What Month/Week?
Month 5, Week 22
How Big is Baby?
Baby is the size of a spaghetti squash, almost 11 inches long and weighing almost one pound
Weight Gain
4.9kg
Symptoms
General tiredness, but nothing else, which is fantastic!
Cravings
None – however I’ve been eating a lot of chocolate… Whoops!
Food Aversions
None
Reflections
This month has had some really high points, but also one low point in terms of my general life, but in terms of pregnancy only it’s probably been my favourite month!
The first highlight was having our 20 week Anomaly Scan, where we once again got to see our growing baby on the sonography screen, albeit a lot more formed than it was at 12 weeks. It was such an amazing moment to see baby and hear all was well. I actually got to have a second scan as well as whilst I was having my actual scan, the sonographer asked if I was willing to be a volunteer that weekend for some heart specific training for the hospital’s sonographers. So I gave up just a small section of my time a few days later and got to see baby again!
It was during the anomaly scan when I was able to confirm that I was feeling baby moving. Prior to the scan I’d felt three movements that I was about 90% sure was the baby, but being a first-time mum and unsure of what I was looking for, I was hesitant to say for certain that’s what I was feeling. However, whilst we were at the scan, we saw baby kick on the screen at the exact moment I felt a movement, and so it was confirmed to me that my instinct was correct. Since then, I’ve been feeling baby moving ALL THE TIME, and I’m absolutely in love with it! I’ve just been sitting on the couch at night with my hands on my belly and just staring at it, marvelling at baby’s movements.
As mentioned, there was a low point at the end of this month, when my beloved grandmother passed away. She was one of my best friends and closest confidants, and while she had been unwell for a long time and so her death was anticipated, it didn’t really make it any easier – Especially considering she was all the way over in Australia and I was in the United Kingdom. I was able to speak to her on the phone every day for the last three days of her life, but I so wished I could have been there in person. I actually didn’t anticipate I’d be able to get out there for the funeral, but a last-minute plan quickly came together and so with 24 hours notice, I was on my way to Australia. Travelling long-haul at 5 months pregnant is not exactly a comfortable experience (hear my full experience in the video), but it was so worth it to be there to farewell my Gran, and to be there with my family during a difficult time. A silver lining to the whole trip was that I got to see my mother and my two (also pregnant) best friends. Originally I wouldn’t have been able to see them whilst I’m pregnant, so it was just so lovely to be able to have my mum feel the baby move inside my bump, and to have some besties bump photos with my two friends.
This month Dan and I also started making some of the bigger purchases for baby, starting with what will most likely be our most expensive item – the car seat. Dan and I both wish to purchase the majority of baby’s items secondhand to lessen the ecological footprint of bringing another child into this world, and to stop even more ‘stuff’ being sent to landfill, however when it comes to the car seat we felt it was best to make this purchase first hand, due to safety reasons. We ended up going with the Cybex Cloud Z, and we are SO pleased with it! Now we just need a baby to put in it!
One Reply to “Month 5 Pregnancy Update”