Week 39: Any day now

Your baby is fully developed and simply putting on the finishing touches — about the size of a small pumpkin, with well-established fat stores and a skull whose bones can still shift and overlap slightly to ease the journey out.

You’re likely weighing up every contraction now. The trick is telling Braxton Hicks from the real thing: true labour contractions come at regular intervals, grow stronger over time, and don’t ease off when you move or change position. Practice contractions tend to fade away.

When real labour settles into a rhythm, time the contractions and call your hospital when they’re around five minutes apart. Until then, rest, stay hydrated, and trust your body — it has been quietly preparing for this for nine months.

It’s normal for these last days to feel endless, and for your patience to wear thin. Try to take the pressure off — rest, gentle walks, a good show to binge, easy meals. If people keep asking whether the baby’s arrived, it’s completely fine to mute your phone for a bit. And keep doing the one thing that matters most, right to the very end: noticing your baby’s movements, and calling your maternity unit promptly if their pattern ever changes. That advice holds even now.

Try to rest and conserve your energy rather than exhausting yourself trying to bring labour on — the old tricks (walks, a curry, bouncing on a ball) won’t do any harm, but your baby will largely come in their own time. Keep your bag, your plan and your support person ready, eat and sleep well while you can, and trust that your body knows what it’s doing.

At your weekly check, your provider may offer a “stretch and sweep” — a simple membrane sweep done in the clinic that can encourage labour to start naturally. It’s entirely your choice, and they’ll explain exactly what it involves.