Belly smaller and squishier than before?

[Ambyrkatt]

I'll be 36 weeks on Friday. On Monday, I had an NST and was told that baby had turned breech. I don't really think baby is breech now, but I'm not certain. I feel little movements down low and stronger movements up high, so I'm hoping the little ones are hands/head and the stronger ones are feet.

Anyway, I have noticed today and yesterday than my belly appears smaller and it definitely feels more squishy. Any ideas as to what this means? Has baby dropped? Or maybe just facing a different way?

I feel like all these questions I keep coming up with are FTM questions that I should already know the answer to, but DS didn't drop until labor, so I'm clueless!

[MaerynPearl]

I have no clue but i know its normal to go back and forth between being squishy and not!

[gradstudentmommy]

I just read in my Hypnobabies workbook today when the baby is anterior, your belly feels hard and when it's posterior, it feels more squishy. So maybe the baby is head down now but posterior?

[Ambyrkatt]

I was thinking baby might be posterior now. So, not great, but certainly WAY better than being breech. I have another NST tomorrow, so I can confirm where she is, but the movements I'm getting today feel more head down to me (or is that wishful thinking?).

[MaerynPearl]

at least posteriors not as hard to encourage baby out of as breech is (just get on your hands and knees for half an hour... and avoid squatting.

if squishy = posterior mines still spinning back and forth daily and sometimes through the day!

[Ambyrkatt]

Yeah, I don't worry so much about posterior. I still have time for turning, right? But breech... that freaks me out beyond belief! Do not want a c-section. Repeat. Do not want a c-section.

[MaerynPearl]

yeah a c section really freaks me out, especially because i have a low lying anterior placenta... talk about making a c-section a bad choice! I really do NOT like the thought of having to cut through the placenta to get to the baby!

[gradstudentmommy]

I think the fact that you're feeling the stronger movements up high and little movements down low bodes well for baby being head down.

I was so clueless during my last pregnancy. I didn't know until AFTER the baby had been born that she had been posterior. I don't even know if she was born sunny side up or if she ended up flipping. In some ways, ignorance was bliss because I didn't worry about it. And I didn't have any back labor, but I did have a very long, painful labor which my doula thought was partially due to the posterior baby.

But posterior isn't the end of the world. And I thought if the baby was "butt first" breech, it could be delivered vaginally and that only feet first breech babies needed a c-section?

I hope your baby cooperates!

[xekomaya]

I vote for posterior. Mine spends a ton of her time that way and spins several times a day. You'll feel more arms and legs poking out and around when the babe is posterior vs. the solid lump of a bum and firm spine down your belly when anterior.

[DoulaLMT]

I'm so glad I'm not the only one whose baby goes back and forth between anterior and posterior! I thought it was unusual because DS was LOA or LOT and stayed that way pretty much the entire second half of my pregnancy. I guess maybe THAT was unusual. This one hands out on my right side most of the time. I do hands and knees every day and have tried to get her to the left side, but so far to no avail. I've felt the squishy belly a few times lately, so I think she's going between ROA and ROP.

FWIW, DS was in a "perfect" position for the entire second half of pregnancy, but he ended up being asynclitic (head cocked to one side, ear to shoulder) and I had a difficult time getting him out because of that. So even a "perfect" position prior to labor doesn't mean much. Except for the head down part. That's pretty important.