When Gail McInnes gave birth to her son, Kieran, she was in for a big surprise. After 41 weeks of pregnancy, a midwife-assisted labour at the Toronto Birth Centre and two hours of pushing, the first-time mom delivered a beautiful baby boy?all nine pounds, 13 ounces of him.
?When he was first placed on my chest after delivery, I remember just being amazed at the size of him,? recalls McInnes. ?I couldn?t wrap my head around how he fit inside my belly.? Though the Toronto mom was 10 days past her due date, she wasn?t expecting her newborn to be quite so?hardy. ?We were expecting an eight- or nine-pound baby, but he was even bigger than we expected,? says McInnes.
Victoria Studnicki, a mom in Oakville, Ont., was told that her son, Bryson, would likely be around seven pounds, eight ounces, but upon arrival, her baby was just half an ounce shy of 10 pounds. ?He was also very long for a baby,? says Studnicki. ?We expect him to grow as tall as his dad, who is six foot two.? While birth weight estimates during pregnancy are inexact, there are methods used to make an educated guess. ?To get an estimate of a baby?s weight before birth, four ultrasound measurements are taken into consideration: head circumference, biparietal diameter, abdominal circumference and femur length,? explains Julia Kfouri, an obstetrician at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto.
What baby birth weight is considered big"
The average newborn birth weight in Canada is about seven pounds, eight ounces, with a ...