Pregnancy is an incredibly fascinating thing that is incredibly common, with more than four million babies born each and every year in the United States alone – as looking at any pelvis model of a female skeleton or a pelvis model of the female body in general. When you look at such a pelvis model – and at a number of types of said pelvis model looking at the growth of the baby over the course of the typical woman’s pregnancy – you find an incredibly amount of change occurring in just a short period of time. But more so than the pelvis model, more fascinating than any of it is the miracle of life that has been create at the end of the day.
As soon as you discover that you’re pregnant, you should schedule an appointment with your gynecologist. At this initial appointment, a preliminary ultrasound may or may not be done (as the embryo might still be too small to appear on the screen, and is really, at the point at which most pregnancies are detected, not much more than a yolk sac) but it is likely that your blood will be drawn and blood work will be done in order to assess the levels of the pregnancy hormone, HCG, in your blood.
At this is initial doctor’s appointment, it is likely that you will have a number of important questions – especially if this is your first baby or first time being pregnant. It’s important to ask them, as there is no such thing as a silly question when it comes to pregnancy and the process of growing an entire new human being within your very own body. Your doctor might use various tools, like a pelvis model or a fetal progress chart, in order to help to explain the intricacies of the pregnant body and the process of pregnancy as a whole.
When we look at a pelvis model or fetal models or a prenatal development chart, it becomes clear how much a woman’s body must grow to accommodate for the fetus. By the end of the first trimester alone, the typical uterus has already stretched to the size of an orange. But by the end of the pregnancy, it will usually reach the size of a watermelon – and sometimes larger, if the woman in question is carrying multiple babies.
The science of birth itself is also a fascinating thing, as can be seen using a pelvic model, a pregnancy dilation chart, and other such important learning tools. First of all, many people are unaware of the fact that a pregnancy is not nine exact months but instead forty weeks. Though a woman can safely deliver her baby up to three weeks ahead of her due date and still have the baby considered to be full term, it is only once the forty week mark has been hit and passed by that a woman is considered to be overdue – and by this point, many women welcome the pains of labor in order to be done with being pregnant and finally get to be able to officially meet their new baby.
In fact, the chemical of oxytocin, the chemical that, at least in part, creates love, is secreted during the process of labor and delivery and directly after birth. This helps the mother to bond with her new baby. On top of this, the bonding experience can be increase through the process of breastfeeding.
Breastfeeding has become more and more common in recent years, and it is even recommended that a baby be breastfed for no less than six months if it is at all possible. Of course, the longer a baby is breastfed the better, and many women will now even breastfeed their babies into toddlerhood and let them naturally wean by themselves, when they decide that they are ready. And the benefits of breastfeeding are truly immense.
Not only does breastfeeding help a mother and a baby to bond, but breastfeeding also helps to build up a baby’s immune system. Breastmilk can help babies to recover faster from illnesses and can even protect the baby from an illness that the mother is fighting off.
