Third Trimester Of Pregnancy
What are common pregnancy symptoms during the 3rd trimester?
The third trimester can sometimes be a little more difficult because at this point you are starting to get a little bit bigger, and you may find it harder to sleep comfortably. You get up throughout the night to urinate. You also get up throughout the night because your hips are sore or your arm falls asleep. Sometimes constipation can roll in during the third trimester and it's not often uncommon for that to be followed by haemorrhoids. I don't want to paint too nasty of a picture because, again, pregnancy can be an absolutely wonderful thing but the third trimester tends to be where you start to get a little tired. You start to kind of get over the ‘Oh I'm pregnant' stage and start looking forward to the ‘I want to be a mummy' stage.
What are common third trimester medical exams?
In the third trimester, typically the first test that will be performed will be the gestational diabetes screening test. It's simply a test in which you drink a concentrated sugar drink, and then get your blood drawn to determine what the level is. Based on the lab where this is drawn, if the level is higher than the cutoff, you will have screened positive for gestational diabetes. If so, then a more definitive diagnostic test will be performed. Most doctors perform a CBC, or a complete blood count, with that initial gestational diabetes screening to determine if anemia has set in, which is not uncommon in the third trimester of pregnancy. It may be recommended that you supplement iron during the third trimester of pregnancy as well.
How will my doctor determine my baby's gender?
There are a couple of ways to determine the gender of your baby. You can have an ultrasound performed, typically after sixteen weeks, and if the baby is positioned correctly, the gender can be visualized. If you get an invasive test, like a CVS or an Amnio, if your age is over thirty-five, or if a screening test has come back positive for that, then those tests do determine the gender of the baby as well.
