The Journal
Because motherhood comes with a lot of questions.
From trying to conceive through pregnancy and life with your baby, The Journal gives you clear, evidence-based guidance without the overwhelm.
Practical answers, explained simply, for the things you are actually wondering about.
82 articles
Membrane Sweeps: What They Actually Do
What happens during a membrane sweep? Learn what it feels like, whether it can help labour begin and what to expect afterwards.
The Mucus Plug: What It Means and What It Doesn't
What does a mucus plug look like, and does losing it mean labour is starting? Understand what it can tell you and when to seek advice.
Stages of Labour: What Actually Happens
Understand the three stages of labour, from your cervix opening to pushing, meeting your baby and delivering the placenta.
What Transition in Labour Actually Feels Like
What does transition in labour feel like? Learn about intense contractions, pressure, emotions and what can help you through it.
Pushing in Labour: What to Expect
What does pushing in labour feel like? Learn about pressure, pushing positions, crowning and why feeling like you need to poo is normal.
Pain Relief in Labour: What Are My Options?
Explore your labour pain relief options, including TENS, water, gas, opioids and epidurals, with practical advice to help you prepare.
Epidural: What to Expect
Considering an epidural during labour? Learn how it works, what it feels like, possible side effects and what happens if it only works on one side.
Emergency Caesarean Birth: When the Plan Suddenly Changes
Understand what happens during an emergency caesarean birth, why it may be recommended and what to expect in theatre and afterwards.
Planned Caesarean Birth: What to Expect
Preparing for a planned caesarean? Learn about anaesthesia, the operating theatre, meeting your baby, skin to skin and early recovery.
Induction of Labour: What to Expect
Learn what happens during induction of labour, including cervical ripening, balloons, breaking waters, oxytocin and managing contractions.
Waters Breaking: What Happens Next?
A gush, trickle or tiny pop? Learn what your waters breaking can feel like, what to look out for and when to contact your maternity team.
Braxton Hicks Versus Labour: How Can I Tell the Difference?
Are those Braxton Hicks or real labour contractions? Learn what changes to watch for and when it's time to contact your maternity team.
Cervical Checks: What They Can and Cannot Tell You
Learn what cervical checks measure, what dilation and effacement mean, how examinations feel and why they cannot predict when baby will arrive.
Going Overdue: What Happens After Your Due Date?
Past your due date? Learn about monitoring, baby's movements, membrane sweeps, induction choices and the emotional side of waiting.
What to Pack in Your Hospital Bag
What should you pack for labour, recovery and baby? A practical hospital bag checklist with advice from a NICU nurse and mother of four.
Your Baby's First 24 Hours: What to Expect
What happens in your baby's first 24 hours? Understand skin to skin, Apgar scores, first feeds, nappies, newborn checks and sleep.
Vaginal Birth Recovery: What to Expect in the First 6 Weeks
Recovering after a vaginal birth? Learn about stitches, swelling, toilet trips, pelvic floor healing, returning to exercise and intimacy.
Caesarean Birth Recovery: What to Expect in the First 6 Weeks
Recovering after a caesarean? Learn about incision care, pain, breastfeeding positions, walking, driving and healing in the first six weeks.
How Do I Actually Know When I Ovulate?
Learn how cervical mucus, ovulation tests, basal body temperature and cycle history can help you understand when ovulation may be happening.
Your Fertile Window: The Days You Can Actually Get Pregnant
Learn what your fertile window is, which days give you the best chance of pregnancy, and how cervical mucus, OPKs and cycle tracking can help you find it.
Ovulation Tests Explained: What a Positive LH Test Actually Means
Learn what a positive ovulation test means, how to read an LH test, when ovulation may happen and when to have sex after a positive result.
LH Surge vs LH Peak: What Is the Difference?
Learn the difference between an LH surge and LH peak, what ovulation tests are detecting and why you do not need to wait for the darkest possible test.
When Do You Ovulate After a Positive Ovulation Test?
Learn when ovulation may happen after a positive OPK, when to have sex and why a positive LH test predicts ovulation rather than proving it happened.
Cervical Mucus and Ovulation: What Are You Actually Looking For?
Learn how cervical mucus changes around ovulation, what egg white cervical mucus looks like and how it can help you recognise your fertile window.
Egg White Cervical Mucus but a Negative Ovulation Test: What Does It Mean?
Seeing egg white cervical mucus but a negative ovulation test? Learn why cervical mucus can become fertile before your LH surge appears.
Basal Body Temperature: What It Can and Cannot Tell You
Learn how basal body temperature can help confirm ovulation, how to take BBT correctly and why one temperature reading does not tell you much on its own.
When Should We Have Sex to Get Pregnant?
Learn when to have sex during your fertile window, how often to try and why the days before ovulation can be just as important as ovulation day.
The Two Week Wait: What Is Actually Happening in Your Body?
Learn what may be happening after ovulation, from fertilization and the zinc spark to implantation, hCG and the first possible positive pregnancy test.
What Happens After Ovulation? 1 DPO to 14 DPO
Follow what may happen from 1 DPO to 14 DPO, including fertilization, cell division, implantation, rising hCG and when a pregnancy test may become positive.
