22 Weeks Pregnant

Your baby at 22 weeks

Your baby now weighs about 453g and is about 20cm in length from crown to rump. However, now that the legs are no longer curled so tightly against the abdomen, you will be given the measurements of your baby's length in terms of crown to heel distance, which by now is approximately 29cm.

The baby's weight is increasing, but while all the proportions of the head, back and limbs are now representative of a newborn baby, they still look very thin. The coming months will see a big change in the baby's weight as it develops more body fat. You may have found yourself already speculating as to what colour eyes your little one will turn out to have, however, they actually have no colour in this part of the eye yet (the iris), although the rest of the eye is fully formed.

How you are feeling

It can be easy to see why some women feel that they lose their confidence when they are pregnant. You have all manner of pregnancy side effects to deal with, including sweatiness, forgetfulness and breathlessness. Unfortunately there is yet another one that you can add to the list, clumsiness. Lots of women find that they become clumsier during pregnancy but few realise that it is actually a direct side effect of their condition. It is caused by the loosening of joints and ligaments, as well as the retention of water, which can make your grasp and balance less firm. This, combined with the reduced concentration due to pregnancy forgetfulness and your ever changing centre of gravity means that you are clearly more prone to embarrassing, and potentially dangerous, accidents. Things will become more hazardous as you get later in your pregnancy. You will probably find that you can no longer see your feet or where you're putting them. This means tripping up and down steps, or pavement kerbs is surprisingly common for pregnant ladies. The best you can do to minimise your chances of hurting yourself is to exercise caution, take things slowly and be sensible. Ask someone else to reach things that require standing on a stool or a step; don't take the stairs at speed and be extra careful in the bath or shower.

What you need to do

Right now, you should be doing your pelvic floor exercises - did you need reminding? There are plenty of mums out there who say that they regret not exercising their pelvic floor muscles properly during pregnancy. However, mention it in a room full of pregnant women and you are likely to see the same guilty look across the group as most of them acknowledge that they do them only sporadically, if at all. (You can guarantee that at this point the whole room will begin doing them as soon as the subject comes up!). Remember, you need to be aiming to do Kegels (another term for pelvic floor exercises) for 5 minutes, 3 times a day. They aren't difficult, you just need to tense the muscles around your vagina and anus as you would if you were to stop yourself urinating mid-flow and hold them tight for ten seconds before releasing, then repeat this at least 20 times. The exercise is easy, and it can be done pretty much anywhere. Remembering to do them is the only hard part. Try setting reminders in your calendar if you are at a computer each day, or on your mobile phone. They don't have to spell out what you need to do for all to see, just seeing 'PF' pop up three times a day is enough to remind you what you need to be doing!

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