Dumb question: Where does the umbilical cord go?

ichamommy

This is a dumb question but I really don't wanna google...

So I just read something that said the umbilical cord delivers nutrients and removes trash from the baby... So does anybody know what it's hooked up to to be able to do what our mouths and butts combined do?

I know this is dumb. I'm tired, borderline comatose and just sitting at my desk trying to look busy. Surfing the web is not an option (intranet), or maybe I'm just too lazy to do it on my phone.

pfeilele

The placenta. The placenta then acts like a telephone between the baby and mom. If that makes sense.

Ylvelill

They drink the amnio fluid that's their water! And you breath and eat for them.

reils500

Umbilical cord hooks up to baby's circulatory system (blood stream). Their blood flow is different than ours because they don't get their oxygen from their lungs, it comes from us via the blood in the umbilical cord.

ichamommy

Babies are weird. Human bodies are weird.

I still don't get what it is in the baby that the umbilical cord hooks up to. The belly? The bloodstream?

Ylvelill

Belly button

cakebatter27

The whole process is weird. I try to not think too much about it. How is there something that weighs 2 lbs inside me alive without food, water or air?! I get the umbilical cord and placenta but man...it's freaky to think too much about.

bullybutt

It's SCIENCE!

runrinserepeat

What weirds me out is where does everything go once the umbilical cord is cut? Are there a bunch of dead end blood vessels in the baby's stomach? I know it somehow works, but I've never been able to wrap my brain around that part.

argonne

ichabody said:

Babies are weird. Human bodies are weird. I still don't get what it is in the baby that the umbilical cord hooks up to. The belly? The bloodstream?

The bloodstream.  The baby recieves all of it's nutrients from it's mother via the bloodstream.

cookieinva

Don't think of it as mother and child, think of it as host and parasite.

pfeilele

Okay. That was a dumb answer. I was like... For real?! The cord just goes into baby as veins and arteries. We break down our food and it goes into baby as if they had done it themselves. I think the veins and arteries turn into a regular part of the circulatory system once it all heals.

iris427

I think this may be a bit of an oversimplification but the cord goes to the fetal liver.

iris427

This link explains it: www.urmc.rochester.edu/Encyclopedia/Content.aspx?ContentTypeID=90&ContentID=P02362

Ylvelill

iris427 said:

This link explains it: www.urmc.rochester.edu/Encyclopedia/Content.aspx?ContentTypeID=90&ContentID=P02362

Thanks for the link!

ichamommy

That link is awesome. To those still wondering:

Through the blood vessels in the umbilical cord, the fetus receives all the necessary nutrition, oxygen, and life support from the mother through the placenta.

Waste products and carbon dioxide from the fetus are sent back through the umbilical cord and placenta to the mother's circulation to be eliminated.

ichamommy

Also..

Shelleybell

The real question is- why am I not pooping more given the fact I am getting rid of my baby's waste lol?

livkight

another question: once they cut the cord, and the rest is hanging out of me, where does THAT part go?

kmawb

livkight said:

another question: once they cut the cord, and the rest is hanging out of me, where does THAT part go?

After you deliver the baby, the placenta detaches from the uterine wall and you deliver that too (either vaginally or via c/s) so the remainder of the umbilical cord goes with the placenta.