Week 17
Your baby weighs 5 ounces now (about as much as a turnip), and he's around 5 inches long. He can move his joints, and his skeleton — until now rubbery cartilage — is starting to harden to bone. His sense of hearing is also developing. The umbilical cord, his lifeline to the placenta, is growing stronger and thicker.
Week 18
Head to bottom, your baby is approximately 5 1/2 inches long (about the length of a bell pepper) and she weighs almost 7 ounces. She's busy flexing her arms and legs — movements that you'll likely start noticing more and more. Her blood vessels are visible through her thin skin and her ears are now in position and stand out from her head. Myelin (a protective covering) is beginning to form around her nerves, a process that will continue for a year after she's born. If you're having a girl, her uterus and Fallopian tubes are formed and in place. If your baby is a boy, his genitals are noticeable, though he may hide them from you during an ultrasound.
Week 19
Your baby weighs about 8 1/2 ounces, and he measures 6 inches, head to bottom — about the size of a large heirloom tomato. His arms and legs are in the right proportions to each other and the rest of his body now. His kidneys continue to make urine, and the hair on his scalp is sprouting. This is a crucial time for sensory development: Your baby's brain is designating specialized areas for smell, taste, hearing, vision, and touch. If your baby is a girl, she has an astonishing 6 million eggs in her ovaries. They'll dwindle to fewer than two million by the time she's born.
Week 20
Your baby weighs about 10 1/2 ounces now. He's also around 6 1/2 inches long from head to bottom and about 10 inches from head to heel — the length of a banana. (For the first 20 weeks, when a baby's legs are curled up against his torso and hard to measure, measurements are taken from the top of his head to his bottom — the "crown to rump" measurement. After 20 weeks, he's measured from head to toe.)
He's swallowing more these days, which is good practice for his digestive system. He's also producing meconium, a black, sticky by-product of digestion. This gooey substance will accumulate in his bowels, and you'll see it in his first soiled diaper (some babies pass meconium in the womb or during delivery).
Week Seventeen | Week Eighteen | Week Nineteen | Week Twenty
Week Seventeen
May 16, 2008
It's funny how the disclaimers that products and events place on items...
"consult doctor before taking," "avoid riding this ride if pregnant," etc. that you have always ignored all of a sudden become relevant to you when your pregnant. It just kinda dawns on you like, oh yeah, I guess I should think twice about that.
More presents! One of Andrew's co-workers couldn't resist these baby booties and some other items to give to me. I had met her one time. She's so nice...and this bootie is so tiny!
5-19-08
I feel I should be more honest about something. While I haven't been physically affected hardly at all by the pregnancy, I have been battling with the blues. I imagine it's the hormones, but I haven't felt myself really since the beginning. More often than not, I feel freaked out by the notion that I'm pregnant. Freaked that I have been entrusted with another's life, maybe I won't be good at taking care of him/her? Concerned that I won't bond with my baby, that we won't connect. Anxious about losing tons of sleep and yet still needing to remember everything. Selfishly concerned about losing 'me' time and only having time to focus on this baby.
Those thoughts are not always specifically going through my head, but overall it's a heavy and life-altering notion to get used to. This isn't the romantic honeymoon filled with skips and joy I thought it would be. It's good we have nine months to get ready.
Yet, I hear about women, and many friends, who've had difficulty getting pregnant or had multiple miscarriages. But yet, here we are, having conceived pretty much right away and floating easily through the pregnancy. I feel uncertain as to why it was so easy for us. It's a blessing and has made it possible for us to avoid a whole road of in vitro fertilization, months of disappointment, dashed hopes and dreams. I feel so blessed and can't help but question why God has blessed us so. But rather than question, I will take this opportunity to thank Him.
5-21-08
Well, I looked up ways to feel connected with your baby while in utero. There were some good ideas...read to him, sing to him, try to get him to respond to your touch, put headphones on your belly and play soothing music, things like that.
But I really think what will make me feel connected to him/her is being able to feel him move. Occasionally I wonder if what I am feeling down there is the little birdie flying around in there, but it's hard to tell because they say it feels similar to gas bubbles or hunger pangs. And c'mon, I'm pregnant, so gas? Hunger pangs? Those are only the two things that I feel constantly anyway!
5-22-08
My new guilty pleasure? A Baby Story and Birth Day. TV Shows that follow the birth of a baby. At first, this was the last thing I wanted to watch because of the labor portion...now it intrigues me, and I guess I am interested in it so much because I want to see what other's experience has been. In all the shows however, that I've seen only one has been a waterbirth, most use epidurals and far too many end up in a c-section. I'm hoping for a natural waterbirth with my midwife at my side. A friend who's had four natural births said to me that it's painful either way.
I will lay down the disclaimer though that this is my plan now, without any clue of how it will be. So if I come back on October 27th having had an epidural, so be it!
...back to the issue of feeling connected...I think that what I am feeling is the baby move. It's just different than I expected. But I LOVE it. It has made this whole experience real to me and I feel a special connection to that little birdie in there. I love being able to feel the movements and the actual baby knowing that soon I will be able to hold that little tiny one in my arms. I wish it would move all the time so I could always feel it! If I had known that the movement was what it would take to feel connected, I would have been less hard on myself for not feeling connected. I was starting to wonder whether that lack of connection would continue after the birth.
Week Eighteen
5-27-08
A little late this week because almost the WHOLE family was in town this weekend. They all came to help us celebrate a housewarming/graduation/baby. Everyone left today, and now the house seems so empty. I miss everyone already and am so glad you were able to make it! Seems strange that the next time I will see some of you will be after the baby is here!
On Saturday, my sister- and mother-in-law (far left, and second from left) threw me a Baby Shower. We went to a little French cafe in Parkville and celebrated by eating naughty and opening gifts. I received so many darling and useful things. It's fun to envision a tiny little body filling out those onesies! I loved the thoughtfulness, and honestly, being the center of attention. It was a great day.
I feel the baby frequently now and take every chance I can to put my hands on my belly to feel it against my palms. I wonder if it will be a big baby, because I can feel it against my belly already, little hard spots here and there, and most of the books are just talking about the fluttering I should be feeling now and then.
Week Nineteen
5-30-08
I am reading the books "Belly Laughs" by Jenny McCarthy (from my sister, Brooke, second from right above). Jenny takes a matter-of-fact approach to describing the nasty things that do or could happen during pregnancy and birth. It's funny--and scary.
I am also reading "Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Baby" by Marc Weissbluth. This was given to me by a friend from Denver, Christin, who said she wished she had read it earlier (her baby is about 11 months old now). I think that this will be invaluable for regaining some semblance of a schedule and maintaining a healthy and happy baby because he is not overtired.
Another book, "Your Pregnancy Week by Week" by Glade B. Curtis and Judith Schuler was sent to us by Ali and Brennon, friends from Andrew's MBA class. We enjoy reading it each week and learning about what is happening with our little cherub around that time and what vegetable or fruit he currently resembles.
6-3-08
We had the sonogram today. We saw our little one for the first time today and all I can say is that it was a heartwarming and love-filled experience. I animated the image along with a watercolor I did to show it a little more clearly. Here's little Roo...
Week Twenty
6-6-08
We are officially halfway to meeting our creation, or should I say God's creation which we've been blessed to love.
Andrew walked in his graduation ceremony on Friday night, that was exciting. Looking at us from the outside, I am very aware of the momentous occasions that we are experiencing right now and that will direct our lives for years and years to come. We have so much and are truly happy. I am so thankful!
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