Twenty-four weeks means I'm six months along! But if you're a thinking person, you might realize it's really 3 3/4 months until my due date.
That's because pregnancy is 40 weeks long. If you do the math, 40 weeks actually adds up to ten months. If that sounds confusing, it's because pregnancy is counted from the first day of your menstrual cycle, which means that for two of those 40 weeks you are definitely not pregnant. The age of the fetus at birth should be 38 weeks.
It’s typically considered a nine month process because you deliver nine months after you discover you’re pregnant. But according to the doctors, it’s ten months. Add to that the fact that most months aren’t exactly four weeks long. Frankly, I still find it confusing so I stick with weeks (out of 40) rather than months.
The scale said 125 pounds but that must be impossible after all I ate over the holiday. By the way, I highly recommend being pregnant over the holidays - feel free to indulge in all those lovely holiday treats!
I was too lazy this weekend to take a picture! Instead, I'll share this lovely graphic with you, thanks to the U of Penn website:
The baby is kicking more than ever, though I still can't predict what will make him kick or when he'll kick. Last night we had our first verifiable episode of hiccups. I was trying to get to sleep and there was a consistent twitching at the side of my belly. Annoying but subtle enough that it wasn't hard to ignore.
This is another big week for your magical growing baby! Just take a look at the checklist for this week: 1) ears: done; 2) fingernails: done; 3) (if you have a boy) testicles: taking their 3-4 day trip from the abdominal wall to the scrotum; and 4) lungs walls: secreting “surfactant”. What’s that? Well, surfactant is sort of what it sounds like: a surface-activated fat whose main purpose is to assist the your baby's little lungs during inflation (as in, filling with air, not getting more expensive). Just in case you’re curious, your submerged baby is still breathing in amniotic fluid, preparing and rehearsing the lungs an oxygen-filled life outside the womb. By the end of this week, your child will be weighing around 2 lbs and 14 inches long. Your cutie-patootie may even be a little more plump, but isn't anywhere near their full baby-fatted cute-self. Most of the “filling out” is coming up in that long awaited (and slightly dreaded?) third trimester. Woo-hoo! Get ready!
Very easy doctor visit today. Urine, weight and blood pressure all fine. Got to meet another new doctor (this makes number four) and she was very nice, I'm happy to say.
She encouraged me to keep hitting the gym. That was nice to hear. Dave and I are making plans to go tonight, I hope!
She discouraged any laying on my back, saying it's bad for the baby even though it doesn't feel bad to me. I wish it didn't feel so good!
I told her that he is kicking more frequently, though still inconsistently. She said that when I go back in four weeks, I'll have a different opinion of how much this little guy kicks. Sounds like it will be much more frequent and perhaps a little annoying. Cute! Maybe I should keep a list of the annoying things my rugrat does before he's even born? :-)
My next office visit will feature the Glucose Screening Test. Sounds pretty straightforward. I drink a vat of sugar-laced substance, wait an hour and then get a blood test to see if I'm in a coma. Anyway I think that's how it goes. She says it tastes like melted jelly beans. I suggested they switch to bowls of ice cream but doesn't sound like that will be implemented any time soon.
At this point you’ve pretty much adjusted to the fact you’ve got a moving little gymnast inside of you, but now they’re going to kick up the party a notch because they can hear and react to sounds from the outside world. Sounds from your alarm clock, a thunder roll, or that darned car honking at you across the intersection can actually jar their little ears enough to elicit a kick or violent bout of squirming. Of course this also means that their little ears are picking up the sounds of your voice and those near you. So go ahead, sing a lullaby to your little angel—if they start kicking, it’s likely they just want you to stop… or maybe it was a kick of approval? You decide. Your baby's tiny taste buds are still growing and their bones are continuing to ossify (harden), their tiny veins are visible through their translucent yet wrinkly skin. (Think of it this way: they’ve been swimming in the equivalent of a long hot bath for the past 23 weeks, so you can’t blame them for being a little prune-like.)
Little late pulling this together this weekend. On Saturday the scale read 125.5, so still gaining weight, yoo-hoo! Dave's excellent baking abilities are probably at fault. :)
Feeling pretty good, though I'm more aware of the tautness across my abdomen as I grow. Baby is still kicking inconsistently. My doc says this will pick up in the next few weeks.
I'm considering a change of costume for the photo shoots. It's a mite cold getting into a bikini in November.
What can I say about constipation and leukorrhea that Jenny McCarthy hasn't already said?
Wait, do boys read my blog? Don't follow the links, fellas.
New symptoms:
- Stuffy, clogged nose; near-nosebleeds
- Leg cramps while sleeping
- Reflux (heartburn)
Let's talk about the reflux. When I met Dave, I had what I affectionately referred to as an "after-dinner cough." This cough was brought on after any large meal, and usually contained a little bit of mucus. After finally talking to my doctor about it, she diagnosed me as having acid reflux. Not surprising, given the massive amounts of food I was once able to eat without a second thought. I grew up overeating and it only started to catch up to me in my mid-twenties.
I was on proton-pump blockers for nearly two years to manage my symptoms. Eventually, I managed to wean myself off of the "purple pill" with several smart moves. I would eat smaller meals, eat them slowly, and stop when I was full. My reflux was a thing of the past, only flaring when I had multiple glasses of wine with dinner.
Now that I'm supposed to be "eating for two," I seem to have lost my once-infamous appetite. My appetite is quite low so I'm not eating too many times a day. So now, when I get the chance to eat, I typically eat as much as possible. My reflux has been worse than it ever has been. Gah. I want this part over. I want to go back to eating like a bird.
The grow must go on! No wonder you’re getting so big, you’re now housing a wonder-baby who weighs nearly a pound and measures nearly a foot in length. Their perfect little pancreas is now further developed and they’ve also started producing their own hormones! Your baby's future in the circus as a world-famous tight-rope-walker is secure: their inner ear is now developed to the point that they have their own sense of balance. Lucky for your little explorer, balance also promotes physical dexterity, which has them actively feeling out their surroundings where skin, body parts, and the resident umbilical cord are the big sensory experiences. Your foot-long baby, is looking a bit like an oversized raisin right now as more and more wrinkles are showing up each week. Not to worry, all that excessive wrinkling is just their skin’s way of planning ahead for the time when they’ll start piling on that irresistible baby chub.
123 pounds this week, looks like I'm actually gaining my recommended pound per week. Yay!
