home pregnancy test

Congratulations on your pregnancy! Welcome to your journey to motherhood. We’re honored to help guide you through the process. At the Round Up, you’ll find many resources to help you: whether it’s your changing body, your baby’s development, how to prepare your home, how to tell those you love, or even just what to register for when it’s time for your shower, it’s all here for you and your baby.

It’s time to schedule your first prenatal appointment with an OB/GYN or a midwife whom you know and trust. Even before your appointment, be sure to ask your health care provider about whether the medications you’re currently taking are safe to take during pregnancy.

If you haven’t already started taking prenatal vitamins, which contain important elements like calcium and folic acid for the health of your growing baby, now is the time to start. There are a decent variety of prenatals to choose from in stores, so you now have the option of a gummie vitamin, pill or powder that you add to your water.

Since you’re pregnant, it’s also time to start avoiding drugs, alcohol and excessive caffeine (about 150 mg of caffeine per day is the safe limit according to the American Pregnancy Association.

Your Body at 1 Week Pregnant

You may still have your period, at this point, but five to 10 small follicles (or sacs) are growing inside your ovaries. Each one contains a single egg that’s too small to see even with an ultrasound. Next week, one of these growing follicles will grow larger than the others and become the dominant follicle, and the remaining follicles will stop growing.

Your Baby at 1 Week Pregnant

You have 40 weeks to go! Most pregnancies last 40 weeks from the first day of your last period so the first week of your pregnancy starts from that day, even if in reality conception happens two weeks later. During the first week, the egg that will become your baby is now growing in a small fluid-filled bubble called a follicle or sac that resides in your ovary. The follicle will grow close to one inch by the time it pops open and releases its egg. This is called ovulation. About 10 other competing follicles, each with its own egg, are growing at the same time within your ovaries.

The preceding information was adapted from The Pregnancy Companion.

Image Source: iStockPhoto

If you haven’t already, go ahead and schedule that first prenatal appointment. While you’re on the phone, ask for a prenatal vitamin recommendation, and find out whether the medications you’re currently taking are safe for your baby.

Start taking your prenatal vitamins, if you haven’t already, and continue to avoid drugs, alcohol and excessive caffeine. About 150 mg of caffeine per day is the safe limit according to the American Pregnancy Association, if any. You’ll want to stay away from all three during your pregnancy.

Your Body at Week 2

Your period has now ended. The dominant follicle is in the process of growing larger than the other follicles and contains the egg that will become your baby. It will continue to grow to about one inch in size before it pops and releases its egg. The release of the egg is called ovulation and often happens 14 days from the start of your period. A few days before you ovulate, you may notice an increase in cervical mucus. This mucus will help sperm travel through the cervix to the uterus. During ovulation, you may notice some pain in an ovary or experience some mild spotting due to the hormonal fluctuations associated with the ovulation process.

Your Baby at Week 2

By the end of the second week, the follicle will be close to one inch in size. At this time, the egg (soon to be your baby) is mature and ready to come out of its follicle to become fertilized by a sperm.

The preceding information was adapted from The Pregnancy Companion.

Image Source: iStock Photo

If you haven’t already, go ahead and schedule that first prenatal appointment. While you’re on the phone, ask for a prenatal vitamin recommendation, and find out whether the medications you’re currently taking are safe for your baby.

Start taking your prenatal vitamins, if you haven’t already, and continue to avoid drugs, alcohol and excessive caffeine. About 150 mg of caffeine per day is the safe limit according to the American Pregnancy Association, if any. You’ll want to stay away from all three during your pregnancy.

If you haven’t already joined a local or online pregnancy group, now is a good time. Circle of Moms has several pages of different pregnancy groups to choose from.

Your Body at 3 Weeks Pregnant

Your dominant follicle releases an egg, which is taken up by one of your fallopian tubes. After a few days within the tube, a sperm will fertilize this egg, and it will become an embryo: your baby’s beginning!

Now, your embryo will travel down the tube towards your uterus. As it travels, it will grow larger and the cells will start dividing from one cell to around 64 cells or more by the time the embryo reaches the uterus. Your embryo may take five days to reach the uterus. If you have significant pelvic pain at this time, inform your health care provider immediately. She’ll want to rule out the possibility of an ectopic pregnancy (one that occurs outside the uterus).

Your Baby at 3 Weeks Pregnant

At the beginning of this week, your brain releases a hormone called Luteinizing Hormone (LH) that will reach the ovary via the blood stream. This hormone makes the follicle pop open and release its egg. The egg will then travel into one of your fallopian tubes for fertilization by a sperm carrying an X or Y chromosome. X, it’s a girl; Y, it’s a boy. The sperm fertilizes the egg by entering it and allowing for its nucleus, where the DNA is, to mix with the nucleus of the egg. After the sperm enters the egg, the surface of the egg undergoes a dramatic transformation in order to prevent other sperm from entering. The egg is now an embryo.

The embryo is the very first beginning of your baby. The embryo is now starting to rapidly divide as it slowly goes down your fallopian tube to reach the main “room” of your uterus known as the uterine cavity. When your embryo reaches the uterine cavity, it might tumble around for a day or two before sticking permanently to one spot on the cavity wall. As it sticks to the uterus it will form special roots called villi. These villi find blood vessels within the uterine wall and form connections with them, allowing for nutrients and oxygen to pass from your blood stream to your developing embryo.

The early part of the baby’s placenta will start producing the pregnancy hormone Human Chorionic Gonadotropin (HCG). Some of this hormone will go to your blood and urine, and it is by detecting this hormone in your urine or blood, that you can tell if you’re pregnant or not. If you take more than one HCG blood test, your HCG level should double every two days or so in a healthy pregnancy.

The preceding information was adapted from The Pregnancy Companion.

Image Source: iStock Photo

If you haven’t already, go ahead and schedule that first prenatal appointment. While you’re on the phone, ask for a prenatal vitamin recommendation, and find out whether the medications you’re currently taking are safe for your baby.

Start taking your prenatal vitamins, if you haven’t already, and continue to avoid drugs, alcohol and excessive caffeine. About 150 mg of caffeine per day is the safe limit according to the American Pregnancy Association, if any. You’ll want to stay away from all three during your pregnancy.

Your Body at 4 Weeks Pregnant

Your embryo has reached your uterine cavity and is starting to form roots, a process called implantation. You might experience some mild spotting or implantation bleeding, which is very common. Yes, it’s worrying to see any kind of blood this early in your pregnancy, but this spotting doesn’t usually mean that you’re having a miscarriage. In fact, a third of pregnant women will experience this kind of bleeding. Contact your health care provider if the bleeding is more than light spotting.

Estrogen levels in your body are slowly rising, and you might start noticing some mild breast tenderness. Most women, however, will not notice any change in the way their bodies feel. In fact, at this early stage, it’s very common for women not to feel pregnant at all. Even if you’re already pregnant, the main pregnancy hormone known as Human Chorionic Gonadotropin (HCG), will take a while to reach a high enough level in your blood stream and urine to be detected. The earliest you can usually detect HCG in your blood stream is two weeks from ovulation, which is usually four weeks from the beginning of your last missed period.

Your Baby at 4 Weeks Pregnant

At this point, implantation is complete and your embryo is getting plenty of nutrients and oxygen from you. A primitive blood circulation is getting established in your growing embryo. The cells that make up your embryo are starting to change into many different types of cells. This will enable the embryo to eventually develop into a baby with all its different parts. At this point, your baby is the size of a single grain of rice!

The preceding information was adapted from The Pregnancy Companion.

Image Source: iStock Photo