32 years old TTC girl after 2 boys (27mo. and 15mo.)

Hi everyone, I just wanted to introduce myself as I have really enjoyed reading other people's sway experiences. I am currently planning on TTC next cycle for our first girl. We are lucky to have two healthy, happy boys. I did not sway with either of them #1 was conceived after about 1 year of TTC on my second round of Clomid 50mg. #2 was unplanned and conceived while I was breastfeeding. My diet for both was very "boy friendly" lots of salt, red meat and relatively high calorie. No artificial sweetners, almost no dairy. My BMI was around 23 at the time of both conceptions and is hovering around that number currently. I drank no caffeine or alcohol when TTC #1. For #2 I was drinking 1 cup of coffee daily and wine 2-3 times per week. Currently drinking 2-3 cups of coffee daily and a glass of wine each night (sometimes 2). I read the Babydust method (would love to hear your take on that) and have scoured the internet for other info as I know many of you ladies have. Here is my sway plan so far:

Diet: Vegetarian (I was a strict vegetarian in the past for many years, but not when I conceived both boys), calories <1800 daily, no formal exercise- just being realistic
Supplements: cranberry, magnesium, vitamin D3, was taking pregnitude to hasten O but it made me breakout so I dropped it
Timing: Aiming for 1 attempt with 2-3 day cut off but my cycles are long and O ranges from CD21-CD30 since coming off of birth control 5 months ago
DTD: Hot baths for husband and FR (he has a high libido and releases almost everyday anyway)
Tracking: I have been using OPKs and the Ovusense monitor to track and confirm O. My cycles are on the longer side.
Prescriptions: I have two rounds of Clomid 50mg left over from TTC #1 (expired in Nov '19) and I'm debating taking it with my sway attempts. I will talk with my gyno at my next appt. in June to explain my long cycles hoping to get a fresh RX.

Any input on my sway would be greatly appreciated! I would also love to hear anyone's success stories conceiving a girl with a shortish age gap from a boy. I've heard a lot of people say that close birth order tends to yield children of the same sex.

Wishing everyone a successful sway,
DizzyLizzy

Hi and welcome Lizzy!

I am personally not a fan of Babydust Method, since they stole our one attempt from us, combined it with timing, and then went out and found one really sketchy study that claimed to prove it (while ignoring the many studies that do NOT prove timing works) and then started selling it as their own research when it was all other people's. I am regularly having people show up here having tried to do that technique for many months to a year and aren't getting pregnant with it. Plus, some of the claims they make about how OPK work are totally untrue. So while it's fine to start off with timing + one attempt, I really urge you to drop timing BEFORE adding attempts, since it's the one attempt that works.

Re cranberry, most of us have dropped it since it didn't work and may up odds of miscarriage. If you do want to continue using it please be sure to stop taking it at ovulation and don't continue into pregnancy.

We find D3 to be a strong blue swayer and I really beg you to wean off that for the sake of your sway. I got boys taking Vit D and dropped it to get my girl.

Are you eating a very high carb diet?? I suspect your irregular cycles are more due to having recently come off BCP, but I have a variation of a diet that may help regulate your cycle while also being a strong pink sway if you're interested.

Cutoff timing is gonna be tough with irregular cycles. If you want to do timing, what I would do is use your fertility monitor or digi opk like Clearblue and then have your attempt that day of SECOND "high" reading (the day before peak). But be aware that sometimes you will have many days of high before going to peak, and other times you can go right to peak without any high readings, so you'll need to have a Plan B in case that happens.

That Clomid is almost certainly good still, so we could still use it. You could even consider breaking the pills to 25 mg and then having 4 months' worth if you wanted to.

Close birth order tends to sway pink since you'll be depleted and still possibly undergoing suppressed fertility due to the presence of hormones in your system. I am happy to give you the backstory about all that if you're interested, it's pretty involved so I don't want to throw it at you if you aren't interested LOL. Just let me know. :)

Thanks for responding! I will drop the Vitamin D and Cranberry. I do tend to eat a lot of carbs, mostly fruit and starchy veg like corn and beans. I really don't have a sweet tooth. I also don't snack a lot and tend to skip breakfast. I am hoping that my cycles will regulate as my body adjusts to being off BCP. I'd like to know more about the close birth order swaying pink (although DS2 was contrary to that since he was conceived when DS1 was only 2 months old!).

I also wanted to get your take on TTC after a surgery. I will be getting a deviated septum repaired on the 18th under general anesthesia. I will be on antibiotics for 10 days and narcotic pain medication for 3-4 days so I know I will be out for that cycle. Any indications that the body being in a weakened state like healing from a surgery might sway pink? Looking for a silver lining :) with missing a month of trying. I think I will still try for a cutoff at least in the short term.

