How your baby's growing: Your baby is still putting on the pounds — about an ounce a day. She now weighs almost 6 pounds and is a little less than 19 inches long. She's shedding most of the downy covering of hair that covered her body as well as the vernix caseosa, the creamy substance that covered and protected her skin during its submersion in amniotic fluid. Your baby swallows both of these substances, along with other secretions, which will stay in her bowels until birth. This blackish mixture, called meconium, will become her first bowel movement.
At the end of this week, your baby will be considered full-term. (Babies between 37 and 42 weeks are considered full-term; a baby born before 37 weeks is pre-term and after 42 is post-term.) Most likely she's in a head-down position by now, which is optimal for a smooth delivery, but if she isn't in the next week, your provider may suggest scheduling an "external cephalic version," which is a fancy way of saying she'll try to coax your baby into a head-down position manually, by manipulating her from the outside of your belly.
You might also notice that your Braxton Hicks contractions are a little more frequent now. Be sure to review with your practitioner exactly when and where to call her when you think your labor has started. As a general rule, you should call when you start having regular contractions coming every five minutes for about an hour.
My Take: I had a doctor’s visit this morning (I'm going every week now). Here are the stats and life updates:
- My blood pressure: 100/62
- Nicole’s heartbeat: 170 (my honey nut cluster breakfast was blamed for this)
- I have gained exactly 29.5lbs. since I got pregnant
- I am now 1 centimeter dilated
- I'm getting a Braxton Hicks contraction roughly 1/day (not painful, just makes my already firm belly like a rock!)
- Jim is reading the Labor chapter of my What to Expect When You’re Expecting book and I'm gaining more respect from him by the day!
Seeing the pictures of Karen’s nephew (born 6/5/07 at 8:20am) freaked me out a bit – in under a month those pictures will be floating around but it’ll be MY kid friends are holding. Even with 7 (8) months for this to sink in it’s still not fully real.
8 comments:
Reading this is getting me excited - be sure to let me know when you want me around because I already can't wait to come out!
I really hope that you into labor at work :) haha
Don't worry... I already know who to call...
I can't wait to be the one circulating those pics of you and your baby. So exciting!!
Congrats on being 1cm. :-P I'm sure you'll do fine as things progress. I just want a phone call right away. :-D
WOW. It seems like just yesterday you were telling me you were prego. I can't wait to have another baby to hold!
And why is it that this explanation you get every week tells you the grossest things? Like that your kid eats all that crap that was on its skin. EWW. I didn't need to know that! But it does help explain why that first poop is so freaking scarey!
wow, just one more month. that's fabulous. So will you be keeping up with the blogging thing as well as you do now?
Woo hoo! We're finally talking about poop!
it always comes back to poop...
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