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What Is the First Trimester of Pregnancy?
The first trimester of pregnancy is the most important for your baby’s development. Each trimester lasts approximately three months, while a full-term pregnancy lasts between nine and ten months. So your first trimester will extend until the 13th week of your pregnancy. But by the time you are certain you are pregnant, you could be five or six weeks pregnant. Now you understand why this stage is confusing!
As a woman, you will see a lot of changes in your body during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. On different days, you will worry about what to eat, the type of prenatal vitamin and test to take, and how much weight you may put on. It is important to understand each pregnancy trimester to help you make the right decisions and changes before the due date.
In this article are some tips on how to survive first trimester changes, what to expect, and what to avoid during early pregnancy.
What Are the Different Trimesters?
There are three stages of pregnancy: the first trimester, the second trimester, and the third trimester. A trimester lasts 12 to 13 weeks, whereas a full-term pregnancy lasts approximately 40 weeks, beginning with the first day of a woman’s last period. During each trimester, the fetus will achieve particular baby growth milestones.
What Happens During the First Trimester?
A woman’s body goes through several changes in the first three months. The fertilized egg quickly breaks into layers of cells and implants in the womb’s wall, where it begins to grow. These layers of cells develop into an embryo, which is what your baby is known as at this point.
A baby grows quickly during the first trimester and the fetus begins to develop a brain, spinal cord, heart, and other organs. By six weeks, you can go for an ultrasound to hear a heartbeat. By the end of eight weeks, your baby’s arms and legs begin to bud, while their fingers and toes start to form. At the end of your first trimester, your baby’s sex organs would have also formed.
What Should You Expect During a Visit to the Doctor?
As soon as you know you are pregnant, make an appointment with your doctor to find out how to care for your body and your baby’s development. Your first pregnancy visit will introduce you to some tips on surviving the first trimester, which happens around eight weeks after your last menstrual period.
The first visit is usually one of the longest, as your doctor will take a full health history and perform a full physical and pelvic exam. The routine will also include the following:
- An ultrasound evaluation to confirm the pregnancy
- A pap test
- General health exam to check your blood pressure, height, and weight
- Thyroid levels check
- Weight check
- Test for sexually transmitted infections, HIV, and hepatitis
- Date of delivery or ‘due date’ estimation, which is around 266 days from the first day of your last period
- Screening for risk factors like anemia
- Learning about your personal and family medical history
During the 11th to 13th week of your pregnancy, the doctor will carry out a test known as a Nuchal Translucency Scan that measures the baby’s head and the amount of fluid behind the fetus’s neck.
Knowing these measurements will determine if there are any chances your baby will be born with a genetic disorder. The scan is also accurate for detecting conditions when combined with other first-trimester screenings.
Even if you haven’t chosen a doctor for your pregnancy care, it’s important to see a health professional to start your prenatal care. The delivery date may seem far away, but you are already seeing changes in your body and will require the best first trimester survival kit.
What Are the Most Common Symptoms During the First Trimester?
During the first trimester, every woman has her own unique experience as her body starts to undergo some major changes. The body releases hormones that affect almost all the organs in your body and so, the first sign you may notice when you are pregnant is a missing period.
Other common symptoms you may feel include tiredness, nausea, breast tenderness, mood swings, stomach upset, headaches, weight gain, unusual cravings, and frequent urination.
Why Is the First Trimester So Important?
The first trimester is very important because it is the stage that starts your baby’s development. According to one study, miscarriages and birth defects usually happen during this period.
During the first trimester, your baby’s body structure and organ systems develop. Harmful substances and infections can damage the fetus’s growth and development during this delicate time. Exposure to these substances can increase your baby’s chance of being born with congenital disorders.
How to Stay Healthy During the First Trimester
Every pregnant woman should be aware of what to do and what to avoid during her first trimester. Here are first trimester tips you need to keep yourself and your developing baby healthy.
1. Take Enough Water
Drinking enough water prevents preterm labor, kidney stones, headaches, and dizziness. If you are also battling constipation, you need to stay hydrated to ease these conditions. If you notice that your urine is clear or light yellow, you are drinking enough water, but if it’s dark yellow, you need to drink more water.
2. Exercise Regularly
Regular exercise keeps you fit and helps regulate your mood and hormonal changes during the first trimester. It is also a step toward to gradually losing weight in the first trimester and battling insomnia.
There are different ways to get a more active lifestyle during pregnancy but before you start any exercise routine, speak with your doctor. They can recommend the best exercise options to build your current state of health and ensure your baby’s safe growth.
