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Sensory belt lets dads-to-be feel their baby’s movements

It doesn’t always take much to move a man to tears; sometimes, all it takes are a few light kicks.

As shown in a video ad recently posted to YouTube, fathers-to-be turn soft when they feel their unborn child’s kicks and squirms in the womb replicated on their own bodies. Thanks to Huggies, the diaper brand marketed by Kimberly-Clark, a pair of sensory belts makes that happen.

After four months of development, the Huggies team invited expecting couples to help test the belts, as they work in pairs to simulate the feeling of being pregnant. The mother’s belt captures the feeling of the baby’s kicks and sends a signal to the father’s belt, which replicates the movements in real time.

One man in the video looks down at his stomach in shock as he reacts to the force of his baby’s kick for the first time.

Also see: Michigan men simulate labour pains in video

“He’s moving a lot,” he says to the camera in surprise.

“I can feel him,” says another man, a grin spreading across his face.

While the men in the video may have avoided the morning sickness and strange middle-of-the-night cravings stages of pregnancy, they can’t escape the emotional toll. As the experiment goes on, the men shake their heads and quickly wipe away tears.

To Huggies, letting dads-to-be feel the flutter of their baby’s movements is a way to include them in the joys of being pregnant – joys that men are otherwise bound to observe or experience second-hand.

Also see: What pregnancy really feels like

“Pregnancy was always about her,” the video declares. “That’s why Huggies did something special to compensate fathers.”

But not all “compensation” experiments are as easy to endure as the one featured in Kimberly-Clark’s tug-on-your-heartstrings ad. Two Michigan men star in their own video stunt in which a gynecologist uses electric shocks on the duo to simulate labour pains – in front of their only slightly sympathetic wives.

Do you think the Huggies experiment is a good way to make men feel more involved in their partners’ pregnancies?