Then I thought about how if I were to have a child, I had always wanted it to be a surprise. I don't know if I will be able to have a baby of my own. If I can't, I will feel sad not being able to have that choice and experience. I wonder, if you adopt do you have to find out the baby's gender ahead of time?
Monday, August 17, 2015
A Passing Thought
While chatting with someone recently, I asked about their pregnancy and if they knew if they were going to have a boy or a girl or if they were going to wait to find out. They said they did not know, but we're planning to find out. She said she was really excited to have a gender reveal party. Happy for her, really.
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You know what's interesting to me? So many of my friends are choosing not to find out the sex of the baby. Like, out of four pregnancies that I knew about at school alone, NONE of them chose to find out. Which is interesting, because I feel like that's kind of a reversal of the trend.
ReplyDeleteI always wanted to find out, especially once everything got crazy with the medical stuff. It is strangely polarizing. People would be like, "It's one of life's greatest mysteries!" And I would be like, "Yeah, HAVING a baby is one of life's greatest mysteries, to me."
But now, I won't know. Most expectant mothers who choose my agency do not find out the gender ahead of time, and if we have a last-minute placement situation it will definitely be a surprise. There's a chance for knowing ahead of time, but it is super slim. We were told also that finding out the sex can make it harder for an expectant mother who knows for sure she is placing her baby, because knowing the sex can make it easier to bond, and not every expectant mother wants to have a strong bond with her baby (or is in a situation where that's possible).
There was a box for gender preference on both our application and our grid, but it was strongly discouraged to actually check one or the other. So there you go, one of life's greatest mysteries, only now it's also the entire baby that's a mystery, not just the gender. :) I feel like gender revealing is just one of many things I've shed in order to make the dream of having a baby more of a reality.
Also, I sort of hate gender reveal parties. They can be really cute, but in general I dislike 'em. Sorry this comment was so long!
You had a thoughtful reply, and I enjoyed reading all of it, Jess!
DeleteNice to hear you know some people that are keeping it a surprise. Maybe there will be a reverse trend! Yeah, not a fan of gender reveal parties. Seems like another way to go over the top and bring more pressure when there is plenty of that around pregnancy already. Some people like to celebrate...a lot. And others may have struggled to get there and may want to make every moment count. To each his own, I guess.
Thank you for sharing about your experiences with the adoption process so far. It is very helpful to know as some agencies do things differently. I would not want to put any pressure on the expectant mother at all. I think that should be her choice. If anything, I would express my feelings with the person working with us on our end and hope that it could at least be a surprise for us if the expectant mother really wanted to know. But, I wouldn't want it to be a source of stress either.
I am a planner, too. Which it is strange that I do have that preference not to know. However, I'm sorry that the choice was something that you had to let go because of IF. It sounds like you are at peace with it being a mystery for when you guys do get matched. Lots of well wishes your way!
You'll always get the surprise of the sex, even with adoption, though it may come before the birth vs. after. Some of it depends on the choice of the birthmother. Though you may find that when you're in the moment, you don't want to wait (or maybe you still will). I think, like so many things, you can't know how you'll feel until you're in the moment, feeling it.
ReplyDeleteYou are right that some of it depends on the birthmother. It is her baby and she is the one in control, rightfully so. It is just hard. One more thing that could be taken from the experience if you are not the one having the baby. It is its own small loss.
DeleteAnd things can always change in the moment. You don't know until you get there.
Gender reveal parties ... really? That's after the baby showers? And before the naming ceremonies? One of the reasons I'm glad I live in NZ! (Though I have had to go to a naming ceremony.)
ReplyDeleteHonestly, I don't know if people have them before, after or part of the shower. Have not been to one and that does not bother me. I've seen videos on FB and heard people talking about them. I blame Pintrest, most likely. Lol
DeleteI had always wanted to know ahead of time what the gender of my child would be. My husband never wanted to know. My view was, it was surprising enough if I would ever get pregnant! Then, going through the adoption process, I would say we found out the gender about half of the time for the pregnancies for which we were considered as adopting parents. Sometimes we didn't find out about the pending adoption until after the child was born, so obviously you know gender then. Other times, I would say maybe a third of the times, we would know the gender of a birth mother that was pregnant. In some instances, I think the birth mother thought it would help matching her child if the adopting parents already knew the gender. For example, if she was having a boy, and an adopting family was looking for a girl, then it would weed out anyone not interested and make the process easier. Obviously, we knew the gender of our son ahead of time because he was already born.
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