PMS or Early Pregnancy: Why They Feel So Similar
Learn why PMS and early pregnancy can feel so similar, which symptoms overlap and why a pregnancy test is more reliable than symptoms alone.
When Does Implantation Happen, and Can You Feel It?
Learn when implantation usually happens, whether you can feel it, what spotting or cramping may mean and when hCG starts to rise.
When Should I Take a Pregnancy Test?
Learn when to take a pregnancy test, why testing too early can give a negative result and when to test again if your period has not arrived.
Negative Pregnancy Test but No Period: What Now?
Got a negative pregnancy test but no period? Learn why testing too early, later ovulation, cycle changes and PMOS can all affect when your period arrives.
We Timed Everything Perfectly. Why Am I Not Pregnant?
Learn why well timed sex does not guarantee pregnancy in one cycle, how long conception can normally take and when it may be time to seek fertility support.
Why Trying to Conceive Can Become So All Consuming
Learn why trying to conceive can take over your thoughts, how tracking can help, when a break may be useful and how to protect your mental space while TTC.
Instrumental Birth: Forceps and Vacuum
Why might forceps or vacuum be needed? Learn what happens during an assisted vaginal birth, what to expect afterwards and how recovery can feel.
Your First 24 Hours After Birth: What's Happening to Your Body?
What happens to your body in the first 24 hours after birth? Learn about bleeding, afterpains, soreness, shaking, sweating and recovery.
41 Weeks Pregnant: For the Mother Who Is Still Waiting
You are still here. Your due date has come and gone, the calendar has flipped right past it, and you are, against all the plans and all the guesses, still pregnant. If you are reading this feeling...
42 Weeks Pregnant: The End of the Road, and the Start of Everything
Here you are. The very last week. Week forty-two. If you are still pregnant as you read this, then you have reached the absolute final stretch of this long, extraordinary road, and I want you to know...
2 Weeks Pregnant: The Greatest Race You Will Never See
Last week, the egg waited. This week, it is finally set free, and the most extraordinary race in all of nature begins.
3 Weeks Pregnant: The Week You Might Quietly Become a Mother of Two
Last week ended on a cliffhanger. The race was won, and one tiny sperm was pressed against the egg, about to break through.
1 Week Pregnant: The Egg's Story That Began Before You Did
Before the positive test. Before the missed period. Before you even suspected anything had changed, there was already a story unfolding inside your body.
4 Weeks Pregnant: The Week Your Baby Announces Itself
For three weeks, your body has been keeping the most extraordinary secret. This is the week it finally lets you in on it.
5 Weeks Pregnant: The Week the Heart Starts to Beat
Last week, you saw the line. This week, your baby grows a heart, and it starts to beat.
6 Weeks Pregnant: The Week You Might See the Heartbeat
Last week, deep inside you, your baby's heart flickered into life and started to beat. This week, it settles into a steady rhythm, and for the first time, there is a real chance you will actually...
7 Weeks Pregnant: A Quarter of a Million Brain Cells a Minute
Wherever you are reading this, stop for just a second and breathe.
15 Weeks Pregnant: The Week Your Baby Starts Moving on Purpose
Last week, your baby learned to make faces. This week, those movements gain something brand new. Purpose.
13 Weeks Pregnant: Building the Voice That Will One Day Call You Mama
Last week, you reached the end of the first trimester, with a baby who could already curl its fingers around anything that touched them. This week, you step into the second trimester, and...
14 Weeks Pregnant: The Week Your Baby Starts Making Faces
Last week, your baby's voice was taking shape. This week, it is the face's turn.
17 Weeks Pregnant: The Lifeline Between You and Your Baby
Last week, your baby began to hear the sound of you. This week, let me tell you about the extraordinary thing that has connected you both from the very start, and that grows strong and sturdy now....
18 Weeks Pregnant: The Week Your Baby Starts Keeping Its Own Hours
Last week, I told you about the cord that joins you. This week, your baby starts doing something that will feel very familiar once they are here. Sleeping and waking, on a schedule entirely their own.
19 Weeks Pregnant: The Week You Feel Your Baby Move
Last week, your baby began keeping its own little hours. This week, all that secret activity may finally break through to you, and you feel your baby move for the very first time.
22 Weeks Pregnant: Your Baby Is Learning the Shape of Itself
Last week, your baby was tasting your dinner. This week, your baby reaches out with brand new hands and begins to explore, touching its face, holding the cord, and slowly learning the shape of its...
16 Weeks Pregnant: One of the first sounds your baby will come to know is you
Last week, your baby began to move with purpose. This week, your baby gets ready to do something just as remarkable. Listen.
20 Weeks Pregnant: Halfway There, and Carrying Three Generations at Once
Last week, you may have felt your baby move for the very first time. This week, you reach the middle of it all. The halfway mark. And it comes with one of the most staggering facts in the whole of...
21 Weeks Pregnant: Your Baby Is Already Tasting Your Dinner
Last week, you reached the halfway mark. This week, your baby does something that will make you smile every time you sit down to eat. Your baby starts tasting your dinner.
