20 Weeks- Development

Your Baby This Coming Week

Your baby weighs about 10.5 ounces (300g) and measures about 7.2 inches (18cm) from crown to rump. He still moves about freely in amniotic fluid.

Your baby may respond to external sounds, such as the music you are listening to or your voice.

Your baby has developed some red blood cells already. The white blood cells that your baby needs to fight infections are being manufactured.

He is developing taste buds on his tongue.

His digestive system is sufficiently advanced to absorb water and sugar from the amniotic fluid that he swallows and pass it to his large bowel.

Your baby has lanugo hair on his forehead and upper lip and his eyebrows are thickening.

Vernix (the waxy substance that covers and protects your baby's skin) accumulates on your baby's eyebrows.

Your baby's eyes are still sealed shut.

Your baby continues to grow and develop and his kicking is getting stronger now.

Your Body This Coming Week

In the next ten weeks your weight gain will increase more rapidly as your baby grows and develops layers of fat. This is when you will gain about half of your total pregnancy weight.

You need to eat about 500 more calories per day now to support you and your baby. You will probably notice an increase in appetite during this time to keep pace with your increased needs and metabolism.

Try to avoid unhealthy snacks and try to choose snacks with the most nutritional value for you and your baby. You may experience uncommon cravings. A pregnancy condition known as pica, causes some women crave eating things that are not even edible (such as soil).

Your skin may itch. This is because it has stretched to accommodate your growing abdomen.

The top of your uterus has risen further and is now parallel with your belly button, probably making your belly button flat.

Your lower legs may be swelling somewhat, though this is improved when you are able to stay off your feet for part of the day.

You may experience heartburn or indigestion. Many antacid tablets are safe to take during pregnancy, but check with your doctor or pharmacist first.

20 Week Journal

How far along? 20 weeks. Halfway there!!!
Total weight gain/loss: Down .4 pounds. Odd. Thought I ate a lot this week.
TP test: Back down to 10 squares. I keep fluctuating in the 10 square range.
Food cravings/ aversions: No.
"Morning" Sickness: No.
Signs of Pregnancy: A little bit of round ligament pain. Also bending over to tie shoes or pick something up is sometimes uncomfortable.
Stretch Marks: Not yet.
Sleep: Decent. Although when I've woken up, my belly has often been very hard and somewhat painful.
Big things this week: Well, there have been a few additional posts over the past week which will let you know what's been going on. The "biggie" is yesterday's update to go along with the new ultrasound photos.
Gender prediction: I had a dream recently about the gender. But otherwise trying not to guess one way or the other.
Movement: Can't feel it, but based on ultrasounds we know that Baby is moving all around.
Labor Pains: Too early.
Belly Button in or out? Still in.
Wedding rings on or off? On.
Weekly Wisdom: Try not to stress about the unknown. Yeah, I know. So much easier said than done.

More Ultrasound photos

For those of you keeping track, yes, I had a second ultrasound today. Why? Well at the last one they discovered that the head was measuring small. So what's the big deal? Doesn't that make delivery easier? It turns out it's an indicator of some other, potentially serious, issues. So my doctor said, it's probably nothing, but she recommended that we go for another ultrasound.

The tech asked why we were there, and we told her. She did her thing, but she also seemed to be looking at the heart a lot. She looked at other areas as well, so we didn't think about it too much. And she seemed much more personable pointing things out to us. And she even did a 3D image for us. So cool to actually see what Baby could actually look like.

Then the tech went to share her results with a doctor. The doctor came in. Why are you here? Again, we mentioned the head. She said the head really didn't look bad. It was still measuring small in one measurement, but the overall measurement was normal so she wasn't concerned. However...

The tech thought she had seen a hole in the outer wall of the heart. Really? She had told us that the heart was the size of the tip of our pinky. And you can see a hole on that? Not only were there the heart concerns, but there also was an issue with the feet. Instead of being flat or curving downward, they were curving upward. Rocker feet. And finally, Baby kept clenching his/her hands. This was an indicator of some brain issues. So all of these things combined made them a bit concerned.

They thought that all of these things could mean a genetic abnormality. In particular they are concerned about Down's Syndrome, Trisomy 18, and Trisomy 13. They encouraged an amniocentesis. Based on the results of this they will be able to determine if Baby has one of these three (results in a day or two) or if it's a different genetic anomaly (results in about 2 weeks).

So at this point, we don't know. It could be something, it could be nothing. And if there is no genetic anomaly, there's still that issue with the heart. So please keep us in your thoughts and prayers over the next few days.

Ultrasound photos

So last Tuesday we got a peek at the little alien growing inside of me. Here it is- both photos with its hand in front of its face. Wish we had gotten the full profile shot, but this is better than nothing.

Another comparison, and some clothes

First off, here's another comparison photo. Yeah, I know. I'm a couple of weeks late getting this posted. Here I am at 17 weeks. I had meant to take a picture every 4 weeks, but I forgot and then life got in the way, so here I am at 17 weeks.And then here is my dining room table covered in clothes that were sent up from Georgia. Wow! This kid has quite the wardrobe already. It was fun going through everything and seeing some of the clothes that we had given to the nieces/nephew being passed on to our babe. And the cute pink plaid hat! (But where's the matching jumper?)
I sorted it into a few different piles: boy on the right, 2 piles of neutral in the middle, and a pile of girl on the left. Then on the far left are pink and blue bumpers, some blankets, and some crib sheets. There's also a stack of bibs and a pile of socks and hats. Now to further sort things by size. And then find a place to put all of it.

19 Weeks

Your baby equals a large heirloom tomato in size and weighs 8 1/2 ounces. (length: 6 inches, head to bottom)

19 Weeks- Development

Your Baby This Coming Week

Your baby weighs about 9 ounces (260g) and measures about 5.6 to 6.4 inches (14 to 16cm) from crown to rump.

Her skin is thickening and developing multiple layers- the epidermis and the dermis, the deeper layer where it will form fat. Your baby is now also developing a waxy protective coating for her skin called vernix caseosa. The vernix protects your baby's skin which is continuously submersed in amniotic fluid. Vernix, which is particularly thick around the eyebrows is held in place by tiny downy hairs called lanugo.

Your baby can now grip with her fists. Toenails and scalp hair are growing.

At this point, it may be possible to determine the baby's sex by ultrasound, if the baby cooperates, but the ultrasound technician will rarely guarantee the sex based on the ultrasound results as mistakes are sometimes made at an early ultrasound.

You can hear the baby's heartbeat with a Doppler ultrasound device or a stethoscope.

Your Body This Coming Week

Congratulations! You are now halfway through your pregnancy!

You may have a strong sense of well-being. You should be able to feel your baby moving in your uterus several times in a day.

Your bellybutton may become flat or may even actually pop outwards. It will probably continue to darken also, but will return to its usual pigmentation after birth. The top of your uterus (the fundus) is just below your navel.

As your uterus expands, you can expect it to put increased pressure on your lungs, kidneys and stomach. This increased pressure can result in breathlessness when you exert yourself physically. It may also cause indigestion and the need to urinate more often. Your expanding belly may also cause stretch marks on your belly. The stretch marks will probably fade considerably after your baby's birth and even more as time passes.

You may continue to have mood swings and anxiety, but this may begin to decrease. If you have been experiencing absentmindedness, it may continue.