Did you want either a baby girl or a baby boy? Some couples may decide to do gender selection for family balancing. Others have a certain preference to a specific gender, maybe due to cultural reasons. If you want to know how to select the gender of your baby, then keep reading to the end of this post.
In this post, I will be talking about the natural ways of selecting the baby's gender, the assisted ways of selecting the baby's gender, and the countries that allow for gender selection.
All women carry the XX chromosome, while men carry the XY chromosome. When a man and a woman have sex and the woman gets pregnant, the woman can only donate one of her XX chromosome to the embryo, whereas a man can donate an X chromosome or a Y chromosome to the embryo.
So you notice that women only carry X chromosomes, but a man can donate an X chromosome or a Y chromosome. If a man donates an X chromosome, then we have an XX chromosome and we have our baby girl. But if a man donates a Y chromosome, we have an XY chromosome and there we have a baby boy.
In some cultures, women receive a lot of backlash for having only girls, but what they do not know is that it is the man who determines the gender of the baby. So next time you hear somebody criticising a woman for having only boys or only girls, remind them to take it up with her husband because actually he's the one holding the genetic cards.
In the 1960s, Dr. Landrum B. Shettles developed the Shettles method to assist couples increase their chances of conceiving a baby of their preferred gender. Dr. Landrum was prominent for his works in sperm biology and actually he wrote a book, Your Baby's Sex Now You Can Choose.
Now after studying the sperm, Dr. Landrum came up with the main differences between the sperm carrying the XY chromosome, let us call it the boy sperm, and the sperm carrying the XX chromosome, let us call it the girl's sperm.
In his research, Dr. Landrum pointed out that the boy's sperm swam faster than the girl's sperm. He also noted that the boy's sperm was lighter while the girl's sperm was heavier. He also noted that the boy's sperm could survive in the woman's body for up to three days only, whereas the girl's sperm could survive for up to five days.
The boy's sperm survived better in alkaline environments such as the cervix and the uterus whereas the girl's sperm survived better in acidic environments such as the vagina.
The Ovulation Method
This brings us to our first method, the ovulation method. For this, you have to know your ovulation day and your fertile window. I have made a post explaining how you can calculate your ovulation day and your fertile window, just make sure to check it out. After knowing your ovulation day and your fertile window, you can time intercourse within those days according to the sex you desire.
The girl's sperm can stay in the body for up to five days, remember? So if the couple wants a girl, the best time to have sex is from the beginning of your fertile window to at least three days before ovulation, and then they should abstain two to three days before ovulation.
The boy's sperm can stay in the body for up to three days and its faster and lighter than girl's sperm. So if you ovulate on day 14 and you have sex on day 9, the sperm will be in the body till day 11, because you just need to say 9 plus 3 to get 11, and hence will not meet the egg for fertilisation. If you want to conceive a boy, the best time to have sex is on the day of ovulation, the day before, and a day or two after ovulation, and you need to abstain from sex from the beginning of your menstrual cycle until three days before ovulation.
Also remember that the boy's sperm swims faster than the girl's sperm, and hence if they are both present, there is a higher probability that it will get to the egg before the girl's sperm. I mentioned earlier about the Shettles method, the ovulation method is part of this Shettles method. So other methods in this Shettles method are a bit controversial and raise some sort of speculation, because there is little to no scientific data backing them.
Sex Position Method
The first is sex position, we said that the boy's sperm survived better in alkaline environments like the uterus and the cervix, while the girl's sperm survived better in acidic environments such as the vagina. Couples are encouraged that the position that is best for producing a boy is one that involves deep vaginal penetration, such as the classic missionary and the doggy style.
So the sperms are deposited closer to the cervix, where the environment is naturally alkaline, and they will be able to swim faster to the uterus and to the fallopian tube where they will meet the egg.
Woman Orgasm Method
Another one in this Shettles method is orgasm. Landrum suggest that if you want a baby boy, the woman should have an orgasm.
This is because when a woman orgasms, she produces alkaline secretions that are a favourable environment for the boy's sperm. Do you remember that? So if you need a girl, you should not allow woman to reach orgasm. As I said, there is little scientific evidence backing this, but I do not see any harm in trying a specific position anyway or having orgasms if you need baby boy.
Sperm Sorting
Another method that we have is sperm sorting. Now this is a technique that is used to separate the sperms containing the X chromosome from the sperms containing the Y chromosomes. Remember, we said that the girl's sperm is heavier than the boy's sperm.
This technique takes advantage of the fact that the large X chromosome has considerably more DNA than the tiny Y chromosome. A sperm sample is first collected from the father. Then the sperm cells are treated with a dye that attaches to the DNA and glows under laser light.
The reasoning behind this is that the sperms with more DNA will glow more brightly than the sperms with fewer DNA. So they use this technique to sort the sperms. Now the sorted sperms are now placed directly into the woman's uterus, something we call artificial insemination, or they can be used for in vitro fertilisation, that is IVF procedure.
However, this method is not always 100% accurate. Actually, it gives an accuracy of 50/50. But there is a more accurate method of ensuring the sex of a baby.
Pre-implantation Genetic Test
This is the pre-implantation genetic testing and it can be done during IVF. Usually it is done to examine embryos for genetic abnormalities before they are transferred to the uterus. But nowadays they are doing it for gender selection.
A woman undergoes ovarian stimulation with some hormones to produce multiple eggs. The retrieved eggs are now taken into an incubator where they are fertilised with sperms to create embryos.
The embryos are then cultured in the lab for several days until they reach the blastocyst state, usually after five to six days. A few cells are now carefully removed from each blastocyst. Before you ask me, this does not harm the embryo.
They are analysed in the lab to tell which embryos will lead to baby girls and which embryos will lead to baby boys. So only the embryos of the desired sex are implanted into the mother's uterus during IVF procedure. This method is very successful, with a success rate of 97 to 100 percent.
But this IVF gender selection allows the parent to increase the chances of having children of a certain gender. However it is very controversial because there are some ethical arguments associated with it. Currently it is legal in many countries including the United States, Australia, Spain and Greece.
However countries like the UK, Canada, China and India have some more strict regulations prohibiting that medical gender selection because of the ethical concerns and the consequences such as gender imbalances and gender biases.