Trends, origin guides, and inspiration for naming your baby.
The third trimester begins this week. RhoGAM, kick counts, and the prenatal-visit schedule all shift; the calendar gets short.
The second trimester closes this week. The easier middle stretch gives way to the heavier third trimester; the symptoms that lifted in weeks 14 through 27 start coming back.
Eyes open this week. Lungs begin producing surfactant. Two small milestones that look unremarkable on a scan and matter a great deal in any earlier-than-planned delivery.
The baby starts listening back this week. Voices heard repeatedly now will be voices the baby recognizes after birth; names said often now begin to mean something.
Viability arrives this week for most neonatal units — a quiet, technical crossing that few people mark out loud. Eight names for the viability week.
Week 23 is the week your baby crosses a pound, the week the fundal tape measure starts reading like a clock, and the week premature survival becomes possible with intensive care. A guide to what's happening, what to watch, and eight names that fit the moment.
The face has finished its main work by now. Features are recognizable on ultrasound, hearing is settled, and the baby is starting to look less like a fetus and more like a baby.
Taste buds come online this week. The baby is, in a literal sense, tasting what you ate yesterday — sweet, bitter, garlicky, salty — and the preferences set now stick.
Halfway. The fundal tape measure starts matching the gestational week, vernix coats the skin, and the calendar finally tilts toward the second half. Eight names for the midpoint.
Hair sprouts this week, both on the scalp and as vernix forming on the skin. The body is laying down its outer layer; eggs are settling in the ovaries; the brain is organizing itself.
The anatomy scan window opens this week. The scan is the most detailed look of the pregnancy and one of the few moments that often comes with new information about the baby.
Fat forms under the skin this week, the cord thickens, and the translucent look of earlier ultrasounds starts to fill in. Eight names for the filling-out week.
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