I can't really remember what Clomid did to my cycles last time, it should bring O up by a few days correct?

Wean off them, don't just drop them cold turkey. (and PLEASE get off that cranberry before your surgery!! Let's wean off that quickly because cranberry can cause bleeding during surgery. I'd like to see you off it all the way for at least a week before the surgery and please tell the doctor you were taking it, and then read it is a blood thinner, since many of them are not up to speed on blood thinning supplements.)

The close birth order thing can be confusing for people because it is really maternal condition and fertility that is swaying. Lower condition/fertility = more girls, higher condition and fertility = more boys. Getting pregnant 2 months postpartum is not at all the norm, and it indicates that you are in pretty good condition and have (or had at that time) a high level of fertility. Most people aren't even getting a CYCLE at that point, let alone conceiving! So just by virtue of being able to get pregnant at all may mean you're more "set" for blue even if close spacing still sways pink.

Because it's about condition and fertility, what happens is that people who are in lower condition and lower fertility simply don't get pregnant at all. The people who do get pregnant are probably the people who are more likely to have boys, and we really can't look at the numbers to prove this because of the overall condition/fertility wrinkle. I have yet to come up with a good way to test for this, unfortunately.

To put illustrative numbers on it, just as an example and not as hard data, let's say that due to your good condition you were 60% likely to have a boy. Close spacing swayed pink for you (let's say 10%) and that made it so you had a 50-50 shot of a boy or a girl, and then you rolled the dice and came up blue. People have a mistaken image that anything that sways is a guarantee, but any given sway tactic makes a small amount of difference and there are still other things that come into play, so just because something didn't seem to work in the past doesn't mean it can't work in the future, or that it doesn't work at all, if that makes sense.

I agree that your surgery will likely sway pink for you. Above all else do what's best for you since it's likely the effect will last longer than a cycle - I don't want you to rush to try if you should wait it out!

Clomid can definitely change your cycle, moving O day either sooner or later. There's no rhyme or reason to it, people report results all over the map!

Hi dizzylizzy i had septum surgery during my first pink sway, got bfp 2 months later and baby was a girl so if anything the surgery should work a bit in your favour :) good luck and pink dust

Thanks for your comment! It’s really encouraging to hear about your sway success after surgery.


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Thank you for your advice, I have weaned off the D3 and took a break from the Cranberry before surgery and during my initial recovery. I think I will resume cranberry pills but just from AF-O as you suggested. I track with OPKs (the pregmate cheapo kind) and Ovusense temp monitor, so I can be fairly accurate with knowing when I O. I recently had my annual gyno exam and I told the nurse we were ttc #3, and explained that my cycles were long (between 40-48 days), so she wrote a new Rx for Clomid. That was easy! I am planning on using it starting CD3 of next cycle. I am a little nervous though because I don't want to miss O. I am planning on doing only one attempt and I am guessing the Clomid will move my O date up substantially. Currently I have been Oing around CD28.

I have been on a vegetarian diet, but I'm not currently losing any weight (lost 5lbs in the week after surgery, but gained it all back). I've been having more drinks than usual, 2-3 per day (my husband is a professional brewer and I am a rather unreluctant taste-tester).

My question is this- which seems to have a greater impact: overall calorie intake & weight loss or the fat/protein/carb balance of those calories? Diet is the hardest thing for me to stick to and I do find losing weight difficult. However, aside from the Clomid, I understand it is the most influential tactic. What are your thoughts?

Great! So glad you got the Clomid!

You'll def. need to use OPK and your Ovusense to have one attempt on Clomid. It WILL very very likely move your ovulation considerably and without OPK you won't know when to have the one attempt. Most people ovulate 5-10 days after the last dose of Clomid.

ON Clomid only do 1 attempt the first month or two and then we'll start adding attempts.

We don't have the data to tell what is more effective for pink, but what I do know is this - the macros are in place NOT because of swaying but for safety. Occasionally we have people who do things like eat 1500 cals of pure sugar, very low protein and fat diet (THIS IS NOT LE DIET) thinking it will somehow sway pink for them, but the reasons those levels are what they are is for the sake of safety, not the sway. Eating too little protein and fat will both be disruptive to your cycle and also to your ability to get and stay pregnant (and in the case of protein, possibly evne your long term health) So be sure you're getting the minimum levels on LE Diet even if you don't want to track day in and day out.