(December 31, 2022, 4:27 pm)eva-Unit01 I personally work with public and see a lot of pregnant ladies and my best piece of advice is talk to them like a normal person and let them bring up that they are pregnant first. In general, there are three rules that I have for conversing with women that I am not dating: do not ask weight, age or whether or not they are pregnant otherwise you could come off as insulting. But all in all, being polite and empathetic will give you the best shot at rubbing her belly, good luck out there everyone!

I was trying to say it like that in my post, but you phrased it much better than what I had to say.

Come to think of it, the best way for me that seems to work is when ever I go to a book store.  There are a lot of independent mom and pop book stores in my local area.  Not that long ago I went to my favorite book store looking for a classic science-fiction book to add to my collection.  That's when this woman with this nice big belly caught my attention, she was this cute redhead that kind of looked like Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) from The X-Files.  I made a quick observation to see if she had any people with her, friends, family, etc.  She appeared to be by herself, so I slowly made my way toward her without being creepy or obvious.  I can feel vibes from people so I know within seconds if they are friendly and wanting to talk or have that passive aggressive "get the fuck away from me" attitude.  

So anyway, when I made my way over to her in the store, I noticed she had a book in her hand that I had read before.  It was The Fountainhead by Aya Rand, which I really liked.  I figured perfect an excellent starting point to talk to her about.  So I had asked her about the book, and I could tell instantly she was an intellectual type.  I have many friends and family that are intellectual and philosophical types, so this was an easy conversation for me to steer in the direction I wanted.  She was a really friendly and talkative person, so this made it even better for my end goal.  

As were talking for a while, she started to rub her belly and and said "oh" and I ask her if she's alright.  She told me the baby just did a real hard kick to her ribs.  Now I felt it was time to ask about her belly.  So I asked her when she's due, is it a boy or girl and if I could possible touch her belly?  She told me of course I can, lots of people ask all the time and she had no problem with it.  So I felt her belly for about a minute and thought it was time to stop, so I pulled my hands away and thanked her then congratulated her on her pregnancy.  After that we talked a bit more about books, then she got a text and read it then she said I have to go it was nice talking to you.  That was a cool experience for me on that day a few months ago.

It's a bit of a lengthy story, but the point is I find that starting a normal conversation then gradually shifting to talk about their pregnancy is key.  Everyone has their own approach about this particular topic, but this method seems to keep working for me.