What’s Happening With Mom?
Things that go bump in the night… make you get up several times to pee. Your ever-growing baby and uterus press down on your bladder which is why you have to use the bathroom all day and why you wake up at night to pee. Baby can exacerbate the problem by poking or kicking you in the bladder
And because there’s extra pressure on your bladder, you may leak urine when you sneeze, cough or laugh. While you might associate stress incontinence with old folks, it happens to many pregnant women too. Doing Kegel exercises will help by strengthening the muscles in your pelvic floor that hold pee in.
Your growing uterus also pushes up on your diaphragm and lungs, making them work harder. Your lungs are breathing slightly faster right now, so you and baby will still get enough oxygen, but you might feel little short of breath sometimes. Take a moment to sit down when you feel you need to.
What’s Happening With Baby?
(Picture supplied by 3D Sono Image)
Baby’s lungs and chest muscles start co-coordinating to make breathing movements, and baby can practice breathing by moving amniotic fluid in and out of the lungs. Sometimes things get a little confused and baby gets hiccups, which you might even see if baby is in the right position – your bump hops with every hiccup.
Tags: bladder, breathing, frequent urination, hiccups, incontinence, Kegel exercises, lungs, third trimester
