I've had quite a few friends & friends of friends give birth over the past couple of months and only one of them has made it to 40 weeks! The others (4) have all been 36-38 weeks! All of them have also been first time pregnancies and all went into labor naturally. Is this just a fluke that so many were at least 2 weeks early? Or is this more common than I think? I'm now trying to get in the mindset that it's VERY likely I can go into labor at 37/38 weeks... I'm obviously FTM as well ;-)
Re: Average gestation?
It never hurts to be prepared a little early!
Married 9/28/13
DS born 11/12/15
EDD 8/13/18
First baby I was induced 39w 3d for a few different things.
It was also mentioned that gestation length tends to run the same in the maternal line of the family. Maybe find out how early/on-time/after due date you were born. Might give you a bit more insight.
Now I'm going to have to call my mom and see how close I was born to due date!!! Lol
Percentage of babies born by 36 weeks: 4.5%
Percentage of babies born by 3 7 weeks: 11.5%
Percentage of babies born by 38 weeks: 24.6%
Percentage of babies born by 39 weeks: 51.2%
Percentage of babies born by 40 weeks: 81.7%
Percentage of babies born by 41 weeks: 97.5%
Percentage of babies born by 42 weeks: 99.8%
Percentage of babies born by 43 weeks: 100.0%
I kept this chart from my 1st pregnancy to give me an idea of the statistics
That being said, I probably will have my bag for the hospital at least close to ready to go a few weeks prior to my due date, but there really isn't a hard and fast deadline for when we get to meet our little man (though I sure wish there was! I'm getting excited!!)