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A Vanilla Pregnancy
What Is Just an Average Pregnancy?
By Shannon McKelden
Most pregnancies we hear about are the extreme ones. Lengthy labors, morning sickness that lasts from conception to delivery or giving birth to a toddler-sized infant. But what is an "average" pregnancy?
Thankfully the average human pregnancy is far shorter than your average elephant pregnancy, clocking in at an average length of 280 days. This calculates out to about 40 weeks or 9.33 calendar months of 30 days, when calculated from the first day of the last menstrual period.
"In reality, this ends up being 266 days (38 weeks) from the time of conception (scientifically the most accurate, but when these numbers were first described, science did not know about the timing of conception)," says Dr. Eldridge Pearsall, an OB/GYN from Beverly Hills, Calif. Today's blood tests and ultrasound also help with accurate dating.
How much weight does the average woman gain during this time of housing and eating for two? According to Dr. Pearsall, the average weight gain during pregnancy is 2.2 to 4.4 pounds during the first trimester of pregnancy (up to 13 weeks) and 1 pound per week thereafter. This average ends up being approximately 28 pounds.
"Remember that this is only an average for healthy individuals with a good diet, moderate exercise and no abnormalities (twins, diabetes, hypertension, etc.)," Dr. Pearsall says. "There are wide normal variations depending on the individual's metabolism."
Shannon Rosenberg, mother of twin daughters from Wesley Hills, N.Y., is a good example of one of those variations. Overweight when she got pregnant, Rosenberg's doctor watched her weight carefully. "However, as my belly grew, my weight stayed the same," she says. "Two weeks before my scheduled C-section ... the scale finally showed that I'd gained 5 pounds." Her girls were born with no complications, and Rosenberg went home 20 pounds lighter than when she got pregnant.
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