do we care and then much whether that infant is a male child or a girl?

"Information technology's homo nature," Dr. Potter says. It started in the Rock Age, he continues: "A family without sons, whose job was to chase and keep anybody fed, might not take survived. Then offerings were fabricated to the gods, and soothsayers were consulted. People passed on to the adjacent generation the methods they considered about effective for guaranteeing a male child, and this inspired former wives' tales."

Throughout history, gender has remained a priority. "For hundreds of years, sex determined non only your life's options merely your parents' options too," says social historian Stephanie Coontz, Ph.D., author of A Foreign Stirring, which tells of the struggle for gender equality in the 1960s. "Information technology influenced how your parents treated yous, what they expected of yous, fifty-fifty if they welcomed you at all."

In many societies, not having a son was a tragedy; for the ruling elite, it was a threat to their power: "Women were killed or killed themselves if they didn't deliver a boy," she says.

Polls today reveal that Americans notwithstanding accept a slight preference for boys. Only in this country, a baby'southward gender is no longer a matter of life-and-death importance. "We increasingly want the aforementioned things for our children, boys or girls," Dr. Coontz says. Notwithstanding, many tin't resist the siren telephone call of knowing Infant's sex.

blue and pink bottles

Credit: Alexandra Grablewski

Finding Out

These days, curiosity, practicality, and peace of mind often outweigh surprise. "We felt that learning the baby's gender was a delicious moment, no thing when we found out," says Robin Rosen of Atlanta, a mom of a girl and a boy.

Some offset-time parents choose to know the sex of their baby but prolong the suspense the second time around. "As a new mom, and then much is completely unknown," says San Francisco mom of two Kat Eden. Finding out the baby'south sex and focusing on picking a name, clothes, and decor helped Eden experience grounded during her starting time pregnancy. "With my second, I knew what to expect," she says. "It was heady to wonder about the little person growing in my tummy."

Sometimes siblings factor into the decision. "My older son is a demand-to-know kind of kid," says Caren Rodriguez of Greensboro, Northward Carolina, a mom of 2 boys. "Beingness able to tell his class about the baby was a source of pride for him."

Those who exercise choose to expect savor the anticipation. As Rachel Levin of New York Urban center says, "Having the surprise to await forward to helped me become through those terminal, long weeks of my pregnancy."

What if you desire to detect out and your guy doesn't? Some parents adopt a "Don't ask, don't tell" policy. One scenario: The doctor writes the sex on an index card and seals information technology in an envelope. The couple agrees that if either of them is bursting to know, he or she can peek.

You could besides wait and see where things become. "We'd been trying to take a baby for a long time," says Sophie Beauvais of Cambridge, Massachusetts. "We were and so stressed out that we stopped trying and took a holiday. Soon after we got dorsum, I found out I was pregnant." They remained undecided about finding out until the day of the baby'south 18-week ultrasound: "By then, we were so thrilled our dream was coming truthful that when the nurse asked if we wanted to know, nosotros both blurted, 'Yes!' Information technology but felt correct."

Dealing with Disappointment

What if you've been envisioning tutus and tea parties, only to discover out yous're having a boy? Or your hubby has a deep desire for a boy, but you're getting a girl? You may be bummed out, and that's okay.

"It's normal to feel let downwardly," says Sara Rosenquist, Ph.D., author of Afterwards the Stork. Feeling guilty about your negative emotions tin can add to the anxiety stew. Talk with your partner, a close family member, or friend. "Pretending you're not upset keeps negative feelings simmering and can intensify the sadness," Dr. Rosenquist adds. Information technology's all-time to work through whatsoever regrets now, before sleep impecuniousness and other realities of having a newborn compound your sadness.

Kerstin Armstrong of Atlanta, a mom of three girls, always pictured herself with boys and needed time to accept that she'd never have a son. "But wishing for a boy doesn't mean I love my girls any less!" she says.

Armstrong'southward husband, Scott, feels similarly. "I was hoping for a boy with each pregnancy, and a part of me will always long for a son," he admits. "Merely Kerstin in one case told me something that even so resonates: 'Everything our daughters know well-nigh boys will come from you.' I consider it a privilege to be their vision of what a human should be."

infant's gender

Boy vs. Girl

Behavior

• Babe girls feel discomfort more acutely than boys do, so they're more likely to fuss when they get cold or have a wet diaper. But don't be too quick to characterization your lilliputian princess high-maintenance; her keener sense of bear upon also makes her more responsive to cuddling and easier to soothe.
• Girls tend to produce more oxytocin, the human-bonding hormone, and serotonin, a "feel-good" hormone. This helps explicate why they're more apt to be caregivers to dolls and younger siblings. Little boys really are more than interested in toy cars, trucks, and other things that move.
• "Boys tend to explore their world more than physically than girls practise, such as by banging their toys, jumping, and playing rough. "They have an unrestrained way of expressing energy," says Adie Goldberg, co-author of It's a Baby Boy! and It's a Baby Girl! Play is calmer amid girls, who tend to stay closer to adults, engage in fantasy, and hang out in pocket-sized groups, whereas boys gravitate toward packs of playmates and intense, active games.

