Eli5: When a baby is in the womb, where does the waste go?
In: Biology
Since they’re not eating there isn’t really poop, at least not how we normally think of poop. Instead of poop, the baby makes something called meconium, which is kind of like poop but made up of water, skin cells, little hairs that fall off the baby’s body, pee that the baby swallows, etc. Usually the baby just keeps that meconium inside until after they’re born and then the release it as if it was a poop (but it looks different than normal poop).
Pee is just released into the fluid that the baby floats in (amniotic fluid) and the baby floats in it and takes it in through their nose and mouth (it’s sterile so no big deal).
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