Most of the hospitals in my area, and def my local one where I am getting ante natal care, DONT tell you the sex. They have signs up saying that babys health is the most important thing and basically dont embarrass yourself by asking about gender at 20 wk scan.

I did find out with Caitlin at 38/39 weeks when a consultant was doing a growth scan but the ordinary scan technicians def wont tell you - although you always hear of the odd person that got told somehow.

A clinic nearby offers 2D gender scans which last 15min but cost £120 and you only get a cpl of pics, no video. (Stuart hates 4D anyway so a fancy video package wouldnt be for us). How important was finding out the gender to you? If your local hospital refused to tell you would you pay £120? I REALLLY want to but tbh its a hell of a lot of money to us and would buy a few months of nappys. You guys seem so lucky as most of you seem to find out the sex relatively easily at routine scans.

not that important but i wonder if my hospital didnt tell people..would i have wanted to know more? we just asked if it was obvious and it was, and in retrospect i think it helped me bond with a 'real' baby?! but we wouldn't have been too bothered if we couldnt find out (maybe???)

I really didnt want to know as I think its a really magical moment when the put the baby in your arms and you find out what type it is. And then theres the phoning everyone with your big announcment!!!

And the choosing the boys and girls names - oh its just so exciting not knowing.

Ive never found out as i love the waiting and huge suprise at teh end. And then theres the pink or blue shopping spree that follows

It was important to me but only really becuase I knew I could find out if I wanted. If it hadn't been an option then I def wouldn't have paid for it. I'm just super impatient so if there is the chance of finding out then I'm there but I am also super tight so no way would I have paid to find out

xx

mmm 120 is a lot of money! I can't believe they don't tell you though... they tell you here but then with all the scans its quite hard to NOT find out.

If they didn't tell you and you had to pay for a private scan I think I would stil do it... I dont think I could NOT find out... but thats me.

I'm far too impatient to wait and I never got that nice moment of the baby being passed to me after giving birth bit anyway so I think it would have been ruined if I waited! I'm not sure I'd pay all that much to find out though.
It was very very obvious at Stephen's scan that he was a boy though and I loved calling him by his name whilst I was pregnant. What I hate though is loads of people are already going on and on at me about how wrong it is of me to find out the sex with this one. It's a very personal choice and it's still a surprise whether you wait 20 weeks or 40 !
(sorry went on a bit there, had some very annoying conversations in work yesterday!)

my local hospital told me when i had my first but not the other 2 , well my consultant told me he would tell me at 36 weeks with D but i paid 75 quid for a private 2d sexing scan
it was very important to me to find out purely as i am so bloody impatient and had to be completely ready in terms of pink or blue stuff and clothing also my housing situation really meant i needed to know soooner rather than later , in all honesty i have picked my prams based on sex , i couldnt have had a nice purple coloured pram with a boy ( personal preferance here by the way )

i didnt find out with rich and as you know we dont know with this one,

to me it makes it more exciting not knowing, i love the fact i've not brought alot of things so i can go out and show my bubs off buying pink or blue.

i know its more annoying for friends and family if you dont know, as they cant buy, but i like that too, (can imagine them all running out shopping on day bubs finally arrives)

also apparently according to a mw i spoke to, moms who dont know actually push harder because they want to know, i dont know if this is scientific

we had scan at 37 weeks and we didnt find out and still couldnt tell anyway.

we were going to have a 4d scan, take rich, but then when i thought of the money, i said i'd prefer to have a family photo when bubs is here, so we going to do that

With Ollie I was so impatient I had to know and I genuinely didn't care wether it was a boy or gir, I just had to know either way so we found out at the scan then had a 4d scan at 28 weeks to double check.

With Amelia, I knew I was going to have a csection and the chances were it would be an emergency so I paid for a gender scan at 16 weeks because I wanted to know first and I know that my oh wouldn't be able to keep it a secret and half our families would know what she was before I did

personally wouldnt find out if i had any more! i didnt with leo and it was a lovley surprise(although i just kind of knew it was a boy) with ollie i found out and regretted it
if i had any more i wouldnt find out...but i have been told by 2 different psycics that id have 3 boys, one was when i was only 12 lol x

oo i didnt knw some places wont tell, i cant see what the harm is in telling people if they can find out?

we found out with paige as we thought it would be nice to know who we was having (we had names for years) this time wefound out as we needed to get a new house, and waned a three bed if it was a boy (i had a feeling it was a boy)

but i think now, if we had another i wouldnt find out even though it would be so hard

The main reasons I have heard for not telling people is

- it takes too much time up at 20 weeks scan, and the time should be spent thoroughly checking organs, fluid, placenta etc. Appointments can run over with people desperately trying to see gender, or other things get missed in the hype.

