Recently I was blessed to find myself pregnant with my third child. My first two children are boys. Almost without exception, upon finding out about my pregnancy the response has been the same, “you must be hoping for a little girl”. To have a little girl would be absolutely wonderful – but no more so than having another boy, I’m convinced.
What is it in us that desires so strongly to manipulate the sex of our offspring? Some people would say this desire is completely natural, and that many people who desire a certain sex and have the opposite, instantly change their minds! The danger lies for those couples who don’t.
I remember well when I had my last son, the lady in the bed opposite me was lamenting that she had had another girl. I remember her saying to the father “but you wanted a boy!” As I looked at their beautiful new baby girl sleeping peacefully in her bassinet I was disturbed. Being a female who was a “wished-for male” myself, I know first hand the detrimental effect such thinking can have on an innocent child.
Our desire to manipulate our offspring’s sex is so strong that in some places amniocentesis is now being performed to determine the sex of the child – abortion being the answer to a negative result. In China, where boys are far more highly preferred than girls (sometimes out of economic necessity), the Government’s strict one-child policy has reportedly led to many baby girls being killed after birth.
So, my statement to you my dear pro-life friends is this – it is NOT pro-life to prefer baby boys or baby girls at all, and let’s not be caught up in such a negative way of thinking. When a woman is pregnant, the child she is carrying already IS – so let’s love and accept him or her exactly as they are.
