You may have noticed a weight gain of 3-5 pounds by now, despite the fact that you don’t look very pregnant yet. By the second trimester, you could very well put on a pound a week and still be within the normal range of appropriate weight gain during pregnancy. It?s recommended that you gain between 25-35 pounds total if you were ?average? weight pre-pregnancy, a bit more if you were underweight and a bit less if you were overweight before. Your weight gain should be gradual, with the most being gained during the third trimester. It?s a good idea to ask your doctor or midwife how much weight is a healthy amount for you. Obvious physical changes are still a little ways off, but approaching. Changes are much more gradual for you, than for your little one. You may be looking at maternity clothes now, but chances are you don’t need them quite yet, because your waistline most likely hasn’t grown a great deal at this point (or at least not to the point when unbuttoning your jeans and wearing a long t-shirt won’t work!).
Your breasts may feel heavier now than ever before and may still feel very tender. Your breasts may become less tender as your pregnancy progresses, but expect them to grow much larger by the time your baby is born. Your total pregnancy weight gain can easily be made up of 2 pounds of breast tissue. If you plan to breastfeed, your breasts may increase in size and weight quite a bit more than that, during the postpartum period!
As your breasts change during your pregnancy, the veins just beneath the skin may become more prominent, particularly due to your increasing blood volume. Many of the veins throughout your body will become more noticeable than they were previously, especially in your legs, tummy and of course, breasts. This blood volume increase is also responsible for your heart beating faster than normal now. By the time your due date rolls around, your blood volume may have increased 50% more than before pregnancy! The biggest rise occurs during the second trimester and continues to increase through the third trimester, but at a slower rate. These veins will usually go back to how they looked pre-pregnancy shortly after your baby is born, when your blood volume returns to normal range.