Week 8 of Pregnancy

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If you were to stand your little one next to a marble, they would be just as tall, about 1.7 millimeters.

Your baby’s heart can now be heard perfectly on an ultrasound scan and also in the midwife’s office with the help of a fetal doppler (a small electronic device that allows you to hear what you would hear on an ultrasound). Hearing your baby’s heart beat for the first time in your life is very exciting!

CHANGES IN YOUR BABY THIS WEEK

The shape of the head with the eyes, where the eyelids, hands and feet begin to form, is already quite well recognizable.

He is capable of bending his arms and legs and his little fingers can already be distinguished on his hands, joined together by a thin membrane.

His lungs and liver are already easily differentiated.

YOUR PHYSICAL AND EMOTIONAL CHANGES

When you are dressed it is not obvious that you are pregnant, however, the waist of the pants begins to bother you. You may even feel that a larger bra size would suit you better, the breast begins to prepare for breastfeeding very early.

In fact, women who suffer an abortion at this stage of the pregnancy discover with surprise that their breasts begin to sprout milk a few days after the loss! The good news is that the initial breast tension begins to give way.

Your vulva changes color! The change may not be very obvious, but your vulva and the inside of your vagina darken, turning purplish. This is known as Chadwick’s sign.

Some smells and tastes may especially bother you. It seems that this is related to our most primal instinct to avoid substances that could potentially harm our baby.

The opposite also happens, suddenly you feel like eating something that had never caught your attention or you start to eat a lot of a specific food, does it ring a bell? Exactly, the cravings are here to stay throughout the pregnancy.

Common symptoms at week 8 of pregnancy

Nausea
Tiredness and sleepiness
Constipation
Changes in the color of your vagina
Increased size of the breasts
the cravings begin
Certain odors may start to bother you
Constant urge to urinate (frequency)

TIPS FOR YOUR WELL-BEING

If your chest volume has increased, buy one or two non-wired bras. They will be more comfortable for you, if you also buy them while breastfeeding, you can use them postpartum if you breastfeed.

Keep in mind that at the beginning of breastfeeding your breasts will increase even more in size (yes, although now it seems impossible to you) and you may think that the bras you buy during pregnancy are not going to help you… but don’t worry, in a few weeks that volume is reduced.

Be careful with cravings, if you eat carrots or apples there is no problem, but if you eat cured cheese or chocolates, in addition to raising your cholesterol and blood sugar, you will gain more weight than you should.

Important– In pregnancy you should never eat for 2, but you have to eat healthy. An excess of weight in the gestation is related to an increase of risks for the mother and the baby. If you start from a healthy weight, the ideal according to the latest published data is that you gain between 20 and 30 pounds over the 9 months.

Also remember to continue taking folic acid.

MEDICAL EXAMS AND TESTS AT WEEK 8

From now on, at each consultation the gynecologist or midwife will listen and evaluate your baby’s heartbeat to ensure that everything is correct and you will be able to hear it too!

If you meet any of the following characteristics, you will be screened early for gestational diabetes because your risk of suffering from it is greater and may involve a greater risk of maternal and fetal complications:

Women with a BMI equal to or greater than 30 (calculated by dividing your weight in kilos by your height in meters, squared: kg/m2)
If you have other children who weighed 10 pounds or more at birth
If you have had gestational diabetes in previous pregnancies
Your mother or father has diabetes

The test is called oral glucose overload (OGS) or “long curve”, it lasts 3 hours during which you must remain at rest.

Upon arrival, they will put an IV in your arm and draw a tube of blood to determine your basal glucose (fasting or not, ask about your center’s protocol). Immediately afterwards, they will give you a small bottle of a liquid with glucose that you will have to drink whole and they will take a blood tube again at 1 hour, at 2 hours, and at 3 hours.

In this way, the doctor can analyze how your body is metabolizing the glucose that you have ingested.

If you don’t have gestational diabetes, your glucose values will not be elevated. The maximum values are:

For basal, 105mg/dl of glucose
At hour, 190mg/dl of glucose
At 2 hours 165md/dl of glucose
At 3 hours 145mg/dl of glucose

If 2 or more values exceed these figures, gestational diabetes is diagnosed. If only one rises, the test is repeated in about 3 weeks.

Keep in mind that, even if the result is normal, the test may be repeated between weeks 25 and 28.

Trick

Sometimes drinking that cloying liquid is unpleasant, some women vomit and the test has to be repeated. A useful trick is to take a slice of lemon from home to suck after drinking it, the excessive sweetness will be more bearable and it does not influence the result of the analysis at all.

Starting this week, a blood test can also be done to find out if the baby will be a boy or a girl , although the definitive test is the 20-week ultrasound.

FREQUENT QUESTIONS

Is it a good idea to buy a home fetal monitor?

For a few years, simple monitors have been sold to use at home.

If you feel like having one, let it be because you want to listen to your baby’s heart or for your loved ones to hear it. But if you are anxious about knowing if everything is going well, it is not a good idea to try to alleviate it with a home monitor, because in these cases, women say that, rather than reassure themselves with its use, they see how their anxiety grows and the constant need to use it.

Keep in mind that even the best professional sometimes has difficulty hearing the fetal heartbeat, because it depends a lot on how your baby is positioned, how small it is, and the layer of fat on your abdomen.

The car seat belt bothers me, is it legal not to use it if I am pregnant?

The car’s seat belt may start to bother you because of the pressure it exerts on your abdomen. Remember that not only is it probably illegal to drive without a seat belt in your area, but in the event of an accident it can be fatal for you, your child, or both.

Although there are no officially approved ones, you can look for seat belt extenders for greater comfort and a reduction in the impact on the abdomen in the event of an accident.