Having lived on this planet as both a Pregnant and Not Pregnant person, I’d like to share a few thoughts on gender reveal parties, as they seem to be the trending roast topic for people who mostly align with the Not Pregnant part of the spectrum.
I did not have a gender reveal party, but we did bring a few props to let our family guess the gender the day we surprised them all with the announcement that we were expecting. My dog ran out in a pink tutu to share the news that It’s A Girl and it was a hilarious, fun moment during a time when we were secretly awaiting further genetic testing results to confirm whether or not the whole pregnancy would ultimately be viable.
I share this detail with you because the timing of finding out the gender of your baby often intersects with a point in the pregnancy when you have enough information to take a deep breath, worry a little less and if you choose to, announce your news.
It’s no secret that people have many opinions on what pregnant people should or should not do and there have long been gripes about we use social media. Some people think our sonograms are gross. Some think we over-post. Many of these same people who share these critiques about what pregnant women should and should not do choose to fill their own social media feeds with an abundance of bar bathroom thirst trap selfies and Can’t Even Adult complaints about how difficult it is to buy groceries. I don’t find these posts to be particularly interesting, but I just scroll on by - an option we all have when we see something that’s not relevant to us in our feeds.
Unlike buying groceries, which is actually quite easy, pregnancy is quite a trying experience for many women and their partners. The glow is hard fought for and I would say the ride resembles a roller coaster, but roller coasters are actually quite pleasant and predictable in comparison.
Every doctor visit, particularly during the first few months, is a new opportunity to either confirm or deny a healthy pregnancy. Given all of the uncertainty in the early months, most folks choose to keep the whole thing a secret, sparing you the uncomfortable experience of having to hear about anything outside of a healthy, normal pregnancy.
For me and I’m sure for most other moms, the gender or our baby was just a fun fact we had learned and a reason to buy silly blue and pink hats and laugh a little bit. This celebration was in no way an indication that I will force gender stereotypes on my daughter or that the gender was of any importance at all to us. It was a fun fact and we had fun sharing it. That was it.
Pregnant women endure a lot during their nine month ride and I think we should celebrate anything we want to during it. If we want to share a photo of our bump every week with the fruit that corresponds with our baby’s development, we should do so and you should scroll past it if you don’t like it. If we want to throw a party every time we don’t completely screw up a doctor office weigh in by eating a shit ton of ice cream and pizza the night before, we should do so and you should scroll past the photos from the party if you don’t like them.
The harmless, silly celebration of the gender of a baby does not affect you or the baby in any way and if you don’t like it, I encourage you to scroll on by. If you’re tempted to draft a snarky subtweet about how stupid you think it is that your friend had a gender reveal party, maybe instead, delete that tweet and take a few minutes to send this simple message to all of the pregnant women in your life, “Hey, how are you feeling?”