Welcome to Week 36 of Your Pregnancy!
Your Baby in Week 36 of Pregnancy
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Those little lungs inside your baby are on the finishing touches of developing by week 36 of pregnancy. This week the lungs have formed true alveoli. These are tiny air sacs in the lungs that process oxygen and carbon dioxide. By the time your baby is born, they will have between 24 and 75 million of these!
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Boys will weigh slightly more than girls will at week 36 of pregnancy. The average weight is between five and seven pounds. Their length is comparable, and unaffected by gender. The average length is between 18 and 21 inches, from the tip of the head to the toes. The things that influence your baby’s length and weight are genetics and what and how much you ate during your pregnancy. Genetics play the biggest role. You can estimate what your baby’s size will be by what you and your spouse’s size was at birth. Your baby will range between the two, most likely.
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The gums in your baby’s mouth are hard by week 36 of pregnancy. If you are going to be breastfeeding, you may be surprised at how hard they actually are! Never fear, once you and baby both figure out how to feed, it won’t (or shouldn’t) hurt you. The gums are hard to protect the developing teeth underneath, and to give baby something to use to mash up their cereal and whole foods they will get in several months.
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The baby drops around week 36 of pregnancy. Relax! It’s not bad like it sounds – it means delivery is that much closer. When you baby drops, the fundal height that your doctor is recording each week is lower. That means baby has lowered their head in to the birth canal and the process for delivery is beginning. Just because your baby has dropped doesn’t mean you will delivery immediately – you can look like you are carrying baby lower for several weeks! The biggest thing you may notice is that you need to go to the bathroom a lot! Your baby’s head may be resting on or near your bladder, so prepare to use the facilities a lot.
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The skin is getting soft around week 36 of pregnancy. The oil glands are in high production, the fat is helping from the underneath and your baby will have the softest skin imaginable. There’s a reason why every skin care commercial uses the phrase – soft as a baby’s butt! Nothing else is softer! Not only do they have the oil and vernix for protection, but also a baby’s skin hasn’t faced elements like sun, wind and pollutants to make it dry. Keep your baby’s skin as protected as you can in those first few months – cover their faces and any exposed skin from the sun until they are old enough to wear sunscreen.
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Your baby’s liver continues to process waste products in week 36 of pregnancy. Even though they aren’t consuming anything more than amniotic fluid, they are processing the fluid and waste out of it. Waste is also being removed from anything else they ingested, or rather you ingested and they got a taste of, through their bloodstream. What you eat and drink goes in to their system as well, and needs processing. The functions are all revving up, ready for final takeoff.
Your Body in Week 36 of Pregnancy
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You begin weekly visits to the doctor around week 36 of pregnancy. The doctor is keeping a close eye on your cervix, and measuring fundal height to check for any significant changes. You may be thinning, dilated or your fundal measurement may have dropped. If the doctor can spot any changes in any of the above, it may give them a clue as to when you may deliver. It’s not an exact science, but they can get a better gauge on your readiness to see if you may need to be induced or have a C-section.
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Starting next week, you should be able to deliver without expecting many or any problems in the lung department. So, if your baby were to be born next week, he or she would be able to wail with the best of them. So breathe a sigh of relief and continue your countdown to the day when you finally hear that first cry.
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Your doctor will test you for strep B in preparation for a vaginal delivery around week 36 of pregnancy. Group B Strep is a bacterium that is relatively harmless for adults, but it could cause complications for an infant. Your doctor will do a swab test and find out if you are negative or positive.
If you are positive, you’ll simply get an antibiotic to treat it before you deliver, greatly reducing the chances that your baby will contract it on their way out of the birth canal. If you do have strep B, and the doctor handling the delivery isn’t your normal doctor, make sure they are aware of it too, just as a precaution.
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By the end of week 36 of pregnancy, you are considered full term! Go ahead and celebrate this milestone as you have made it to a vital point in your pregnancy. You can deliver any time from now on and your baby should not have any complications. If your doctor has you scheduled for a C-section, it will probably happen during this week, before you would go in to labor on your own. Get all of your last minute details taken care of and make sure you take time to rest! Your blessed event is just around the corner.
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