When you see a pregnant woman with a huge gut, it is often thought “what a bigger baby she will have inside”, but the truth is that the size of the gut has no direct relationship with the size of the baby .
The same happens with small bellies from which babies with very good weight come out. It is common for women with small guts to worry about the growth of the baby in the womb, but you should know that not all tummies are the same.
The shape and size of the gut depend on many factors in addition to the size of the baby, such as the position of the baby in the uterus. If it is crossed, the gut will be wider, while if it is upside down, it will be less.
The size of the gut also depends on the amount of amniotic fluid and the size of the placenta, regardless of the weight of the baby.
The physical characteristics of the mother also play a role. If it is tall, even if it has the same gut size as a 20 cm shorter woman, visually it will appear that the tall one has a small gut and the low one a huge one. It is a matter of proportions.
It also has to do with the tonicity of the woman’s abdominal muscles. When the muscles are more flaccid the gut comes out more and when they are more developed the gut looks flatter. In cases of obesity, the gut can even go unnoticed.
The position of the uterus also influences, which in some women is located backwards making the abdomen less noticeable, and the spine that if it presents a deviation will make the belly look more or less prominent.
If it is a new mother, the gut takes longer to notice than in later pregnancies since the uterine muscle has not yet distended.
As you can see, the size of the gut does not have a direct relationship with the size of the baby. It is the ultrasounds through the measurements of the growth parameters (abdominal perimeter, cranial perimeter and length of the femur) that will determine if the baby’s size is adequate for its stage of gestation.
In Babies and more | The nine most frequently asked questions about the tummy in pregnancy: all the answers
