After intercourse, sperm can survive in the womb for up to five days as it makes its way to the egg. Usually, the egg is fertilized in the fallopian tube. Once fertilized, the egg may take 3-4 days to travel to the middle of your womb to find a place to implant. During that 3–4-day journey, cells start a slow division on the way to making your baby. The fertilized egg remains a single cell for the first 12 hours after conception. After 30 hours or so, it divides from one cell into two. Around 15 hours later, the two cells divide to become four. And at the end of 3 days, the fertilized egg cell has become a tiny structure made up of just 16 cells. At this point, the tiny cells start to speed up division as they attach to the middle of the womb. This usually occurs 6 days after conception. Once the implantation occurs, the cells start dividing quickly for the next 4 weeks. This is a basic, condensed version of all the amazing things that are going on at the microscopic level. I am taking you on an ultrasound guided journey. What you will see during the 4th week of pregnancy, is the gestational sac and a white dot. This is the baby’s home, and the white dot is the baby inside. On ultrasound, you will begin to see a small black circle inside the womb. This black stuff in the gestational sac is the beginning of amniotic fluid. This fluid is going to become particularly important during the entire time of your pregnancy. I will explain more about how important it is later.
