| Dear Kaitlin,
One of the most nourishing perks of being a part of the Free Birth Society Membership Community is the opportunity to gather on live calls, where we discuss radical topics freely.
On Wednesday’s Community Call, one of our members asked about the SneakPeek at-home blood test that claims to reveal with “99.9% clinical accuracy” a baby’s sex as early as six weeks gestation. Her curiosity presented us with the opportunity to explore the cost and benefits of both doing the test and waiting to discover a baby’s sex until the moment they are born.
So, first off…inaccurate sex determination happens often. Whether it’s a blood test or an ultrasound scan - room for error exists and matters. Because we know this is the case, what is the point of investing time, money and attention in tests that will still leave you wondering if you’re actually having the baby girl or boy it says you’re having? Or worse, being one of the moms discovering at birth that the test was wrong, and you are totally disoriented. I’ve seen it countless times, and it’s pretty rough.
The same goes for genetic screening tests, which aren’t even close to consistently accurate. To be told something is wrong with your baby when everything is actually fine is not okay, and sets most women off on a very stressful and unexpected medicalized pregnancy.
Inaccurate test results put families on disconnected, false timelines where they imagine realities that aren’t at all related to truth. The effects of this on family energetics can’t be ignored because they are key factors in each member’s overall health and well being. Unnecessary stress is, quite literally, toxic, and no one wants to grow their baby in a toxic environment. As Sister MorningStar says, “If you stress the mother, you stress the baby”.
On the other hand, what if the test is accurate, but the results are undesirable? The most likely outcome in this scenario is, again, disconnection - be it momentary or months-long. Disappointment in the realm of test results quite often leads directly to dissociated states of victimhood, guilt and shame, as well as even more confusion than that which initially existed prior to any testing.
Let’s be honest. It’s all (and maybe…always?) about control. It’s motivated by the stories we make up, and the meaning we make from these thoughts.
“I really want a girl, so I need to prepare myself for a boy.”
“Everyone is saying it’s a boy, but I think it’s a girl, so I just need to know.”
“I already have 3 boys, so I need to be prepared for the disappointment if it’s another one.”
On and on.
This idea that “knowing” the sex of your baby or “knowing” whether or not their bodies have any genetic abnormalities gives you any semblance of control whatsoever is an illusion, and always carries the *great* potential for underwhelm and frustration.
In my experience, it does more harm than good. And the “good” it does, the theoretical knowing, is just …well, that it feels good to think we are in control.
But really, that’s just kicking the can down the road. And bypassing the enormous bank of lessons the mystery of pregnancy has for you.
What if pregnancy’s biggest lesson was SURRENDER. What if it was designed for you to meet the great unknown, to sit in the deep mystery of it all, and to say hello to the (sometimes great!) discomfort of that.
What if sitting in the not knowing was actually the very skillset motherhood *needs* you to strengthen? The greater satisfaction comes from wading through the mystery of it all, allowing yourself to experience what it means to wait and wonder before you discover.
What is available to you in a wild pregnancy is big, and the gifts within the work is abundant.
And so the question is begged, what are these tests actually accomplishing? What journey are they inviting you to partake in? Do you want to hear the statistical, potentially false story they are going to tell you? Aren’t they just satiating your desire for control, placating some notion that you just need to know *now* in this instant graduation culture? Can you really afford disappointment and disconnection? Is that really worth the potential “knowing”?
Or, can you playfully imagine what story is unfolding within your wondrous womb, entertaining the possibility that everything is unfolding perfectly, and whoever your baby happens to be is exactly who they are, regardless of your preconceptions?
What would it feel like to give yourself to god….to the great mystery of life?
Discussing these nuances on the call led to us discussing what pleasures await those who exert self control when it comes to the temptation of learning their baby’s sex before birth. Is the mystery worth it?
Totally.
I’ve attended many homebirths where the mother didn’t know the sex of her baby prior, and I’ve never witnessed disappointment at the moment she discovers who it is that she created. Even when she was worried that it would occur.
When you understand the basics of the hormonal matrix, birth is arguably the most important time to discover a baby’s sex. Even if you have preconceived notions of what sex you want your baby to be, when you are experiencing the truly prolific hormonal exchange between you and your baby, those notions melt away. The highs you’re experiencing in your limbic and animal brain are so profound in those moments; to discover the sex of your baby in that firework of peak euphoria is the ultimate catalyst for earthside bonding.
Anything shy of this is truly a robbery for motherbaby.
In fact - if you do strongly prefer one sex over the other then I would argue it is paramount to discover the truth during the climax of hormonal exchange and bonding to protect you and your baby from the prenatal disappointment that would otherwise be present.
This divine design is not accidental. There are reasons why a baby’s sex is intentionally concealed within the womb until the moment of emergence.
When it comes to the mystery of a baby’s sex, I encourage you to embrace it, and to take it as an opportunity to think about what you think a boy means and what you think a girl means. All of that is your own interesting stuff to learn about, and your mothering may benefit from taking the time to unravel it all before your baby lands in your arms.
Your baby chooses you, and you choose them.
It could also be said that experiencing the ambiguity of an unborn baby’s sex prepares a mother and father for the ambiguities of the birth process and of parenthood overall. Engaging with your baby and intuiting whether they are a boy or a girl (for fun!) is a far more powerful initiation into mothering than a quick 99.9% accurate answer is.
Give yourself permission to know, without medical proof, that your baby is who you think they are. This is a very rich place to explore. Enjoy the storytelling that occurs within your own mind, free of attachment to how the story ends.
When your baby is born and you finally find out if they are a boy or a girl and how their body developed over those many moons, you will look at them and be like, “Yes! You are YOU! Of course you are you! And you are me. Yes, of course you’re here and exactly who you are supposed to be.”
In Joy,
Emilee |
