Woman gives Birth without knowing she is Pregnant

Not sure quite where to put this topic - moderators please move if wrong place.

I heard an interesting and puzzling story on the radio today about a 20yr old who went to hospital with back and abdo pains, and was sent home with painkillers. When pain got worse, parents called ambulance and on route to hospital her waters broke. Sounds normal, except she didn't know she was pregnant and didn't have any "baby bump". When born the baby was 5lb 8oz = 2.5kg. (see http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-kent-26865910 for story & video).

This raises several questions for me: How common is this? How would she have not known she was pregnant, surely her periods would have stopped & she'd have felt the baby? How, anatomically, can this happen - if her enlarging uterus is entirely within her normal abdomen, how do all the other organs get affected?

your thought and views would be appreciated.

This is more common than you might think, but unusual in thin women like this.

I hate to put it this way, but stupidity plays a role here.

Very heavy women, especially who have irregular periods are typical for this occurrence, especially in lower socioeconomic areas..

My grandmother delivered a full term stillborn baby without knowing she was pregnant. This was back in the early 50's. She was a rather large women. My mother said the her mom started to bleed real bad and they rushed her to the local doctors office where she delivered it. Mom said the doctor was really shocked because he had seen her just a few weeks before.

I was working in an ICU unit in a hospital when we received a woman from the ER with severe abdominal pains. She was grossly obese. Shortly after arriving she needed to move her bowels. Several of us were needed to get her on a bedpan. Imagine our surprise when we was the baby's head between her legs. Sounds far fetched I know but it's true. She was so large you couldn't tell nor could you get fetal heart tones and she was clueless

Last month, a worker at a Houston apartment complex heard noise in the dumpster and found a baby (he was fine). They located the teenage mom, and she said she had no idea she was pregnant and thought the baby was dead when she delivered him.

I know it happens more frequently than we think, but I am amazed every time. I can understand not showing if the mom is overweight or obese, but I don't understand how they do not feel the baby moving inside. My daughter used to wake me up at night "bungee jumping" from one side to the other, kicking and stretching she was so strong.

I'm with switchablesusie on this one: stupidity plays a part. I suppose she never had sex either. You have to wonder about some people in society.

There are cases where the woman has been severely abused and becomes pregnant through the one who has abused her. The concept may be so horrible to comprehend that the brain and the body literally hide it from her, especially if she is heavy or obese in body weight. The brain is VERY powerful and many times we forget just what it is capable of. On a large, heavy, obese woman, conducting pelvic exams can be very challenging especially if they are self conscious with poor body image. It is common to have irregular cycles and hormones to be messed up as adipose tissue secretes its own hormones thus disrupting normal hormonal secretions and body cycles. In a heavy woman, gaining baby weight, increasing in size of their clothes, having increased pressure in their abdominal cavity, increased breathing issues, new breathing issues etc, they can attribute to the fact they are just putting on more weight. If they have a history of cysts, fibroids, bowel and GI issues, headaches, fatigue, swelling of the extremities, and or are aware that these can be side affects of being heavy, they will not see these signs as pregnancy.

I have a girlfriend who is VERY thin, athletic. Her cycle has always been irregular. Six years ago she went for an annual and discovered she was 4 1/2 months pregnant. As for morning sickness, it didn't give her a clue due to the fact she had an eating disorder of many years and was constantly throwing up and using laxatives. She also did not know the SOB she was having sex with was messing with her birth control pills. He also refused to use condoms. She married the SOB and had two more children with the same experience as with her first. Thank God her divorce should be final in July of this year!

Some women who are pregnant hardly show at all. If they are trying to hide it from others, it is possible. When they do deliver, it can come as a shock to many who had no clue. My sister in law has had 4 live births and only started to barely show in her 7th, 8th, 9th month, though she knew she was pregnant and she is not at all overweight.

I also agree with Susie in regards to stupidity and lower socioeconomic class and area.

It can also be due to lack of education the woman/female has received and how tuned into her body she is and any taboo surrounding her age and situation of how she became pregnant. This can play back into how the brain and the body can hide the pregnancy from her and those around her.

Thanks for all your replies; they've been very informative. I had considered that obese females might not notice increase in weight / bump appearance. However, it seemed unbelievable for slim females.

Here is another article on the same incident:

https://uk.lifestyle.yahoo.com/size-10-party-girl-gives-birth-to-surprise-baby-thinking-it%E2%80%99s-back-pain-095735984.html

It mentions one very important fact the the BBC article did not: the mother had regular periods during her pregnancy, so much so that she thought her labor pains were only bad menstrual cramps. I can't imagine how this is even physically possible.

Years ago I had a woman working for me who went 7 months before knowing she was pregnant. Not the sharpest tool in the shed because when she missed a bunch of her periods and started to gain weight thought she had a tumor.

When this situation was reported in the papers a couple years back in our area, I asked an acquaintance who was an OB/GYN doc what was up. He said it was usually a heavy woman whose weight gain was passed off as getting fatter. Who knows what she thought about the baby kicking, and other symptoms like morning sickness and no period. He'd had two, and said most OB docs had at least one in their careers. Nurse told me her heavy daughter came to her with weird symptoms, puzzled. Nursey recommended pregnancy test--daughter was almost 6 months pregnant.

It's very curious.

Years ago I had a woman working for me who went 7 months before knowing she was pregnant. Not the sharpest tool in the shed because when she missed a bunch of her periods and started to gain weight thought she had a tumor.

Thinking you have a tumor ... now that's an even better reason to go to a doctor ...