This was originally written on Tuesday, January 29, 2008

I forgot to mention in my blog yesterday that my cousin's wife gave me a really good book while I was trying to conceive, titled Your Fertility Signals: Using Them To Achieve or Avoid Pregnancy, Naturally by Merryl Winstein.

There's a chapter that goes along with my topic today: Choosing Your Baby's Sex. Now, let me put a disclaimer at the beginning, lol! By no means is this guaranteed, so if it didn't work for you--or if you try it in the future and it doesn't, don't get mad at me! I'm not saying this is for sure.

But, aside from my son's name coming to me before I knew I was pregnant, and the Chinese calendar (hehe), one of the other reasons why Joe & I were confident we were having a boy is because of what the Catholic Church told us when we were in pre-marital counseling before our wedding in 2003.

At the all-day workshop that we attended, they explained that statistically more boys are conceived when a couple "does it" (I'm refraining from using the proper term to avoid those who are looking for "that" coming to this site) at the exact time of ovulation, while more girls are conceived prior to ovulation. This is because the boy sperm are generally faster swimmers but die quickly, and the girl sperm are slower but live longer (i.e. they hang around for a few extra days). Therefore, if a woman is keeping track of her ovulation, she may actually have just as much of a role in the gender selection process as the man!

In the book I just mentioned, they used mucus as the indicator. But if that grosses you out, you can use temperature and/or the ovulation predictor test (which is what I did). They wrote: "One study showed that 310 of 314 couples in Nigeria successfully pre-selected a boy, and 90 of 92 couples successfully pre-selected a girl. To have a girl: Make love on the first day of mucus. After that, do not make love any more until the evening of the fourth day in a row after the last bit [when ovulation is over]. You will have a better chance for a girl if you stop making love at least two or more days before you actually ovulate. To have a boy: As soon as fertile mucus begins, avoid intercourse. Since ovulation usually occurs on the last mucus day or the day after, make love then, and also on the next one or two dry days."

If you're like me and not thrilled with this idea, you can also get to know what days most likely show up as positive for you on the ovulation predictor test & temperature chart. For example, in August I didn't take my temperature (it was just a fluke that I even did the ovulation predictor test!) but the OPT showed positive on my cycle days 16 & 17. Since I "did it" days 16 thru 18, but not after day 12, it's no surprise to those who preach this method that Joe & I are having a boy. To have a girl, we would have wanted to do it day 13 or 14 and then not until 18 or after. To have a boy, day 16 was best for "doing it", and also the next day or two. . .and we did all three! I even had a sign later that night (on day 16) that made me think I had just ovulated. In fact, I said to Joe (although still not really believing I'd get pregnant that month), "According to the Catholic church, if I get pregnant this month it will be a boy!"

Who knows if it was just a coincidence or not, but I do have to say we'll probably try it this way when we want to have our second/last child--only for a girl. Although, even though girls are more common and easier for most people to conceive, it seems harder for ME since my cycles are irregular. I'm not sure I'll know how to predict when I'm going to ovulate before the OPT or temp chart says.

Okay, enough about that. It's weird to go out in public now and have strangers know I'm pregnant. Until this month, it didn't seem like random people would notice--but now they do (and I've even had a couple comment). I don't know why it's weird to me, but it is. Maybe because it's like they know something about my personal life--but until now, people I didn't know wouldn't know what was going on unless I told them!

Haha, you know how I talked about Joe gaining weight (6 lbs w/out his clothes, 9 lbs with) while I'm pregnant? Well, I thought it'd be funny to put my maltipoos, Bella & Cosmo, on the scale--and they've gained weight, too! Cosmo, who has been 9.5 lbs. ever since he reached his adult size a year-and-a-half ago, suddenly weighs 11.5!!! Bella, who has always been 10.5 ALSO weighs 11.5 lbs. They've never been the same weight before. Gaining 1-2 lbs. on these two is huge! I think there's something in the air. Watch out if you're around a pregnant woman. . .:p

Today I'm just taking it easy. I feel I've been running around a lot and don't want to get sick. I better go rest up!