Life with multiple pregnancies in the womb

About 3% of pregnant women in the United States are multiple pregnancies, resulting in twins or more. Every 8,000 births, a mother will have triplets, and every 64 million births, a foursome will be born.

Jennifer Clapp-Bennett and her husband, Daniel, saw the faces of three boys on a computer screen, moving flexibly in three-dimensional space for months before their womb.

National Geographic TV channel has used 4-dimensional ultrasound images when Clapp-Bennett is pregnant, extrapolating them to create the rendering of the lives of babies in crowded uterus.

The Bennett trio of boys were in the womb.(Photo: ABC)

Dr. Thomas Pinckert, Clapp-Bennett's doctor, was watching these footage."It was impressive, and it was very accurate , " he said. "I loved to go and watch it."

Three boys of Bennett are now 10 months old: Ashton, Roman and Colten. They were born through an early caesarean section about 1 month before, each weighing about 2 kg - quite large for triplets. Now, they are very lively and curious, busy crawling around.

However, having multiple pregnancies is also quite complicated.

When a new embryo implants in the uterus, 7 to 10 days later, it is still smaller than a grain of rice. From here, the baby begins to grow fast. At the end of the second month, the baby is only 2.5 cm long, roughly the same size as a pea. At the end of the 3rd month, your baby can be up to 7.5 cm long, with eyes, ears, arms, legs and most other parts of the body to create the shape of a fetus.

But in the case of multiple pregnancies, the uterus becomes too crowded when the baby is 5 months old. Each fetus, at that time, was 17 to 22 cm long. But because of lack of space, their growth rate slowed.

Clapp-Bennett said she felt clearly the bustle inside her body."If one starts kicking, then all of them will move around. It's like they're doing rhythmic exercise in my belly."

By ultrasound, doctors say they can see special things happening in a multiple pregnancy uterus. For example, this baby holds the other baby's hand, pulls each other's umbilical cord, sometimes there is another baby behind the back, or covers her face to protect herself.

Some researchers believe that in the womb, early signs of this twins or triplets may be detected when they are born.

"Twins are close to each other at the same time as the inertia of the womb , " Penny Glass, director of child development at the National Children's Medical Center in Washington, USA, said. expression. They crawled to and touched each other, like they did in the womb.

Because of seeing children often through ultrasound, Clapp-Bennett said she learned how to distinguish them - and these traits are still true today.

"I think the children are still the same, Ashton, is always the center. They are very similar to the personality while in the womb , " she said.

T. An