Gender Preferences After Loss - Daring to want more than "just a healthy baby"

Look, honey, I'm (kind of) showing! ~10 weeks pregnant

Once I decided I was ready to have children, my husband and I knew we wanted at least two children. We never thought to clarify that we wanted at least two living children, because it never crossed our minds. My ideal age difference between each child was about three years. After Isabella died, the age gap concept was thrown out the window along with everything I had ever pictured. Before I was discharged from the hospital, we were told that the recommendation after a c-section is to wait at least twelve months before conceiving again in order to lower the risk of uterine rupture. Twelve and a half months after Isabella's birth, I became pregnant.

As we began emotionally preparing for another child while grieving our daughter, I began praying we'd have another girl. My husband prayed for twins. Girls tend to run in my family with the occasional boy thrown in. Since I only have sisters and my good friends are all female, I'm most excited by and comfortable with the idea of raising girls. In addition to this lifelong desire, we have adorable baby girl clothes and I want to use them.

Part of me was initially reticent to voice this preference for a girl. It feels like after a loss, parents are not supposed to have a gender bias. It’s as if we should believe and say, “I just want a healthy baby.” Several of the first times I mentioned something about wanting a girl, people responded with a variation of, “They are both great. You’ll just be happy to have a healthy child.” I do want a healthy child, but I meant I want a girl.

People seem to think that our greatest dream is to bring home a child, anything else is just a bonus. That somehow, losing a child means we also have to bury our desires for any specific characteristics. Most people can express those dreams about future children – hair color, gender, eyes, height, etc. – but not women who’ve had a loss.

But most of us do have many desires beyond just bringing home a healthy child. When it comes to gender, I know some people want the exact opposite sex of the child they lost while others want the same. I've always wanted girls and Isabella's death did not diminish that.

About a month after Isabella died, I told my husband that I wanted to find out the gender of future children early in order to start bonding. When I was about ten weeks pregnant, we had genetic testing done which screened for Down Syndrome, Trisomy 13 and 18, as well as gender. A week after the testing, we found out that genetically everything appears typical (praise God!) and that we are having a boy.

I burst into tears.

Yes, I’m tremendously grateful that everything looks good so far. Yes, being disappointed it’s a boy instead of a girl seems trivial when we could be facing life threatening concerns during pregnancy. And opening the envelop to read, “boy,” felt like more of my dreams of raising girls died. The future I had pictured was already shattered when Isabella died and continued to become even more unrecognizable with the knowledge that, as of right now, we have no living girl and no one looking at us will even know that we have a girl.

A friend I made after Isabella’s death has three boys and one girl. Her daughter was stillborn at full term due to a cord accident. She said that numerous people have come up to her when she has all of her boys at Target or the grocery and have said, “Wow, you have your hands full. I bet you wish you had a girl.” Ouch.  

We never know anyone’s full story and words can poke at invisible wounds in ways we can never imagine.

As I've gotten more used to the fact that I’m pregnant with our son, I've come to see the grace in our second child being male. Had our second child been a girl, we would wonder how her mannerisms and physical characteristics would compare to Isabella, although I imagine many of these comparisons would be unconscious. Since our next baby is a boy, he will be his own person without the shadow of his sister in the same way.

Although I see the grace, part of me still mourns the second daughter I'm not having. Much of pregnancy feels like there is a component of mourning. When we found out I was carrying a singleton rather than the twins we'd prayed for, we mourned our brief dreams of twins and a fuller home. When we found out it's a son, we mourned the daughter we won't have to wear the clothes still sitting washed and unworn in drawers. Of course, we are daily praying that this boy be born alive and healthy. We will rejoice when and if God grants this prayer. Right now, I'm trying to stay in the present moment, not taking on future fears, while allowing myself to feel the complex emotions this season brings.