This month was our first attempt at ttc another dd, and as seems to happen after the best of swaying plans are laid - everything goes awry once you make your first attempt. :) I ovulated 1-2 days earlier than normal, and in fact, in all the time I have been charting, I have only ovulated earlier than this one other time, 3+ years ago. *sigh* (And yeah, I know it would have been smarter to start BD sooner, but I had to keep in mind that 1. I am far, far, far more likely to ovulate late than early, and 2. dh and I are old and tired, lol, and even BD 4 times in a row is a superhuman feat for us to have to accomplish! :) )
So, anyway, I wondered how timing sways if there are only 3 BD times. This is what I found.
There were 91 girl charts, and 83 boy charts, resulting in a preference for girls of 52.3%. This is the breakdown of the charts
- 3 non-consecutive times including ovulation: 31 boy charts, 34 girl charts (sways girl 52.3%)
- 3 consecutive times including ovulation: 6 boy charts, 7 girl charts (sways girl 53.8%)
- 3 non-consecutive times including O and the day after O: 4 boy charts, 7 girls charts (sways girl 63.6%)
- 3 consecutive times including O and the day after O: 3 boy charts, 2 girl charts (sways boy 60%)
- 3 non-consecutive times ending before O: 23 boy charts, 26 girl charts (sways girl 53.1%)
- 3 consecutive times ending before O: 4 boy charts, 6 girl charts (sways girl 60%)
- 3 non-consecutive times with NO BD on O but WITH BD the day after O: 12 boy charts, 9 girl charts (sways boy 57.1%)
As you can see, there is a small preference for girls, but it is only about 3-4%. (The few high percentages are due solely to having small numbers of charts available for those patterns, and the percentages are not reliable for that reason.) Here are some other ways to look at the numbers.
- the BD includes ovulation: 44 boy charts, 50 girl charts (sways girl 53.2%)
- the BD doesn't include ovulation: 39 boy charts, 41 girl charts (sways girl 51.25%)
- the BD is non-consecutive: 70 boy charts, 76 girl charts (sways girl 52.1%)
- the BD is consecutive: 13 boy charts, 15 girl charts (sways girl 53.6%)
- BD includes the day after ovulation: 19 boy charts, 18 girl charts (sways boy 51.4%)
- BD doesn't include the day after ovulation: 64 boy charts, 73 girl charts (sways girl 53.3%)
Note: It may seem a bit odd that girls are favored for everything except for BD that includes the day after ovulation. But the reason for this is simply that there are more girl charts in this sample. Since the results for everything are close to 50/50, almost all of the patterns slightly favor girls.
The moral of the story is that if you are planning frequent BD to sway for a girl, it is best to start too early rather than too late (assuming both you and your partner can keep up with the BD schedule!). If you try for frequent BD and get cut short by early ovulation - even by just one day - it does significantly reduce your timing odds for getting a girl. This is yet another reason why it is good to do several effective things to sway. You won't screw up your whole sway if you mess up one part! ;)