One mom is astounding people with photos from her pregnancy in which she never had a visible baby bump, even at nine months — despite eventually giving birth to a totally healthy baby.
When Nikki Salazar got pregnant two years ago, she was excited for a “cute” baby bump to show off in maternity photos. As the months passed however, her stomach remained more or less flat.
“It was so weird,” Salazar, now 23, a mother of one in New Jersey, tells TODAY.com.
Salazar’s doctor told her not to worry — pregnancy is different for everyone and taller women (Salazar is 5’9) may appear less pregnant than their shorter counterparts. They assured her that her unborn baby was measuring perfectly.
“My doctor said some people show later on,” she says, adding, “I didn’t think it would be ‘never.’”
Apparent in TikTok videos with millions of views, Salazar wore crop tops from her first to last trimester, yet most people didn’t realize she was pregnant.
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“At eight months, I just looked bloated,” she says. “What gave me reassurance were the ultrasound appointments, because I could see my son, and when I felt him kick at six months.”
Salazar says the scale didn’t move a lot during pregnancy; she only regained pounds she initially lost with morning sickness. While expecting, Salazar walked a lot and she maintained her pre-pregnancy diet.
Her family knew she was pregnant but Salazar waited to widely share until her third trimester. Salazar says some wrongly assumed that she experienced a “cryptic pregnancy,” when a person doesn’t know she is pregnant, but it wasn’t the case.
Salazar was disappointed that she couldn’t wear maternity clothing, including a beautiful black dress bought by her mom which still hangs unworn in her closet.
“People say I was lucky ... but I feel like I missed a big part of the experience,” says Salazar. “That part is a little sad — I wanted a baby bump.”
Salazar certainly felt pregnant.
“By the end, I couldn’t even walk because my back hurt,” she says. “I felt so heavy and out of breath.”
Why do some expecting moms not appear pregnant?
“I see often see patients who question the appearance of their bodies, whether it’s looking ‘too’ pregnant or not pregnant ‘enough,’” Dr. Dallas Reed, chief of genetics at Tufts Medical Center and principal medical advisor at Myriad Genetics, tells TODAY.com. “My advice is to not compare yourselves to others.”
Reed says the size of the baby and the uterus and the amount of amniotic fluid, which cushions the baby in the amniotic sac, can account for a larger or smaller bump, along with one’s height and the height of their uterus.
“As the uterus grows, organs move around to accommodate the baby and if there’s not a lot of space, the only way to go is out,” says Reed.
In July 2022, Salazar gave birth to a healthy baby boy who weighed 6 pounds, 13 ounces.
“It doesn’t matter what someone looks like,” Dr. Holly Cummings, an associate professor of Clinical Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Pennsylvania, tells TODAY.com. “It matters whether the fetus is growing well, and we can tell that through ways other than how someone looks.”
This story first appeared on TODAY.com. More from TODAY:
