Week 18 · Second trimester
18 weeks pregnant
Water lily
14.2 cm (5.6 in)crown to rump
The Water lily (~10–15 cm) rests at the meeting place of surface and depth. It is a keepsake for a week when subtle movement may begin to ripple into notice.
This week, inside
The fetus is around 14.2 cm from head to bottom. Hearing, feeling, swallowing, and sucking reflexes are developing, while the arms and legs keep moving.
What you might be noticing
Some people begin to feel movement as a bubbling or fluttering sensation around now, while others do not yet. Stretch marks, sleep changes, bloating, and dizziness are also possible.
- Possible flutters
- Stretch marks
- Sleep changes
- Bloating
- Dizzy
Small things that help
If you notice a first flutter, save the time and place without turning it into a schedule. Make a note before an upcoming scan about what you want to know—and what you may prefer not to know.
For the record
What small ripple changed the feeling of this week?
Zohra asks one of these every week, and keeps your answer. A year from now it is the part people say they are most glad they wrote down.
Where this came from
Not sure you are at week 18? Work out your due date — or see every week’s size on one chart, and the rest of the second trimester.
Keep this week
Zohra draws this same flower in the app, at this same size, and keeps what you write beside it — with your bump photos, the letters, and the sounds from your appointments.
Zohra arrives on the App Store for iPhone shortly. Everything on this site is free to read now, with no account and no sign-up.