3. Take Prenatal Vitamins
There are prenatal vitamins that give your body the folate it needs during the first trimester. Some of these vitamins help cover your needs for calcium, iron, and zinc to ensure your baby grows well. They also provide the right amount of omega-3 fats like DHA (docosahexaenoic acid) and EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid), to help your baby’s brain development.
Talk with your doctor about the best prenatal vitamins that are most suitable for you and discuss certain prenatal side effects and how to manage them. Not a fan of pills? You can try prenatal gummies for people who can’t swallow pills.
4. Work Out Your Pelvic Floor with Kegel Exercises
A typical first trimester workout during pregnancy aims to ensure you deliver your baby safely. Pelvic floor with Kegel exercises will teach you how to work your pelvic muscles, strengthening them to support the growing weight of your baby during pregnancy. It also helps to relax these muscles so that your baby can pass through the vagina during delivery.
5. Practice a Healthy Diet
When it comes to the many tips for first trimester healthy living, you should include a rainbow diet. When planning your meal or snack, try colorful foods like dark green spinach, orange carrots, red apples, yellow bananas, blueberries, and more.
These foods will not only offer nutritious and antioxidant benefits but also give your baby various tastes and flavors to look forward to. When you eat these foods, your baby also eats them through the amniotic fluid.
What Should You Avoid During the First Trimester?
If you are pregnant, it’s normal to adjust and make some lifestyle changes to ensure that your baby’s development is safe. The following are some of the things you should avoid during your first trimester of pregnancy:
1. Alcohol
First things first, no amount of alcohol is safe during pregnancy. Taking alcohol during pregnancy exposes you and your developing baby to a lot of risks. For example, drinking alcohol in the first trimester can lead to central nervous system problems in the baby.
2. Strenuous Exercise
If you are not used to first trimester workout routine, you can speak to your doctor about a safe exercise program during pregnancy. Do not try a new strenuous activity during this delicate period. According to a study, at least 30 minutes of moderate exercise for 5 days a week is fine unless you have a medical complication.
3. Caffeine
A lot of pregnant women fall victim to taking caffeine in the first trimester of pregnancy because they are so tired. What they fail to know is that caffeine can pass through the placenta to affect the growing baby’s heart rate. A little quantity of caffeine may be fine in the first trimester but up to two cups of coffee or 200 milligrams of caffeine can lead to a risk of miscarriage.
4. Smoking
According to a research, smoking during the first trimester of pregnancy comes with risks such as a chance of losing it. Babies born to women who smoke during pregnancy are exposed to substances that can cause birth defects, premature birth, low birth weight, and infant death.
5. Cat Litter
If you are pregnant cat owner, you can change your cat’s litter box safely or you can have someone else take care of this chore. Toxoplasmosis is a parasitic infection that can be passed through cat poop in their litter or on outdoor soil with cat poop.
If you are infected during your pregnant, you could pass the illness to your unborn baby. If a baby catches the disease during the first trimester, it can lead to birth defects like eye and brain damage.
6. Raw Sprout
Pregnant women should avoid eating raw sprouts because they can cause foodborne illnesses. Symptoms of food poisoning from eating raw sprouts are vomiting, diarrhea, and stomach cramps. Some may say that cooking them well before eating can reduce the chances of poisoning, but it’s best to be safe.
What Is the Most Critical Week of the First Trimester?
In pregnancy, each part of the fetus’s body forms during a specific time frame. According to a research on first trimester, major birth defects of the body and internal organs are most likely to happen between 3 to 12 fetal weeks. This may be the same as 5 to 14 gestational weeks since the first day of your last period.
What Positions Should be Avoided in Early Pregnancy?
There are a few bad positions that you should avoid during pregnancy because they can affect the development of your baby or your body posture. Some of them include:
- Prolonged standing
- Crossing the leg while sitting
- Sitting in the same position for up to 30 minutes
- Sleeping on your stomach
- Heavy lifting, climbing, or carrying.
- Bending from waist instead of your knees while lifting.
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes, you can have a successful first trimester! These are the first delicate moments that will affect your growing and consulting your doctor every step of the way is a great start.
Some of the signs of a possible problem during pregnancy include severe headaches, blurred vision, vaginal bleeding, abdominal pain, fever, difficulty in breathing, and extreme weakness.
Although a parent’s genetics can affect a baby’s physical look, there are vitamins you can take to promote a healthy skin development. Some of them include vitamins A, C, and E, omega 3 fatty acids, folic acid, and antioxidants.
[…] Fatigue refers to extreme tiredness one may experience after a challenging physical or mental exercise. Pregnancy fatigue refers to the normal high-level tiredness you may feel during pregnancy. You are most likely to experience pregnancy fatigue during the first trimester. […]