The “How Will My Baby Look” Dilemma

Many future moms are getting at one point or the other of their pregnancy to the moment when presumptions about their baby appearance tend to become something very frequent.

The future parents are most of the time leaning towards the theory that girls take after their father and boys take after their mother. This is the result of the common belief that somehow the baby’s sex is responsible for switching genes and resembling more one parent or the other.

We as parents have the ultimate saying about how our baby will look and this matter is not something that is solved during pregnancy.

What we should know for a fact is that the human body has 46 chromosomes and between 60 thousands and 100 thousand of genes.

Your baby will take 23 chromosomes from the mother and 23 from the father, so with a 50/50 % report, the odds of the child looking more like one parents than the other is pretty much a game of chance.

Considering that our genes are keen to do mathematical permutations, the multitude of gene combinations would allow an average human couple to produce over 6 trillion babies all carrying unique features and some completely different from the others.

Can you picture now, why is it so difficult to imagine how will your baby look like?

Taking for example the color of your baby eyes, you should be aware that there are hundreds of genes able to decide on that matter. It may come as a surprise for two people having blue eyes to bring into the world a baby with brown or black eyes.

The surprise is actually not so great because the genes responsible for the eye color are running on the genetic lines back to three or four generations so the genetic information is in there ready to pop up.

The face and body features reside in the same area of genes transmitted through the generations. The shape of the hands, the feet, the nails and the hair color are conditioned by powerful genes that are transmitted from generation to generation.

The finger prints and the teeth characteristics are features proven to be transmitted directly from the parents to their baby.

A mom could make an idea about her baby’s face by looking at the pictures of family members and relatives. If a pointy chin, a large nose or a wide smile is something frequent in those pictures the odds are very great that the baby will inherit one or the other.

We all want our sons to be tall “as a church steeple” and our daughters to be slender like “a twig in the wind”. Unfortunately we are the designers of our children and they inherit our average height and weight.

If you have a baby boy waiting to be born, make the average between the height of his father and yours and add 10 centimeters. If the baby is a girl decrease the average with 10 centimeters. The method might sound too simple but it really works and it has been proven to be accurate.

The baby’s future weight will depend on many factors based on the genetic disposition and that is pretty much something that you as a parent can control.

The personality and psychological disposition on the other hand are the most interesting aspects a mother should consider.

The baby will inherit and improve many of your talents and qualities but also will have the wonderful disposition you have. Still you must be aware that it was proved by so many studies that the environment and the company a baby is surrounded with has a huge influence over the baby’s personality.

2 COMMENTS

  1. It is amazing how complex genetics are. I never expected for my kids to look quite how they do, but they’re more gorgeous than I could have imagined.

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