Enceinte de 24 semaines! (24 Weeks Pregnant!)

By now, Gabe weighs about 1 1/2 pounds, having gained about 4 ounces since last week. Footprints and fingerprints are forming. He's growing steadily. Since he's almost a foot long, like an ear of corn, he cuts a pretty lean figure at this point, but his body is filling out proportionally and he'll soon start to plump up. His brain is also growing quickly now, and his taste buds are continuing to develop. His lungs are developing "branches" of the respiratory "tree" as well as cells that produce surfactant, a substance that will help his air sacs inflate once he hits the outside world. His skin is still thin and translucent, but that will start to change soon.

Thanks to a fully developed inner ear, which controls balance, Gabe may have a sense of whether he is upside-down or right side up in the womb. I may notice a regular sleeping and waking cycle. With intensive medical care, babies born at 24 weeks have more than a 50 percent chance of survival. Complications are frequent and serious, however, such as bleeding in the brain and impaired vision.

In the past few weeks, my uterus has risen above my belly button and is now about the size of a soccer ball. It kind of does look like I have a soccer ball in my shirt. I looked back at my preggo pics with Stella, and people are right - I'm carrying much lower this time. I'm a little bigger than I was last time at 24 wks, but not drastically as some people have implied. We had a routine appt. yesterday. Gabe's heartbeat was 141 bmp. I'm measuring at 24 cm, right where I should be. Joel and I (and some students) noticed that I really "popped" this past week. My doctor noticed as well and said that you usually have a rush of weight when you pop out. This happened with Stella, too. She is absolutely not concerned, but I really want to watch it and be exercising regularly b/c I want to stay within the 25-35 lb range. I have started working out again, but it's not that fun when you're pregnant. I'm used to pushing myself to the edge EVERY time. Well, now I'm not supposed to get my heartrate higher than 145, I have to be careful to not get my internal temperature too high for the baby (how can you really monitor that??), and I have ligament stretching and pain every now and then, so I have to slow it down. People also look at you because maybe they assume pregnant people can't work out? My sports bras don't fit (if you've seen me recently, you know why), I have to search for a shirt to wear that won't let my belly pop out, and I have no maternity workout pants, so my pants fit a little strangely. Oh well - as long as I'm getting some exercise, right?

We talked about the ultrasound results, which were all good. Nothing was concerning. Gabe was in the 93rd percentile at that point, so I was thinking, "Holy cow. I'm going to have a huge baby. Weird, since Stella was small." Well, it turns out a full-term baby in the 90th percentile is 8 lbs. Ok kids - that is not big. I'm fine with that. 9+ I'm not fine with, but 8 I could handle. She said if I start measuring 3+ cm ahead, we'll do another ultrasound later on, but I'm not even measuring ahead. Again, she is not concerned, and she said boys are just bigger. His size projects an April 24 due date, so if that's true and I have him 2 wks early, that could be April 10. We'll see. I still think I'll have him 2 wks early like Stella. I have no other frame 'o reference.
I'll have my thyroid retested and a glucose screening test before my next appt, which is 2/9, to check for gestational diabetes.

I will be doing an additional 2 days of the maternity leave due to snow days, so I'll finish 1/26 now. I was dragging this week. I think it was a mix of it being the first week back, and Gabe's just growing and things are stretching, making me tired. I hope I'm a little more chipper next week. Until next time...