A baby’s gender can’t be felt OR determined by old wives tales!

by Courtney on February 9, 2011

P.S. Not my belly!

A question I get often is whether I have a feeling I’m having a boy or a girl. The answer is no – I have no feeling either way. But, determined to help me out, sometimes people will study my belly as if the answer is going to become so clear based on how I’m carrying – low or high, wide or basketball-style. I hear people say; “I just felt it. I knew it was a boy, or a girl.” Or once I read Katie Holmes say in a magazine; “I was craving pink the whole pregnancy.” How exactly do you crave a color? For people who just “have a feeling,” I’m here to tell ya that you have a 50/50 chance at getting it right. So if you have a boy and you had a feeling you were, you’re not psychic or more “one with your belly” than the next gal. You just got lucky – and the odds were halfway in your favor!

I just finished reading an EXCELLENT book co-authored by two OBGYNs entitled “Hands Off My Belly: The Pregnant Woman’s Guide to Myths, Mothers, and Moods.” It basically dispels all the myths and old wives tales that we’ve all heard for decades and in many cases, believed to be true, from the first trimester to delivery. As I read this book I felt like I was definitely growing wiser about this whole pregnancy thing and starting to recognize fact from fiction when well-meaning people gave me advice. But before this book, you better believe I was trying the old wedding ring on string over my belly trick in which it’s a girl if the ring moves back and forth and a boy if it moves in a circular motion. For your info, it moved back and forth all three times I tried it, so I’m definitely having a girl. Or am I?

I thought I’d share some of the ah-ha moments I had while reading the chapter on “Gender Myths” so we can stop falling prey to these tales that have just been handed down from generation to generation but with no basis in medical facts. Let’s begin…

How you carry your baby gives a clue to its gender

Anything from the height and weight of the mother to her pelvic bony structure plays a factor on how a woman carries a baby. An itsy bitsy penis on the other hand, cannot cause you to *hang low*, so to speak.

A fetal heartbeat lower than 140 beats per minute is a boy and above 140 is a girl

Depending on the arousal of the fetus, the heart rate can fluctuate from 130 to 110 to 150 from day to day. It also depends on if the baby is awake or asleep when you’re connected to a Doppler at the doctor’s office. How this became indicative of a boy or a girl has left these OBGYN’s puzzled in their research. The first time I heard the baby’s heartbeat at 14 weeks I remember my doc uttering the number 150 and then this week I heard the heartbeat again and it was 140. So according to this gender “indicator,” I’m having a girl based on the first time I heard the heartbeat….but with the latest being 140, it could go either way!

The good ole Chinese Calendar

For fun, the authors went through a small sample set of patients in their practice to see how closely the Chinese Calendar matches up with the actual gender of the babies. They actually found that in 9 out of 10 cases the calendar was correct. But they’re quick to say there’re too many variables that are not accounted for in the Chinese Calendar, as the calendar is too basic. And according to the Chinese Calendar, I’m having a boy!

Hey! What about the heartbeat and the ring on a string motion? I thought I was having a girl??

You must be having a boy because your husband has only brothers

This is what I’ve always thought – I’m going to have three boys because the male gene is so dominant in my husband’s family. But according to our author docs, gender does not run in the family. Women can only donate an X chromosome to her fetus and a man can either donate an X or Y – but it’s totally at random. The authors said it best here: “for a male to only give Y chromosomes to a female partner, it would be counterintuitive to the propagation of our species.” At some point, women are needed in this world to carry future generations to life.

Other quick myths are:

If you already have two boys or two girls, then your next baby will be the same sex – false!

If the pregnant woman craves spicy or tart foods, then she’s having a boy – false!

If the baby tightens up in your stomach like a ball, then you’re having a boy – false!

Faster hair growth on your leg means you’re having a boy – false!

The missionary position makes boys – false!

If you prefer lying on your left side, you’re having a girl – false!

I really felt like I learned a lot from reading this book, so I highly recommend it to moms-to-be out there. Why go into all this blindly? I definitely feel better and have less anxiety about things after reading this. I’ve read all about things like keeping your placenta after birth – to eating it – to planting it with a tree (a placenta tree!), to storing your blood chord, and more! I plan to do future posts on other interesting tid-bits from this book because there’re so many goodies.

Bloggy Note: I know this was more of an educational post vs. my usual hilariously funny, have you on your knees bent over laughing out load post, but occasionally I need to make sure you get your money’s worth on this blog. Not that you’re paying me…………………

Were there any old wives tales or myths that you’ve always believed in that just got shattered above, or any you want to share that I didn’t mention?

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Tagged as: "baby", Hands Off My Bella, pregnancy, pregnant

{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }

Kim February 10, 2011 at 8:13 am

What a great post. Very informational. I’m at 31 weeks and still thinking I need to get my hands on that book.
I did not have any “feeling” that I knew what I was having, though other people did. Suprisingly, 50% of them were right! ;)

Where do you get the cool belly pics for your blog posts? Love them.

Courtney February 10, 2011 at 10:34 am

Thanks Kim! You should definitely get this book because it’s going to go into a tons of myths and things you should know about labor and delivery and things like do you keep your placenta afterward? Do you want to store your blood chord? and more stuff like that. These are things I’d randomly read about in other blogs or magazine articles so I kept meaning to look it all up online eventually, so it was nice to find a book that talked about it all in one place.

I get all my bloggy pics from Google images. I just type in something in the search like “gender myths for babies” and then search on ‘images’ vs. the ‘web’ and I get all kinds of pregnant belly pics!

Colleen February 10, 2011 at 9:36 pm

So I have three kids, I had no clue with my first – but her fetal heart rate was always 140+, and she was a daughter. My middle pregnancy was different – I knew, without a doubt, overwhelmingly – it was a boy. I painted the room blue, only picked a boys name, bought blue baby clothes – it was crazy. I never felt it was a boy – I knew it was a boy. Brooks of course, was a son. My third pregnancy was like my first – no clue, but a fetal heart rate of around 130 consistantly – Blake, my third child and second son.
So who knows…..I do believe the logic of fetal heart rate – but that instinct, I can’t explain.

Courtney February 11, 2011 at 12:41 pm

I can see if you have a boy and then your second pregnancy is vastly different, how you might assume the combination of things such as heart rate, the way you carry, cravings, etc. might mean you’re having a girl. I guess just from reading this book the way the docs broke it down from myth to myth, it started to make sense, like, ya, I guess a baby’s heart rate would be lower if it’s sleeping when you’re connected to the Doppler. Or, why would a boy make you carry any differently than a girl? It’s just funny now when people tell me things so matter of fact about how to tell if its a boy or girl. Last night on Twitter someone said: All you have to do is take a needle on a string and hold it above your belly and if it goes from side to side it’s a boy and if it moves circular it’s a girl! Like that really means something!! And besides, the details of this little trick is different from website to website – because the website I read said the circular movement is a boy! AHHH!

jessica February 20, 2011 at 4:24 pm

“the circular movement is a boy” :) )))

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