This blog post will consist of the rest of the weekly updates, from the first trimester...
Week 7 - Baby Willis is the size of a Jelly Bean
We couldn't hold out any longer and decided to book a private scan, it was £89 as we could only get in on the weekend, expensive, but you can't put a price on a settled mind. We saw our tiny baby on screen with a fast heart, beating away, it really choked me up. Sleeping issues still this week, serious insomnia but I bought a lovely triangular pillow from Ikea to keep me comfy, then Todd got jealous so I had to go back and buy him one & Gibson ended up curling up and sleeping in it every morning. Tired, tired, tired! The private scan actually put us back a week, we thought we were 8 weeks, but we were actually 7
"Baby W is now half an inch and the hands and feet have emerged from the already developing arms and legs. The mouth, tongue and tooth buds also developed this week. Baby W has tiny veins showing through the extremely thin skin. Our baby has an appendix and pancreas. More and more organs are forming with a tiny digestive system linking up with the mouth"
Week 8 - Baby Willis is the size of a Gummy Bear
No troubles for me this week other than some heart burn - this is supposedly common during pregancy because of the pregnancy hormone "progesterone" which relaxes muscles such as the valve between your throat and stomach. I'm more hungry than usual this week, so now my Google searches consist of "Is it okay to be eating ready salty crisps for breakfast?"
"Baby W's facial features are developing rapidly, the structure of the eyes are forming and some little eyelids! The breathing tube is forming which connects the lungs up to the neck. Babies don't actually take their first breath though, until they are born. The placenta which is forming along side our baby will provide all the oxygen our baby requires"
Week 9 - Baby Willis is the size of a Cola Bottle
This week we had our first meeting with the midwife aka "the booking appointment" It went really well and I got my blue notes. This week was a super hot bank holiday weekend, my skin was very sensitive and I caught myself burning more quickly than usual. This is why they say for the first 12 weeks, don't dye your hair or do anything different to your skin like tan, tint brows etc because your skin is extra sensitive and you could react to things differently now that you're pregnant. Still bloating badly, so finding it hard to feel good wearing anything! Oh and I'm having the most bizarre dreams, and plenty of them a night!
"Baby W's sex was determined at conception, but this week the reproductive organs will either become testes or ovaries! Although we won't know for sure until a later scan. Baby is moving around in the sack of amniotic fluid. Our baby's heart is now properly formed, with four chambers and pumping blood all around his/her body."
Week 10 - Baby Willis is the size of a Selection Box Chocolate
So this week wasn't fab, I felt extremely emotional and sad, with no explanation apart from probably starting Grey's Anatomy and crying at every episode? I had a really scary heavy bleed on the Sunday, followed by a disastrous trip to a&e/ stay on the gynae ward, where I wasn't seen by a single doctor and was sent to an emergency gynae clinic the following day. For reasons unexplained, I have a bleed around my uterus, they told me not to worry unless it continued for more than 7 days. - No that's fine nurse, I won't worry what so ever that I'm pregnant and having a period style bleed, totally fine! But this did mean we had a scan, which we were both balling our eyes out at, we saw blood pumping through the umbilical cord to our baby, who had a strong heart beat, and really looked like a baby. We decided to tell our family this week as we wanted their support should we have more scares before the end of the trimester P.s hello little foot!
"This week is now the start of the Foetal period. Kidneys, liver, brain and lungs are all starting to function. Baby W's head is now half the size of the body. The fingers and toes have become properly separated losing any webbing. The eyes are moving from the side of the head to the front. The diaphragm emerges this week so the baby can make some noise!"
Week 11 - Baby Willis is the size of a Fortune Cookie
I feel like deleting this entire blog post and just typing "Tired." That's all I have to say for this week. I have been starting to have a good clear out in the room which will eventually become Baby W's room and moving things around the house, other than that, just tired!
"Baby W is busy moving around my uterus. This week is the begining of a three week period when Baby W will double in length and will go through a growth spurt. Our baby's little fingers have tiny fingernails forming"
Week 12 - Baby Willis is the size of a Macaroon & Week 13 - Baby Willis is the size of a Cupcake
Um so, we went for our 12 week scan and now this blog post is all bloody messed up because actually we are 13 weeks and a day haha! But anyway, I've been feeling NORMAL. Totally normal, I had a funny spell over a weekend where I thought I had the flu or something but otherwise, I haven't felt pregnant at all. The "12" week scan, was so reassuring and made us so happy. I feel like the luckiest person in the world, to see our baby go from a tiny splodge at 6 weeks to an actual baby at 13 weeks. Everything looked perfect, little Willis wouldn't stop wriggling! It's the most surreal thing, seeing my baby kicking about so much on screen, yet I didn't feel anything at all! I accepted the Nuchal Translucency screening for chromosomal abnormalities which is where they measure the fluid at the back of the babies neck, take your bloods and then put the results into a database which gives you a probability of your baby having certain chromosomal abnormalities. Fingers crossed everything will be okay! Oh... if you should find yourself at the JR having scans, scan photos are £5 each, so take your purse!
"Baby W now has the ability to open and close his/her fists and to make sucking movements with the muscles in the mouth. All the organs of our baby's digestive system have developed into their final shaped including stomach, liver, pancreas and intestines"
I hope you enjoyed reading how our little babe has developed over the last 13 weeks! Second trimester... let's do this!
Love, Rey x
