JUNE 15TH - 20 weeks

WOW! You are 20 weeks old and your mom says that she can feel you turning and stretching all the time. I drove you and your Mom and Dad to the airport today.
I was so conscious of having a precious cargo that I drove extra slowly. You are flying to Cape Town for a holiday - and guess what?? This is a secret, but I'm sure I can tell you. Mark is going to propose to Tammy - on top of Table Mountain if they can get up there today!! Isn't that wonderful news? I wonder if you can feel the love of those around you? I wonder if you can feel your mother's love when she holds her tummy and your father's love when he lays his hand on her tummy and tries to feel you move? It's quite strange to look at Tammy and realise that she is carrying our grandchild inside her! Isn't that a miracle!?

So, what do you look like now? What development has taken place in the last two weeks?

20 weeks - Foetus may suck on thumb. Extremely rapid brain growth; eyebrows and scalp hair become more visible and foetus blinks more often.

So, are you viable yet? Not quite. Wiki says:

"Viability is defined as the ability of foetuses to survive in the extra uterine environment... There is no sharp limit of development, age, or weight at which a foetus automatically becomes viable or beyond which survival is assured, but experience has shown that it is rare for a baby to survive whose weight is less than 500 gm or whose fertilization age is less than 22 weeks. Even fetuses born between 26 and 28 weeks have difficulty surviving, mainly because the respiratory system and the central nervous system are not completely differentiated... If given expert postnatal care, some fetuses weighing less than 500 gm may survive; they are referred to as extremely low birth weight or immature infants.... Prematurity is one of the most common causes of morbidity and prenatal death.[24]During the past several decades, expert postnatal care has improved with advances in medical science, and therefore the point of viability has moved earlier. As of 2006, the youngest child to survive a premature birth was a girl born at the Baptist Hospital of Miami at 21 weeks and 6 days' gestational age. "

So, little baby, you just stay where you are. Keep safe, keep growing, don't be in a hurry to be born. When the time is right we will be waiting to welcome you.

Lots of love,

Silly