Sex Determination—Boy Or Girl?
THE BABBLE TAKE
Peeing in a cup of Drano, wedding rings on strings, carrying high versus carrying low — there are a veritable cornucopia of non-scientific ways to predict the sex of a baby. Though many swear by them, none has been proven to be more than fifty percent accurate. Of course, you could just look at the ultrasound, though this is more accurate with boys than with girls. Amniocentesis is the only other scientific method to determine the sex of a fetus, but like ultrasounds, doctors won't do them unless they are necessary for medical reasons. For those who aren't content with merely knowing if they're having a boy or a girl, there are a few ways to try stacking the odds. Shettle's method is based on theories about differences in speed in female and male sperm; MicroSort is a more scientific process in which sperm are dyed according to gender. The only foolproof method appears to be selecting embryos according to gender during IVF. However, IVF is costly and risky and not done for the sole sake of gender selection. Many, like Columbia University's Dr. Mark Sauer, also consider gender selection unethical. Whatever you chose to put your faith in, knock yourself out (but be careful with the Drano).
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Belly Belly
"Gender selection has long been a topic of debate, for reasons of credibility as well as moral issues. While some gender selection methods claim to be highly successful, they often disregard other methods, claiming their own to be more accurate. [...] Gender selection should not rule your attempts at conception - some methods can even decrease the chance of conception due to timing methods."
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Pregnancy Today
"Sara Fleury of Phoenix, Ariz. swears by the Chinese fertility chart. Laura Brooks and her friends in Orange County, Calif. say if you want to know the sex of your baby without an ultrasound, the pencil-on-a-string method has proven 90 percent accurate in their group. Then there's the old urine-in-the-Drano test. In fact, there are dozens of unscientific methods commonly used by expecting couples, all anxious to know whether they're having a boy or a girl."
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Canadian Medical Association
"Obstetrics is both exciting and rewarding for many family physicians. The rewards lie in the varied challenges it brings — some of the more interesting challenges involve the deceivingly simple. For example, the often asked question, 'Can you tell if it's a boy or a girl?' seems quite simple."
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BabyCenter ®
"Choosing the sex of your child is technically possible thanks to advances in fertility treatments that allow doctors to create or identify embryos of a certain sex. But today's sex-selection options aren't equally effective, affordable, or available. The most accurate sex-selection methods are usually the most expensive [...] involving invasive infertility treatments and fertility drugs with side effects."
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iVillage
"What could be more fun than trying to guess the sex of your baby-to-be? [...] For hundreds of years, expecting moms have relied on time-tested methods of guessing their baby's sex. Even though these old wives' tales are far from foolproof, they are certainly more fun than their more reliable successors, amniocentesis and ultrasound. Enjoy guessing your baby's sex!"
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