Baby Development
The Week 23 edition:
Pick up your dancing shoes because your baby can feel you dance! They also respond to sounds by moving your belly. Wave-like movements that move food down the digestive tract have started. This means your baby is practising to swallow! They are as big as an eggplant weighing 453 grams and measuring 29.21 cm from head to toe.
Here is an extensive list of everything your baby has been up to this week:
- Your baby can not only hear but respond to low – pitched sounds like the dog barking and is more likely to respond to the male voices.
- They are moving a lot more now. You may feel the baby hiccup besides the kicks and flutters.
- The placenta is growing along with the baby, giving oxygen and nutrients to the baby and removing the waste products. Placenta is such a wonderful organ, it filters out many toxins and germs and makes all the pregnancy hormones! It is worshiped in many cultures as the baby’s twin.
- Wave-like movements have begun in your baby. They help propel during peristalsis or digestion.
- The baby’s skin may look pinkish and saggy at this point. There is a lot of weight gain coming!
Mother
Track your growth at Week 23:
You will see a lot of new symptoms this trimester. These may include bloating, as your intestines are moving to make space for the growing uterus and baby, increase in appetite. Stretch marks will grow and you will surely hear yourself snoring in the middle of the night. The only way you will be able to keep your head afloat in the sea of changes is by relaxing. So, do close your eyes from time to time and unwind. Plan for your maternity leave and consume more organic produce. Go dancing with your baby and remember to drink lots of water! You got this!
Here is a list of symptoms you may see this week:
- You have been eating many meals a day to get all the needed energy to thrive in this pregnancy
- This has to be followed by bloating. Digestion slows down and you have less space in your abdomen
- If your face feels swollen, it is normal.
Your feet and ankles will feel progressively swollen over the next couple of months. It is ok for the swelling to come and go (transient), not ok for it to stay. - Too much flossing may lead to bleeding gums.
- Do not think too much about the stretchmarks on your body, it is your skin stretching to make space for your growing baby
- All the best to your partner for all the snoring at night!
