When you go in for your ultrasound anatomy scan, aka the first time yous come across your infant adult beyond a gestational sac with a heartbeat, you lot probably have images in your caput of a perfect button nose, pudgy cheeks and a sweetness smiling — just similar how she might look at birth. But the reality is most ultrasounds taken betwixt eighteen and 22 weeks, even 3D ones, don't come out that fashion.

So if you're an expecting parent thrown off by the images you see on the screen, first know that you're certainly not lonely. Many parents take posted online about seeing a strange or only plain creepy face at the anatomy scan. And second, several perfectly normal reasons tin explain why the sonogram turned out that style. Here'due south why the ultrasound might not show your infant looking like a niggling angel just yet.

Does baby really look like the 3D ultrasound?

3D ultrasounds attempt to show facial features instead of just a two-dimensional (cantankerous-exclusive) view of your womb, but they notwithstanding rely on soundwaves to piece together an image — which isn't ever perfect.

These soundwaves bounce off internal organs and fluids, and a computer converts the echoes into a 2D image. Combining multiple second images taken at unlike angles and so creates that tertiary dimension, but the ultrasound doesn't always become an accurate read on some of the surfaces.

In other words, it's not like a photographic camera on your phone. And so while 3D ultrasounds tin can serve as a helpful diagnostic tool in some scenarios, you can potentially chalk up any strange faces you run into to the style the applied science works.

Other reasons your baby's face up looks weird on an ultrasound

Regardless of the type of ultrasound you lot get, sometimes the images tin can turn out a lilliputian foreign. No crusade for alarm! Here are a few perfectly normal reasons your baby's olfactory organ, face up or head will expect dissimilar than you expected.

Baby is still developing body fatty.

At this stage in pregnancy, your baby's pare nevertheless looks transparent since she has then little body fat. Considering in that location's not every bit much covering the bones, her face might look more angular.

Baby'southward face is turned toward the uterine wall.

If your baby is facing away from your belly during an ultrasound, the sound waves might reveal only two-thirds or half of her face up, which can await a little odd.

Baby's face is covered past another torso part.

Similar to what'll happen if her face is turned, a confront partially covered by an arm or another limb could besides look strange.

Infant's soft spot is really big.

The soft spot that your infant has at birth exists during pregnancy too, and yous might really see this gap in the skull during your first anatomy scan. It can look similar a large, black spot on the top of her head and slit downwardly to her olfactory organ.

Then there you lot have it: A creepy face at 20 weeks is near never cause for business organization. The fetus at this stage is still growing into a cute-as-a-push button baby, but even so has more than 4 months to become.

That said, ask questions and vocalization whatever concerns before you get out your ultrasound appointment. Beingness reassured that your baby is fine will aid you sleep better (no thing how scary your sonogram might have been) so you tin can go back to dreaming of big eyes and tiny toddler toes.