Week 36: Bags packed

Your baby’s lungs are nearly fully mature now — if they arrived this week, most babies need little or no help breathing. About the size of a large mango, they’re most likely head-down and busy practising breathing, swallowing and sucking, while laying down the fat that’ll keep them warm after birth.

From now your antenatal checks become weekly. You may feel heavier pelvic pressure and a definite waddle, and you might notice a “show” — a small amount of blood-tinged mucus — which can be an early sign things are gearing up (though birth could still be a little way off).

Make sure your hospital bag is packed and ideally in the car, and program your maternity ward’s number into your phone. Know the reasons to head in or call: regular contractions about five minutes apart, your waters breaking, any heavy bleeding, or reduced movements.

It’s a good moment to understand what’s coming. From 37 weeks your baby is considered “early term”, and full term is 39 to 40 weeks — so while you’re nearly there, there may still be a few weeks to go, and going a little past your due date is common, especially with a first baby. Around this time you may also be offered a group B strep swab, depending on where you’re giving birth, which checks for a common bacterium so antibiotics can be given in labour if needed.

It also helps to know the real thing from a false alarm: Braxton Hicks tightenings are irregular and ease off, while true labour contractions become regular, longer, stronger and closer together. Now’s the time to finalise the practical pieces — the car seat fitted and checked, your support person on standby, and a plan for who’ll look after other children or pets when the day comes.

If your baby is lying bottom-down (breech) at this point, your doctor may talk to you about a gentle procedure called ECV to turn them, or about your birth options. There’s still time, and plenty of support.