High BMI and NHS Scans

[TemporaryNameGame]

I had a BMI of 46 at my booking appointment.

I've had 3 scans so far:

1st private - went perfectly.
2nd early NHS due to cramping and bleeding @ 11 weeks - went perfectly.
3rd 12 week NHS...

My 12 week NHS scan went appallingly because baby was head forward and feet back. Nobody mentioned that even in this position it should have been possible to get readings. Nobody mentioned my BMI at all either.
The midwives just said that baby was in an awkward position and that's that.
I left with no pictures and no nuchal screening.
Later on, my badger notes were updated to say it was impossible to scan me due to BMI. I was surprised because it wasn't mentioned while I was there. I assume they don't like saying it to your face.

I don't typically carry much weight around my middle and so I thought my scans would be normal but now I'm really fretting.

It's my 20 week scan v soon and I'm now absolutely convinced that they won't be able to check for abnormalities or tell me the gender.

Should I just book privately instead?

Did larger ladies here find that they weren't actually able to be told about abnormalities and gender before birth?

Really confused because I've been told that I'll be getting extra scans due to my size but it equally seems that scanning doesn't work on bigger women. My trust do not offer transvaginal.

Any advice or reassurance is gratefully received. Thanks so much.

I have a high bmi and at 12 week scan I thought everything went great and I got amazing pictures but on my notes it said restricted view because of BMI.

My 20 week scan baby was in the most awkward position it took the sonographer an hour and 15 minutes to get all the info she needed and I had to move onto my side then onto the other side and walk round the room for a minute. It never mentioned BMI but it said restricted view due to feral position on my notes

Yep. Maternal adiposity doesn’t just mean ‘high BMI’ as an interchangeable term.

I think you’ve completely missed my point though… I have been ‘built’ exactly the same for all 3 of my pregnancies and have been almost exactly the same weight. But the ONE pregnancy where my BMI was in the 0.1 into the obese category, was coincidentally the ONLY pregnancy where my ‘maternal adiposity’ was mentioned at a scan. However it has never been mentioned in my other two pregnancies.

I understand what you are saying, and I know better than anyone that BMI doesn’t count for a lot. In my case I am explaining that it seems an awful coincidence that the extra 0.1 on the BMI scale was the tipping point between my scans not being technically difficult at all, and it being mentioned at every single scan for only one pregnancy. I think it is only natural to assume it was mentioned purely because they could do, as I was flagged as having high BMI.

Well I don’t know the trust. I wouldn’t even know if someone was down as high BMI at mine as I don't check for it. Possible but it doesn’t really matter does it?