Do you believe in the baby dust/shettles method to conceive a boy or girl?

[Sparklythings1]

We already have a little boy and are now ready to try for baby #2. Ideally we hope to have three children so I would be delighted with a boy or girl this time but I would (in theory) like to experience both if I was lucky enough to have another so it would be nice to have a girl now then leave the last one up to fate.

I’ve been loosely following the babydust method and ‘trying’ 2 days before ovulation with only one attempt. It says boy’s are conceived closer to/on ovulation day so you should go no closer than 2 days out for a girl. This could be a load of nonsense and I’ve seen so many mixed reviews on it. I’m aware this could be lowering our chances of conceiving though and we’re on cycle #3 so far. Should I just forget this method and do it every other day or is there any truth to it do you think?

It's complete nonsense.

I think you have a 50% chance of conceiving a boy, and a 50% chance o conceiving a girl.

Speechless.

I tried it. Doesn't work

Well some sperm have an X chromosome giving you an xx (female) baby and some have a y giving you an xy (male) baby so what about this method makes an x or y sperm more likely to fertilise an egg at different points in the cycle?

Sounds like nonsense to me though I confess I know little about it.

Unless you have selective IVF there is zero way to choose. Just enjoy TTC rather than adding pressure trying to control something completely uncontrollable.

Its nonsense. The sperm determines x or y and you cant time how quick one gets there. Put it this way if you have sex days before ovulation hoping for a girl and you have the slower girl sperm waiting, do you think the boy sperm thats also been sat waiting all died off?

The idea behind it is that the x sperm live longer, so more of them are still around if dtd a few days before ovulation.
I have a daughter who is the result of dtd the day after period ended. So on this very scientific sample of one, it works!!
(We weren't actively trying, no idea when I ovulated but defo a good few days after the one shag we had )

Not saying that the idea is true btw, just that that's what they say...

@bumpertobumper interesting! 😂 it probably is just 50/50 and proves itself in that people want it to be true then it is. I feel like there’s no harm in giving it a shot though if I’m not getting majorly stressed about TTC yet anyway

I tried to conceive a girl and it worked. Look at Luisa Zissman blog on it too

@Fleur405 the theory is that the male sperm are faster but die off quicker so if you go a few days before then they will no longer be viable and the female sperm will be there waiting when the egg is released. There’s a book on it and a lot of studies to back aspects of it up but also a lot of people saying the opposite so it’s hard to know what to think. I think while we’re still not in a massive rush we’ll keep trying it for a month or two longer

@Roseandrose20 ohhh, heading there as we speak! Thanks

DS was conceived by DTD 5-6 days prior to ovulation. Pretty sure he should be a girl based on that theory. Currently pregnant with DC2 conceived on ovulation day, I’ll let you know.

We used the shettle methods as did my BFF we both got what we hoped for.

No, you had a 50% chance of having a girl, and you had one. There was no method. You just won the odds (which isn't hard - it's literally 50/50), and you are using that to reinforce your misguided belief that some random woman in the internet determined the sex of your child.

OP, if you want to keep reducing your overall chance of conceiving every month by limiting sex, then crack on, but it seems rather foolish to me.

Absolute nonsense. Be grateful with whatever sex you get.

@1994girl yip as stated above 😊

If you don't care how long it takes to get pregnant and you don't care with sex the baby is then there's no harm at all spending a few months only having sex s few days before ovulation day to see if it results in a girl. It's obviously not a foolproof method but if it slightly increases your chances of an x sperm getting to the egg then why not. DD was conceived similarly to a PP by DTD immediately after a period, outside the alleged fertile window so who knows

@canyoutoleratethis exactly that.

We tried this after having 2 boys. We absolutely would have been happy with either boy or girl but thought we'd see if the theory worked....and we had a girl. With both boys we DTD right on ovulation and with our girl it was about 3 days before. Who knows if there's any scientific basis 🤷🏻‍♀️

Think the stats are 57% ish for male and 43% female but males are more likely to be miscarried.
Either way you can't choose by timing sex

It worked for me both times!

Wanted a girl so we had sex 5 days before ovulation.

Wanted a boy next time round, so we did it the day before ovulation.

You have absolutely no way of know if it worked for you. You could have never heard of the method and had the same outcome. There's no proof or correlation between when you had sex and your babies sex. It's a 50/50 chance.

It's called confirmation bias.

It was chance that you got the result you hoped for so now you 'believe'

Well, I can tell you that I have three sons, all conceived on or about ovulation day.

I still don't believe in the Shettles method, it was pure chance.