Family Planning: Is it a Boy, Girl or a Secret?

We have had three children, and never at any point were we at all tempted to find out the gender of our babies. We loved saving the surprise for the delivery room, and then calling everyone to yell out the big news. I also find it to be very motivating at the end of pregnancy, knowing that our baby is still keeping us in suspense until the very last second. 

We had our ultrasound this week, and though we had barely discussed the possibility of changing up our routine and finding out the gender, I had a panicked change of heart just before the appointment. 

“But what if we buy our youngest daughter a toddler bed, only to find out that we should have held out for one of those cool bunk beds with a trundle that sleeps three girls?” I cautiously asked my husband about two hours before we left for the doctor’s office. I was pretty sure he was already on to me when he calmly replied that we didn’t have to buy a toddler bed until the baby actually arrived. 

When we got to the parking lot of my doctor’s office, I tried a more direct approach. “I’m suddenly having a change of heart about finding out the gender,” I confessed. 

Jason acknowledged that he suspected as much, and said that if I decided I wanted to know, he wouldn’t be at all upset with me for changing my mind. 

What was going on in my head was a sudden realization that this might be it. We’ve started to introduce a discussion of being finished with having kids. We’re not sure yet, because we both love the camaraderie of a big family and always pictured ourselves tumbling over a herd of children in a very loud, crowded house. But the topic has come up. 

I felt like this might be my last chance to have the opposite experience of knowing the gender and bonding with my baby, knowing its identity as a boy or girl. But I also felt nervous in my panicked way of realizing this, that it was also maybe my last chance to experience things the same way we’d always done it. 

Unfortunately for my husband, one of the quirks of my personality is a tendency to analyze every miniscule decision far beyond necessity. But there was no time for me to be quirky, and I was annoyed with myself for creating ridiculous drama and wavering on such a fluff decision. Was it really that big of a deal to wait 19 more weeks? We quickly decided that we would ask the ultrasound technician to seal the news in an envelope, in case this wasn’t just a whim. 

That envelope sits in my kitchen now, and I feel pretty calm about the whole thing. I’m pretty sure I still don’t want to know. I can think of many reasons why it would be convenient to know. For instance, my husband has an unwavering preference for a boy name that rhymes with the name of my oldest child, which in my mind qualifies for a veto. But off we’ve gone to the hospital the last two times with that fight unresolved, and returned each time, thankfully, with a darling baby girl. 

The panic I felt is related to the possibility of this being our last pregnancy, but it more broadly may indicate a grasping of some sort of control. 

Family planning is somewhat of a misnomer. In this age where we can find out a baby’s gender, and in some circles people are even selecting it, we are given a sense of being able to direct the path of our families. But it remains that many women who long for a baby can’t have one, and rarely do you meet a woman who has not known the sadness of a miscarriage. We really don’t have much control at all. 

We are holding on to the envelope, and maybe we will come up with a creative way to share the news if we decide to let loose its contents. But for now it will just give me peace of mind, knowing it’s there if I find myself in a panic again.