41 weeks pregnant: what is happening this week

No length this week - the NHS stops publishing one at 41 and gives a weight instead: around 3 to 4 kg on average. That is the only weight figure in the entire week-by-week guide, which is why every other page here carries a length and no weight. A range rather than a number, and a wide one, which is the appropriate way to report it. The rapid growth phase is over. Skin may look red and be peeling, because the vernix that protected it has largely gone. Everything needed for life outside is finished. This is the week induction is discussed properly. The NHS offers it from around 41 weeks, and the conversation covers what it involves, what the alternatives are, and what monitoring looks like if you wait. It is a decision with options in it rather than a procedure that happens to you, and going into that appointment having read the NHS page on induction makes it a conversation between informed people. Being past the estimate is common, is not a failure of anything, and is precisely what a five-week term window predicts.