Wellness

• Infant girls are v times more likely than boys are to get hemangiomas, raised red birthmarks caused past a buildup of blood vessels. They usually disappear past age 9 but can be treated with steroids or removed by lasers.
• Baby boys are at college risk for hernias. That's because when they're in utero, their testicles descend from the belly, which can get out a cavity in the groin that requires surgery to repair.
• Baby girls are 4 times more susceptible to hip dysplasia, a dislocation of the thighbone from the hip socket. Braces tin unremarkably remedy the condition.
• Boys more than often accept asthma, yet they're more likely than girls to outgrow it past adolescence. I possible explanation: Higher testosterone levels might relax airway muscles.
• Girls are more decumbent to UTIs. Their urinary tract is shorter, and then it's easier for bacteria to attain their bladder and cause an infection

Motor Skills

• Boys often have stronger motor skills—think jumping and climbing. They might also master tasks like aiming a throw and building block towers at a younger historic period than their daughter peers do, probably considering the surface area of a boy'southward encephalon that's devoted to visual-spatial relation is larger. But...
• ...Girls can boot serious barrel when it comes to fine motor skills: They pick up finger foods earlier on and, when they're older, acquire to write and tie shoes sooner.
• Girls generally are toilet-trained earlier than boys are. They typically chief the potty at nigh 35 months, whereas boys tend to start using the potty at effectually 39 months. There are loads of theories every bit to why girls get a head start. 1 popular caption: Mommy's "plumbing" is the same as her daughter's, and she often does most of the teaching.

Milestones

• Boys are late growers: They usually don't reach 50 percent of their adult superlative until virtually 24 months; girls can reach that mark at simply 20 months. Boys also enter puberty roughly two years afterwards than girls do and tend to continue shooting upwardly for three more years.
• Girls talk information technology up earlier than boys practice, cheers to their more than efficient utilise of the language centers in both hemispheres of the brain. At 18 months or and then, a daughter's vocabulary consists of virtually 90 words, compared with twoscore words for nearly toddler boys. But by historic period 3, boys are usually but as skilled in the gift of gab.

What It's Like to Have All of Ane Kind

"After we found out we were having our quaternary boy, I burst into tears. My married man patted my arm and said, 'It's okay, honey. It's not your fault.' We both had wanted a girl very much, simply we speedily got used to the idea of raising little boys who operate on only two speeds—running and sleeping—and who have a pack mentality. One nighttime they got together and rigged up a rocket launcher. The rockets? My tampons. Try explaining to your neighbour why her Lexus is covered in feminine-hygiene products! It'south been wild, crazy, and loud, only we wouldn't have it whatever other way." — Ariel Lawhon; Wichita Falls, Texas

"We have two girls, ages v and 3, and I love sharing the things that were important to me as a child, like Little House on the Prairie and the Ramona books. Only know this: At that place will always be glitter all over everything in your firm. Resistance to princesses is futile." — Kristin Mahoney; Southward Orange, New Jersey

"Having iv boys keeps it uncomplicated—with each infant nosotros already had the clothes, toys, and how-to-raise boys books. I've researched soccer teams and baseball leagues and accept a stable of other boy moms to call on. What'south truly wonderful is that if I didn't have so many boys, I wouldn't have known how unlike from ane some other they could be." — Annie Drexler, Atlanta

"As the female parent of three girls, ages 5, three, and 1, and as a total girly daughter myself, I truly savour all my daughters' apparel-upwards, makeup, ballet, and pretend play. My married man loves being the merely man in the firm. That said, it tin can oftentimes be an emotional roller coaster. If they spot a issues, cover your ears because the sound can be deafening! If they scrape a knee, y'all'd think the leg was broken, their reaction is then dramatic." — Andrea Miller; Sienna Plantation, Texas

Practice Gender Prediction Kits Actually Piece of work?

Instead of waiting for a sonogram, some preggo parents are finding out at home.

A slew of gender prediction kits has sprung upward at drugstores in recent years, and some claim to accurately predict a babe'due south gender as early as five to 7 weeks into a pregnancy. Peeing in a cup or pricking your finger and sending a blood sample to a lab for DNA testing is like shooting fish in a barrel enough, merely these aren't surefire methods.

Amongst the kits, urine tests, which check for the presence of testosterone as early on as 10 weeks, are the to the lowest degree expensive and besides the least accurate. Kits that use a blood sample to discover gender are imprecise as well (your bath isn't a quality-controlled lab!) and pricey (often upward of $300). If you have more money than patience, you may want to try one, but don't paint the nursery till yous get a sonogram!

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Source: https://www.parents.com/pregnancy/my-baby/gender-prediction/are-you-having-a-boy-or-a-girl/

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