Thirty Four Weeks: Little Tiny Giant

Our sweet little Lincoln arrived early on Tuesday November 4th. Oh we are so in love. While I'm away staring at my baby while he sleeps, we'll catch up to birth day with the weekly posts. With him coming four weeks early, we have a bit of catching up to do!

October 21, 2014

Little Tiny Giant,

Let me start by saying that I'm glad you're healthy. I'm so grateful that your umbilical cord works and that it gets you all the nutrients you need. I'm so blessed to see you bouncing on the screen and doing cute little things during the ultrasound.

But also,

You're a giant.

Today we went for your growth scan at the doctor's office. Once again they say these measurements can vary in weight. With you 'weighing' approximately 4.25 pounds three weeks ago, and with the average baby gaining half a pound a week at this point, do the math. You should measure about 5.75 pounds this week right? Or you know maybe the scan three weeks ago was off and said you were heavier than you really were so maybe you'll measure even less then that...

Nope.

I paid a bit more attention this time to each individual measurements...

Your head, which means your skull, is quite large (and you have hair!). If we based your due date off your head alone you'd be due about November 15th, which is like two and a half weeks ahead of schedule. About the 98th percentile...

Your abdomen, which I'm assuming is more the size of your chest, is also quite large. About the 98th percentile as well. Due date just based off of your chest would be more like November 12th, which is you know, only 3 weeks ahead of time.

Your femur, which the sweet ultrasound lady refers to as your thigh bone (which would make way more sense to you until I turn you into a nerd), is sort of normal size, I didn't get a chance to look at all the numbers for your femur because they all of a sudden calculated your overall estimated weight based on these three measurements.

You weight six and a half pounds!

At thirty four weeks!

That's like the 97th percentile little baby. That's like if you add on the estimated half a pound you're supposed to gain every week and even still you get delivered a week early, you'll be nine and a half pounds! But if you keep up your rate of growth from the past three weeks which is 0.75 pounds per week then you know, you'll weigh a nice 10.25 pounds at birth.

Your dad was ecstatic. I am thrilled you're so healthy. But this just means you need to be streamlined and ready to go when delivery day comes. None of that breech baby or posterior stuff okay? If you need me to I can give you a lesson on what it means to be ready for all this okay.

Let's just say that the doctor moved onto a different subject during our visit and then glanced at her computer again and said 'I just can't believe how big your baby is!' and told me that her first baby was smaller at birth than you are now.

But don't worry, I'm very proud of you. I hope you come out huge and chunky and squishy and cuddly. And your dad homes you come out a lineman. He's already bragging to the world about how big you are.

We love you, you little tiny giant. Keep growing strong,
Mom