I have just found out I am pregnant

• Start folic acid, if you have not already. It matters most in exactly these weeks.
• Keep taking any regular medicine until a doctor has told you which to change. Thyroid tablets in particular should not be stopped; the dose often needs to go up, not down.
• Book the first visit for somewhere between six and eight weeks from the first day of your last period. Earlier if you are bleeding, in pain, or have had a miscarriage or an ectopic pregnancy before.
• Do not repeat the test every morning. A positive is a positive. The scan at the first visit says the rest.

The story: your last period, your cycles, previous pregnancies and how they went, your own health and your family’s, medicines, allergies, work. Then blood pressure, weight, and a scan, which at six to eight weeks confirms that the pregnancy is in the uterus, shows whether there is one or more than one, and, from about six weeks, shows a heartbeat. That heartbeat is the moment most women let themselves believe it.

Blood tests follow: blood group, haemoglobin, thyroid, sugar, and the standard infection screen. A urine test. And a conversation about what to eat, what to avoid, what is normal, and what is not.

You leave with a due date, a calendar of visits and scans, and a number to call.

This is the usual order. Yours is adjusted to you.

• 6–8 weeks. The first visit and the first scan.
• 11–13 weeks. The scan that measures the fold of skin at the back of the neck, with a blood test, to assess the chance of a chromosomal condition. Whether to have it, and what its result would mean for you, is discussed before it is done, not after.
• 18–22 weeks. The anomaly scan: a detailed look at how the baby has formed. The longest scan of the pregnancy, and one of the most important.
• 24–28 weeks. A sugar test for pregnancy diabetes, and the haemoglobin again.
• After 28 weeks. Visits every two to three weeks, then weekly near the end, with growth scans where they are needed rather than by routine.

Sex determination is not done here, at any scan, at any stage. Disclosure of the sex of the foetus is prohibited by law.

You are spotting. Light spotting in the first weeks is common and is often nothing; it is also the reason to be seen rather than to wait. Call, describe it, and come in for a scan. Bleeding with pain on one side needs to be seen the same day.

You conceived after fertility treatment and you are terrified. That is normal, and it does not go away by being told it is normal. Early scans are done more often for exactly this reason, and you can ask for one whenever the fear gets ahead of the calendar.

You have thyroid trouble, diabetes or high blood pressure already. Come as early as you can, ideally in the first weeks. Each of these is managed well through a pregnancy, and each is managed better when it is managed from the start.

• Bleeding, at any stage
• Pain on one side, or pain with faintness
• Vomiting that stops you keeping fluids down
• A severe headache, sudden swelling of the face and hands, or blurred vision after twenty weeks
• The baby moving less than usual after twenty-eight weeks
• Fever, or burning when you pass urine