Slowly, Slowly, Bit by Bit - Week 23

So we have come to the 23 week mark and things are still going well - for both of us. Our little girl is getting bigger and is hopefully doing everything she should be doing. I know - I say that just about every week.

This week -

• The proportions of the body are now quite similar to a newborn although thinner since she hasn't begun to form body fat.
• The bones located in the middle ear harden.
• Our daughter is able to hear. (Low-frequency sounds mimicking a male voice penetrate the abdomen and uterine wall better than the higher frequencies of the female voice - so she will be hearing Jochen better than she will be hearing me.)
• The eyes are formed, though the iris still lacks pigmentation.
• The pancreas, essential in the production of hormones, is developing steadily. She has begun producing insulin, important for the breakdown of sugars.
• Our baby's lungs have begun to develop surfactant, a substance that will help her lungs to expand following birth and therefore be able to breathe.
  
• She now has REM (or rapid eye movement) patterns in her sleep, which indicates she may be dreaming! I wonder what she is dreaming about.
  
• Our baby can now rotate her head and could experience hiccups. Hiccups are caused by the sudden, irregular contractions of her immature diaphragm (the muscle that supports the lungs) and while she may have been be capable of sporadic hiccups as early as 12 weeks gestation, they are generally stronger and more rhythmic by this stage. So far I haven't felt any hiccups that I know of.
  
• If born now, our baby has a anywhere between a 2% - 15% chance of survival, her odds going up with each passing day.
  
• The average baby at this stage weighs about 501gm and is 28.9cm long from head to toe.

If you like a challenge, I found this Ultrasound Quiz where you have to work out if it is a boy or a girl or occasionally another piece of anatomy. I thought some of you might enjoy having a go as well. It does seem to take a while to load the pictures, so allow plenty of time.

On Monday afternoon we have our next appointment with our OB Dr. Simon which will be good and as per usual I'm looking forward to it. Then on Tuesday night I have the first of my antenatal classes which is physio. I'm not sure exactly what we will be talking about but it will be good to chat to other pregnant women, hopefully some of whom might be due around the same time as me.

On to a completely unrelated topic, last night I was getting such a kicking as I was trying to go to sleep that it was virtually impossible. Jochen was snoring away and I was just lying there coping a beating. I get the biggest kicks that she is gives me a fright quite often. I can only imagine what it will be like as she gets even bigger and stronger. But I have to admit I still love it, no matter how uncomfortable it may get.