Can I know if my baby is big for my pelvis? Help!

[faheena]

I had my daughter in Sept 2003, and now I am 34 weeks pregnant with my second. First was an emergency c-section, I had gone to my hospital only for a checkup where they told me that I was leaking amniotic fluid slowly, but I had no pains at all. They asked me if I wanted to be induced, I didn?t know much about it and I happily agreed. After inducing twice (with a gel) I started to feel slight pains and when I was at 3cm I took epidural. I spent 7-8 hrs of labor under epidural with strong contractions, but my cervix failed to dilate after 3 & half cms. Baby was showing distress and finally I was told that I will need a c-section, my Epidural was then topped up and I went into the surgery. As soon as my baby was born, my doctor told me that "This was anyways a very big baby for u to deliver vaginally coz you have a small pelvic inlet" my daughter?s weight was 3.165kg & it was my 38th week. Now, I want to know was there a possibility that my doc could find out about my bone size & baby's head size during my last weeks of pregnancy? Because even now with my second baby I am seeing the same doctor, my due date is 3rd Oct 2005, but she has told me that if its again a same sized baby then I will have a c-sec, she has given me a date 15th Sept.2005 for an elective c-section. And has also told me that if incase natural labor begins before this date then she will give me a short trial to deliver normally. Now I am very confused whether or not to have my operation on 14th Sept.? or wait for a natural birth till I complete my full 40weeks i.e 3rd Oct.? Or shell I ask her to 1st induce me on 14th before my operation & see if the baby can be born vaginally? Or may be by scans she can find out the size of this baby before hand? Pls. give me your advice what I should do.

[jampots]

faheena - lots of moms on this site have had similar (in a lot of cases - worse) experiences. They can gauge the size of the baby by scan. I am assuming you are very small and this may be why they have advised you to have elective c/s. My first was born by em c.s at 39 weeks and she was 3.9kg, I had to go the elective route next time too as I was even bigger - he was 3.95kg at 37 weeks. However for some people on here thats nothing! Would you prefer a vaginal delivery or are you worried about it?

[faheena]

I certainly want a vaginal delivery but I want to wait for normal birth, but only when my doc can confirm to me that this baby's size is smaller then my 1st one. Problem is that she is not cheking my pelvic & baby's size at all. If she says to me for sure that its again a big baby then I WILL NOT wait for normal birth I can straight away go for my c-section on 14th without any doubts.

[RedZuleika]

The only thing with measuring the size of the baby - or indeed your non-labouring pelvis - is that it fails to allow for the amount of expansion during labour. From everything I've read, it seems that one's pelvis can expand by up to 29% during labour - so the doctor couldn't have definitely known the outcome of trying to birth your daughter.

Obviously the decision is yours entirely and has to be one with which you are happy: it isn't the doctor's decision to 'give' you a trial of labour.