Love Them or Loathe Them: Baby Showers Are a Pregnancy Rite of Passage

Key Highlights :

1. Baby showers can be a bit wet and unpleasant.

2. Baby showers are a way to celebrate the arrival of a new baby.

3. Baby showers are not a good time if people have had a lot to drink.

     Baby showers: you either love them or you loathe them. But whether you're a fan or not, they are an undeniable pregnancy rite of passage. For many expecting mothers, a baby shower is a chance to celebrate the impending arrival of their little one with friends and family, and to be showered with gifts and love. But for others, baby showers can seem a bit...wet.

     If you’ve never been to a baby shower, here’s what you can expect. Instead of spending your Sunday afternoon doing the weekly grocery shop, or catching up on your favourite TV show, you have to sacrifice your precious free time to celebrate your friend’s life choices.

     In an ideal world, baby showers would involve eating delicious food and sipping on Aperol spritz in a sunny garden bar. But in reality, most baby showers are held at the parents of the expectant mum’s house, and usually involve tiny sandwiches and one bottle of prosecco to share between 22 guests. Then the games begin, with no Cards Against Humanity or beer pong in sight. Instead, guests are expected to partake in activities like “pin the vomit on the baby” or “guess the poo”, where different types of chocolate bars have been melted into nappies and you have to literally chow them down.

     It’s understandable if this isn’t your idea of a good time. But for some, baby showers are a chance to celebrate the impending arrival of their little one with friends and family, and to be showered with gifts and love.

     Of course, we would all love to gift our pregnant friend the entire Jamie Kay catalogue, but there’s a cost-of-living crisis and some people are barely making rent. And in some cases, the expectant mother has just gotten married and her friends have already forked out to celebrate her and her husband on their wedding. So, it can be a tough ask to expect them to buy her $60 lambskin booties from Nature Baby out of their “emergency account”.

     But despite all the potential downsides, sometimes a baby shower is exactly what an expectant mother needs. For example, if she has been housebound with hyperemesis for more than seven months, and she’s feeling bored, exhausted and lonely, a baby shower could be just the thing to lift her spirits.

     For Sinead, this is exactly the case. After having an internal battle about whether to have a baby shower or not, she decided to go ahead and have one. But she’s doing it in the least painful way possible – no gross games, and no eating anything out of nappies. She’s also made a gift registry but is only giving it to people who say it’s helpful. Plus, she’s inviting men to the party so it’s not a circle of women with a The Handmaid’s Tale-esque vibe.

     For Sinead, her baby shower is a chance to get her hair blow-dried and to wear a nice, tight dress. It’s a chance to have fun with her friends for the last time until she emerges from newborn hell, and to revel in an afternoon where she is the centre of attention.

     So, love them or loathe them, baby showers are a pregnancy rite of passage. For some, they are a chance to celebrate the impending arrival of their little one with friends and family, and to be showered with gifts and love. But for others, they can seem a bit wet. But either way, they’re a chance for expectant mothers to enjoy a special day that is all about them before they become a little girl’s mum first and everything else second.

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