How have I only just found out that babies are born with no knee caps!

[jmh740]

Dd 14 just told me babies are born without knee caps I though she was taking the p but it's true, how have a had 3 children and studied child development and only just discovered this???
What else do I need to know?

Yep, true

Have you googled an X-ray of a baby’s skull? They have all their adult teeth and that’s really creepy tbh

What

It is not really true. They haven’t completely ossified and fused but neither have any of the long bones.

It would be like saying babies are born without a femur just because the femur hasn’t fused.

Yeah but they do have kneecaps, they are just made of cartilage and harden into bone with age.

You can’t even see all of the adult teeth on the X-ray of an eight year old.

For some reason I did already know this. My own "I didn't know that" was that I thought for ages the saying was "a leper never changes his spots"

@LibertyMole

It is not really true. They haven’t completely ossified and fused but neither have any of the long bones.

It would be like saying babies are born without a femur just because the femur hasn’t fused.

Spoilsport! Did you tell your kids Santa wasn't real! Haha.

I'm off to google an x-ray of a baby's skull.

As a pregnant tryptophobic with a fear of kneecaps because mine dislocate, this thread has literally been absolute hell

The toddler skull X-ray!!!!!!

@plodalong12

For some reason I did already know this. My own "I didn't know that" was that I thought for ages the saying was "a leper never changes his spots"

But to the original OP I was like… Whaaaaaat??

DS3 is lying next to me in bed, so tempted to squeeze his knee but don’t want to wake him

I literally saw this being debunked on QI yesterday. Unfortunately like the OP the panel weren’t previously aware of the myth, so the trap fell a bit flat.

Here’s the QI link, including cool X-ray.

Has anyone seen the pictures of babies on mri scans? Now those are terrifying and they also look like the aliens from Mars attacks

@GrandTheftWalrus

Has anyone seen the pictures of babies on mri scans? Now those are terrifying and they also look like the aliens from Mars attacks

I need to see a pic!

Re toddler skulls, the images which look like a face full of teeth are of children with hyperdontia; most toddler xrays are much less terrifying, although yes they do have adult teeth in them.

What? Are you sure 🤔

There you go

@GrandTheftWalrus 25 weeks pregnant and about to got to bed to have nightmares of my baby staring from my womb like an alien from mars attacks.
Thank you

Sorry! My baby is now 7 weeks and I'm glad I didn't see them when I was pregnant 😂

Aren’t kneecaps always just cartilage though?

A 78 yo didn't know that there are no muscles in human fingers, only tendons.

I knew it since I was 10!

Babies are made of jelly. I know one who was born with one leg bending in the wrong direction at the knee, so that's how I knew about no kneecaps. Physio just gently pushed it back the right way, velcroed it up for a few days and it was fine ever after.

the knee caps don't start forming from cartilage to bone until between the ages of 2-6.
that's why they can happily crawl about on all fours for hours - their knees are not bones so they don't hurt!

is that all babies? my son whom is now 11 years old was born with kneecaps, how are they born with no kneecaps can someone please explain to ho this is possible? please thanks life is a learning curb and I love learning new things. I did not think it would be possible for babies to be born with no kneecaps. that's news to me!