Your Pregnancy: A Week-by-Week Guide

You are 38 Weeks Pregnant!

WHAT'S HAPPENING WITH YOU

Your baby is truly "full term" and could really arrive at any time!

Around this time, you may "lose" your mucus plug. It can look like thick, slippery brown discharge or an actual "plug." Some women never experience this. For others, it may occur just before labor, or any time in the last month of pregnancy.

Remember to keep track of your little one's movements and call your practitioner if you notice any drop in frequency or change in the pattern.

WHAT'S HAPPENING WITH YOUR BABY

During the next two weeks your baby will gain weight, as fat is stored to help maintain body temperature and glucose levels. Your baby might still have vernix (that creamy coating that protects the skin), but it is mostly confined to skin creases and folds and the back and neck. Your baby has a firm grasp reflex now. If a light is shown on your belly, your baby will now turn towards it. This is called the "orienting response."

Your baby may weigh six to six and one half pounds at this point or he or she may weigh eight pounds or more! At around 18 1/2 inches long, he or she would look very well developed if born today. Your baby would not need any special care at this point.

The "lanugo" or fine downy hair that covered most of your baby's body in the second trimester is mostly gone now, or present only on the upper back and shoulders.

FACT OF THE WEEK

While the lithotomy position (mother on her back with legs elevated in stirrups) is gradually losing favor as the ideal birth position, some providers continue to insist on this position at the time of birth. The moment of birth is not the time to discuss your care providers preferences, so it is important to talk this over now.

Consider alternative positions:

Side lying: Takes the weight and pressure of the uterus off of the major blood vessels and the perineum. The upper leg can be lifted or grasped by the mother when she pushes.

Semi-sitting: This position assists gravity in bringing the baby down into and through the pelvis.

Squatting: This position "opens" your pelvis and assists gravity. When not instructed in the "proper way" to birth a baby, most women spontaneously choose an upright squatting position in which to give birth.

These alternative positions sound nice and all, but doctors do not allow any other position other then the traditional Lithotomy for delivery. As long as OB doctors have to pay the highest in malpractice insurance we will never be able to try any other position....unless you choose to use a midwife. So it kind of bugs me when sites like this "recommend" these other positions knowing full well that they are not available to laboring women.