Everything you need to know about the second trimester of pregnancy

Posted July 9, 2021

Well, there you have it, you are finally past the longest trimester of pregnancy (that’s not true, the worst are the last days before giving birth which seem to last a year on their own). But at least, good news, the risk of spontaneous abortion decreased significantly, your nausea may have ceased, and if you’re lucky, you feel a little less like you’re having a permanent gastro or a good hangover. Amen!

If you are a good student, you are registered in a maternity or childbirth center (if not, don’t panic, it’s still possible) and you may have told your employer that an alien was crouched in your uterus. And now, what will happen? What’s the plan?

The fourth month or the beginning of the second trimester of pregnancy

By the second trimester of pregnancy, you are good for slamming one medical examination per month. It is not even the worst thing in the world, as all you need to do is consult your midwife, doctor or gynecologist who will verify that you are in good shape.

For this you will be entitled, among other things, to a weighing, to measure blood pressure and to listen to the baby’s heart thanks to a Doppler. This is also an opportunity to talk about your pregnancy ailments to a professional who can reassure you in case of anxiety, or even prescribe compression stockings if your calves give you the impression that you are the size of Russia, that kind of thing. .

If you are not immune to toxoplasmosis, you will be prescribed a blood test every month to check that everything is going well and you will systematically be entitled to a urinalysis to check your sugar and albumin levels.

This is also the time to make a date for the famous morphological ultrasoundwhich should be performed between the 19th and 22nd week of amenorrhea (SA), i.e. approximately for the fifth month of pregnancy.

If you wish, you can also take advantage of the 4th month of pregnancy to perform a early prenatal interview with a midwife. During this appointment, you and your partner can ask any questions about pregnancy and childbirth. It is an appointment that lasts longer than the classic monthly follow-up appointments, and that can allow you to reveal certain fears or anxieties, or even to realize that you need help, psychiatrist, in particular, and be redirected to a professional. suitable.

What happens in the fifth month of pregnancy?

Surely now you have to feel your baby’s kicks, and if this is your first, you must be quite surprised at how it feels. Feeling him moving can help you understand that yes, indeed, you have a human being inside your body, and that obviously he hasn’t quite grasped the concept of night sleep, as nothing prevents you from doing somersaults at three in the morning and preventing you from to sleep. Great, it will help you plan well the first few months after birth (not true, it will be worse).

As for dating, like every month now, a consultation with your midwife, doctor or gynecologist for a quick check-up, with the same exams of the previous months.

But the fifth month is also the big time of morphological ultrasound! It lasts about half an hour, and is quite intense in emotions. In fact, if you wish to know it, you can find out right now what is the sex of your future baby. So sometimes you don’t see anything at all, especially if your heir decides to show only the back and the ball, but, from a physiological point of view, it is during this echo that we can normally distinguish his genitals.

In addition to sex, the ultrasound will mainly check the physical structures of the fetusmeasuring the head and abdominal circumference, in order to confirm the good growth and development of the little alien.

But the end of the fifth month, as Tania Totolidis, general practitioner explains, is also ” the possibility of making an appointment with a dentist for a thorough examination of the teeth, given the high calcium requirement of pregnant women. It would be a real shame to have tooth decay and only eat applesauce due to pregnancy, wouldn’t it? (I’m barely extrapolating, let’s see!)

The sixth month and its little joys (or not)

If you’ve never done this before, the sixth month of pregnancy, the last of the second trimester, is the time to start childbirth preparation sessions. For some practices, like haptonomy, you need to start a little earlier, but don’t panic, you’re still in the nails.

The sixth month is also the time when, in some cities like Paris, you can put your future unborn child on the waiting list for a municipal nursery school, if it’s a childcare modality that interests you. Obviously you will have to confirm your registration once the heir is born. Speaking of administration (yes, I know, we all love it), it’s also the time when your potential mate, if you’re not married, can do a recognition of early paternity, so that his kinship is recognized. For more information, you can take a look at the public service portal, everything is explained very well there.

Otherwise, in terms of medical visits, nothing changes compared to the previous months. You will still need to visit your midwife, doctor or gynecologist to check the same things as the previous months and special attention will be paid to your blood pressurewhich shouldn’t be too high.

Finally, the sixth month is mainly the time when a gestational diabetes screening can be offered to you, using a particularly dirty test. You will notice that, if you talk about it with people around you who have already been pregnant, the mention of this test causes more or less similar reactions, with “euuurk” and “never again, there is hell”.

So, yes, we are not lying to you, this test, which consists of ingesting a solution of 50g of glucose diluted in water while drawing blood (I’m simplifying, huh) is not the BEST period of pregnancy. But it is important, even if not mandatory, since it allows to avoid birth complications (with a baby that would exceed 4 kg), and to prevent possible malformations of the fetus by not detecting type 2 diabetes in time in the mother.

Finally, the last little detail of this sixth month of pregnancy: don’t forget it update your vital card if not already done, so that your healthcare costs are covered 100% from the first day of the sixth month and up to 12 days after your birth.

So ready for the last trimester of pregnancy?