25 Weeks Pregnant: The Week Your Baby's Brain Begins to Fold
Last week, your baby started to answer you back. This week, deep inside that busy little head, the brain takes on the shape it will keep for life. It begins to fold.
27 Weeks Pregnant: The Week Your Baby Starts Learning You by Heart
Last week, your baby started filling out. This week, you cross into the final stretch, and your baby begins to do something profound. Not just to hear you, but to know you,...
28 Weeks Pregnant: The Week Your Baby Learns Your Scent
Last week, your baby began learning your voice by heart. This week, the very last of their senses switches on, and it brings them even closer to you. Smell.
33 Weeks Pregnant: The Week You Give Your Baby Their First Shield
Last week, your baby was getting into position for the big day. This week, you begin giving them something extraordinary, a gift only you can give. Your own hard-won immunity.
34 Weeks Pregnant: A Protective Coat for The Journey Out
Last week, your body began arming your baby with your immunity. This week, your baby starts rehearsing the very first thing the two of you will do together once they arrive. Feeding.
37 Weeks Pregnant: Your Baby Is Ready, and So Is Your Liquid Gold
Last week, the countdown began. This week brings two milestones worth celebrating. Your baby is officially ready for the world, and your body has perfected the very first gift it will give them....
38 Weeks Pregnant: The Week Your Baby Learns Day from Night
Last week, your baby reached early term and your liquid gold came in. This week, while everyone waits, your baby is quietly busy with something rather lovely. They are beginning to learn the...
39 Weeks Pregnant: The Week Your Baby Chooses Their Own Birthday
Last week, your baby was learning day from night. This week, they reach full term, completely ready for the world. And here is the astonishing part. Your baby may be the one who decides when the...
40 Weeks Pregnant: The Finish Line, and Your Baby's First Breath
Last week, your baby reached full term and may have been getting ready to call the day. This week, you reach the finish line. Week forty. Your due date. The moment all of this has been quietly...
8 Weeks Pregnant: The Week Your Baby Starts to Move
Last week, your baby's brain came alive. This week, the body it will one day command starts to move.
9 Weeks Pregnant: A Full Set of Teeth, Years Before the First Smile
Last week, your baby was an embryo. This week, it has a new name.
10 Weeks Pregnant: Ten Fingers, Ten Toes, and Fingerprints All Their Own
Last week, your baby got a new name and a hidden set of teeth. This week, look at the hands.
11 Weeks Pregnant: Practising to Breathe, Months Before the First Breath
Last week, your baby grew ten tiny fingers and a fingerprint all their own. This week, that little body comes alive, and begins to rehearse something it will not truly need for another six months....
12 Weeks Pregnant: A Hand That Already Knows How to Hold On
Last week, your baby began practising to breathe. This week, you reach the milestone so many women quietly count down to. The end of the first trimester.
23 Weeks Pregnant: Getting Ready for the First Breath
Last week, your baby was busy learning the shape of itself by touch. This week, deep inside that growing little body, the lungs begin one of the most important projects of all. Getting ready to...
24 Weeks Pregnant: The Week Your Baby May Start Dreaming
Last week, your baby's lungs began getting ready to breathe. This week, something even more wonderful happens between the two of you. Your baby starts to answer.
26 Weeks Pregnant: Your Baby Is Starting to Look Like a Newborn
Your baby has spent months building all the tiny pieces of themselves.
29 Weeks Pregnant: The Bones That Will Carry Them a Lifetime
Last week, your baby's final sense switched on. This week, your baby gets seriously strong, building a skeleton out of you, and growing big enough that they become a presence you can truly feel.
30 Weeks Pregnant: The Week Your Baby Starts Doing It Themselves
Last week, your baby was building a skeleton out of you and becoming a presence you could feel. This week, something quietly momentous begins. Your baby starts taking over the jobs your body has...
31 Weeks Pregnant: The Wiring of a Whole Mind
Last week, your baby began taking over the running of their own body. This week, deep in that busy head, the wiring of a whole mind is being laid, connection by connection, at a furious pace.
32 Weeks Pregnant: Getting Ready to Be Born
Last week, your baby's brain was wiring itself into a whole mind. This week, your baby turns their attention to something new entirely. Getting ready to be born.
35 Weeks Pregnant: The Secret Purpose of All That Baby Fat
Last week, your baby was rehearsing for their very first feed. This week, they turn their energy to filling out, plumping into the soft, round newborn you are about to meet. And that gorgeous baby...
36 Weeks Pregnant: The Week the Countdown Begins
Last week, your baby was filling out into a soft little newborn. This week, things shift from growing to getting ready. Your baby starts moving into position, and the countdown to meeting them...
What a kick count actually tells you
A kick count is not about reaching one perfect number. It is about knowing your baby, and getting checked straight away if their movements change.
Myth: you can only get pregnant on the day you ovulate
One of the biggest misunderstandings when you are trying to conceive is thinking you need to have sex on the exact day you ovulate. You do not. Some of your most fertile days happen before ovulation.
Why I will not tell you the exact time your baby should sleep
I cannot tell you the exact minute your baby should go to sleep. But I can help you get pretty close, by looking at their awake window, their tired cues and their sleep pressure together.
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