- Some people may abort certain sexes so it stops this happening (cant even get abortions here so thats dumb!)

- People do get it wrong and its to stop that happening and the heartache/expense that can cause.

ooo i see, thats pretty bad people would get rid of the baby if it wasnt the sex they wanted

see our hospital tell but they say its not 100% that it is the right sex

both scans with paige n this little man it was hard to tell as paige had her legs shut and so did he lol but she was like i would say its a boy.

the sexing scans your end are costly, i think the one they do at baby bond is 80quid, n the 3d one with three b/w pics and a 5-10 min dvd is 140. we had it done with paige want on this time but cant really afford it.

perry did say if we couldnt find out what we was having fro our 20 week scan he would pay to find out x

With Libby they told us they were quite sure she was a girl but not 100% we had a 4d scan to confirm it, we were absolutely desparate to find out.

With Dexter I kind of saw 'it' before the sonographer confirmed he was a boy But if they couldnt tell us then I would of paid again to have a private scan.

To us it was VERY important, as you know I decorated the bedrooms before they came (as tbh, I hardly have a chance for a shower let alone decorating!) and got clothes,picked names etc. To us it made it all feel a bit more real, that there was a tiny person growing inside, I hated calling them 'it' before the 20 week scans.

xxx
xxx

it was important for us as we felt more prepared, and i know for a fact if we bought loads of neutral colour clothes, the moment the baby was born and people bought us pink/blue etc then the neutral ones would never be used. I hated dressing bubs in in cream/white/yellow after about 6 weeks lol.
I do say this but i would like to think that if we do have another we may keep it a secret.
Just everything from pram/bouncy chair/highchair etc i just know i would have wanted the 'girly' versions if i didnt know what dita was when she was born and had got all neautral stuff.
x

I wanted a surprise but i cudnt find enoguht unisex clothing so i wanted to be prepared for our 1st baby so we found out. I wouldnt pay that much to find out the sex to be honest x

I had to find out I'm so impatient lol. We paid for a private gender scan with both boys at 17/18 weeks x

I want to know for sure, but I already know that my hospital wont reveal the sex either as I see the sign for it. I am far to impatient and would rather be prepared with all the colours lol. Im not sure what position we will be in financially when im lucky enough to fall pregnant but I think I will end up going for a gender scan anyway (not sure o/h will be of the same thinking lol)

I was convinced I was having a boy from the start but we didn't find out although we had plenty of opportunity to (scans at 20, 32, 34 and 38 weeks). We both wanted the surprise and also had heard of people being told they were having one and then getting the other. If we had another we wouldn't find out either

Hmmm, I was just extra extra impatient, so yeah I would pay the money if I couldn't find out at my NHS scan.

We started off saying we wanted a suprise, but curiosity quickly took over and I felt I could bond with Alyssa so much more as I knew she was a girl.

To me after spending 3 years TTC and then 9 months carrying her + an extra 12 days lol! The whole experience of giving birth to her was so overwhelming for me that it didn't make a difference.

The minute they said I could start pushing I burst into tears as I knew that this little person that I had longed for so much was about to make her appearance into the world and it was the best feeling ever.

I still got Matt to check though when she was born that she was a little girl lol! xx

it was really important for me not to find out the sex
I didn't want anyone else to know so if I did find out I'd never have been able to keep it secret!
plus, I knew it was a baby......the sex was irrelevant!

I didn't find out what any of mine were. I wanted a surprise everytime. The hospital here asked me when I first went into the scan room did we want to know the sex and we said no.

I didnt find out. I dont know why. I wanted to and oh kinda did. no one else wanted to know. my mum said if we found out she just didnt want us to tell her. I would have found that too hard not being able to say "she" or "her" in front of my mum.

honestly I think with hindsight I would have bonded more if Id have known my little girlie was in there. I had quite a difficult labour and didnt get to hold her straight away like id hoped and imagined, didnt manage to breast feed and was quite difficult attending to her every need when Id had a section and was quite sore. so knowing in advance it was the little girl id hoped for I might have felt a bit different.
I will defo 100% find out with any future babies regardless of cost. my hospital dont even give 20 week scans at all so Id have to pay anyway

x

They dont do 20 week scans??? Do you just get a dating scan at 12 weeks then?

I was a bit miffed at only getting 2 scans as other hospitals iv heard of doing dating scan at 12 weeks, 20 week health scan and then a scan at 30 ish weeks to check fluids/positions etc. In the end with Caitlin I had loads of scans at the end due to growth issues.

Im so shocked at people not getting a 20 week one!

OMG! I can't beleive you dont get a 20 week scan steph, thats awful!