Six years ago, I was VERY pregnant with our first child. We were anxiously awaiting this baby’s arrival. I had no idea how our lives would change so completely.
I also had no idea the gender of our child.
I’m not one of those moms who wants to raise her child without a gender.
In fact, we opted out of knowing for reasons I don’t exactly remember. I feel like it was something along the lines of “I want something to be a surprise when the baby is born” or “I don’t want my family buying too much gender-specific stuff especially if it is a girl” or “let’s do it the old-fashioned way.”
Really I didn’t have a great reason but I remember it’s what I wanted so my husband played along.
It ended up being a special moment.
When the magical moment arrived, the midwife handed me the baby and let me make the announcement. “It’s a girl??!!” I said with more than a little surprise in my voice. Everyone had been saying it was going to be a boy.
I really wanted a daughter but had convinced myself that wasn’t going to happen. No one could believe it when I told them. It was a really special moment that I love telling people about.
After that, the pink gifts started flooding in. And I was surprised by so many other things when it came to adding a baby to the family that the gender was such a small part of it.
Some people just don’t understand.
One thing that is consistent is the look of shock and lack of understanding I get when I tell people we didn’t know our baby’s gender before she was born. When I try to explain, I really don’t have a solid argument except that its what I wanted and it worked for us. Which, by the way, is all I should need to say.
They always ask about the specifics.
How did you decorate the nursery? Well, I did a neutral color on the walls and added gender specific touches once the baby was born.
What kind of clothes did you bring to the hospital for the baby? Actually, some of each gender and I returned the ones I didn’t use.
All of the gear we received and bought was gender neutral which was great because we were planning to have another child or passing the items along.
Would I do it again?
I can’t say this enough… it was absolutely the right decision at the time.
It was a really special moment when we met our daughter. I think it took some of the pressure off when I was pregnant. There were no pre-conceived notions about how we were going to raise this girl. One thing that was more difficult is that we had to pick names for both genders. I swear if she had been a boy she might just be called “Baby #1” because we never settled on a boy’s name.
But the 2nd time around, I was due 4 days after my oldest’s birthday. I wanted to know if I should wash and prep all of her old clothes or get them out of the house. I also wanted to decorate and do things a little differently so I found out. And again, that was the right choice for us at that time.
And, by the way, it was another girl!
You’re not crazy… I did not want to know, either. My reason was kind of vague… But I didn’t want a lot of PINK or BLUE. I also wanted my child to be their own person. So, she arrived, I was thrilled (I wanted a girl), her nursery was in blue, yellow, green, and a hint of purple (a friend gave me the nursery set her two boys had used)… And she did not care. Being held, clean, fed… Was what she needed.
I didn’t find out either and had to pick out two names and take two different outfits to the hospital. My delivery story was very different, though, and I was forgotten during the cesarean. While the doctor was showing my husband our baby, I had to ask if it was a boy. (I couldn’t see because my head was behind the barrier.) It was a boy.
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