Can you choose your child’s gender?

“I am on the verge of being divorced,” wailed Mary when she visited the clinic.

“I can’t conceive a boy and my husband and his family won’t hear of anything else.” Mary had five daughters spaced a year apart and was six years married.  “Sometimes I feel I am bewitched, surely it can’t happen that God only gave me female eggs,” she lamented.

“Times have changed and the value of a child depends on how much care and education you give them rather than their  gender,” I explained. But Mary would not listen. The social pressure was too much. She had tried all sorts of tricks to conceive a boy, but nothing seemed to work.

“So you are my last resort,” she said. “I have a feeling my husband is already seeing another woman and it is just a matter of time before me and my girls are thrown out.”

But what Mary needed to know was that the determination of the sex of the child lies with the man. If you are getting girls or boys only, it is not your fault.

There is nothing wrong with you as a woman. All the eggs produced by a woman are of one type. They contain the X chromosome.

Men however have two types of sperm: those that contain X and those that contain Y chromosomes. If a man’s X sperms fertilise the woman’s egg, the result is a girl. On the other hand if a man’s Y chromosome fertilises the egg, a boy is the result. It is therefore unfortunate that communities and families erroneously accuse the woman when she gets only one sex of babies.

“So you mean there is nothing I can do as a woman to get a boy?” asked Mary anxiously. To a large extent, nature has a way of sorting the sex of children born so that there is a near 50/50 balance. A few things can however be tried out by the woman based on what is known scientifically about the X and Y sperms.

Y sperm are smaller and more fragile. As a result they are more affected by smoking, alcoholism and other chemicals. Avoiding exposure to some of these can increase chances of conceiving a boy. It has also been found that Y sperm are less resilient to the acidity of the vagina as compared to the X. Trying to change the pH of the vagina, however, has other consequences, such us fungal and bacterial infections, and has not been proven to increase chances of getting a boy.

 Know your ovulation

The Y sperms are known to swim faster than the X and reach the egg if the woman has already ovulated.

They however also die faster. Knowing the day of ovulation and having sex immediately ovulation happens could increase chances of getting a boy.

This also means that sex is avoided three to four days before ovulation because the X sperms swim slowly but live longer, waiting for the egg to be released.

For this method to be tried out, the woman needs to know when ovulation will take place. During ovulation, the basal body temperature rises.

If a woman monitors her body temperature over a three month period she will notice the pattern and can easily use it to predict day of ovulation.

Some women know when they are ovulating because of a pain in the side of the lower abdomen.

This symptom can be combined with the temperature chart to increase accuracy. Around the time of ovulation also, there is more colourless slimy discharge from the birth canal. Once the woman knows the day of ovulation, which happens 14 days before the beginning of the next menstrual flow, she should avoid sex three to four days before that day but have sex on the day to increase chances of getting a boy. If the desire is to get a girl, the woman should have sex three to four days prior to ovulation and avoid sex towards the D-day.

 Ethical issues

Some studies have also concentrated on the diet of the woman to find out if it affects the sex of the baby.

In one study it was found that diets rich in sodium and potassium over a period of time favoured conception of the boy child, while those rich in magnesium and calcium favoured the girl.

More studies are needed to confirm these findings but there is no harm talking to a dietician to try these diets out.

Medically, the ethics around sex selection is hazy and most health professionals do not actively help with baby sex selection.

There are, however, rare cases where some diseases are transmitted to one sex of the baby and not the other so that it is safer for a couple to select the sex of the baby on medical grounds.

In such instances, technology has been applied to sequestrate one type of sperm (either X or Y) and inseminated them to the woman artificially or do in vitro feritilisation (IVF). Such technological interventions are however not recommended for social reasons.

“Anyway, I will try out some of what you have described and hope it works,” said Mary as we concluded the session.

Six months later Mary called, excited after doing an ultrasound scan. She was pregnant with a baby boy. “Well, you are a lucky woman; most of the time it doesn’t work,” I said, remembering the many women who have tried these techniques but failed.