If only a few weeks have passed since you found out you were pregnant, and already you’re noticing more frequent trips to the bathroom, this all very normal. The urge to pee more starts early on in pregnancy and continues right through to the third trimester as the uterus, and your growing baby, pushes up against your bladder.
Is it a bit annoying? Yes. Is it normal? Yes. In most cases, frequent urination is nothing to worry about.
In this article, we will cover:
- What causes frequent urination throughout pregnancy?
- Tips for managing frequent urination during pregnancy
- Could frequent urination during pregnancy signal a problem?
Read on to understand what’s causing you to pee more, how to pee a bit less and the signs to look out for when it comes to urinary tract infections (UTI).
What causes frequent urination throughout pregnancy?
There are a lot of ways that pregnancy can affect your bladder – most of which are totally normal (if a bit inconvenient). Here’s what to expect throughout your pregnancy:
First trimester
Frequent urination – one of the more common early symptoms of pregnancy – can start around week four in your first trimester.
This is all to do with your hormones. After you conceive, the fertilized egg, together with the developing placenta, begins to produce an increased amount of the hormone hCG.
This pregnancy hormone increases blood flow to your pelvic area and kidneys, which become more efficient during your pregnancy. The downside is that it can cause symptoms like nausea and a frequent need to urinate.
Hormones such as progesterone and relaxin soften the muscles and ligaments in your pelvic floor to prepare it for delivering a baby. This also weakens the muscles that control urine flow, so you may also find that leaking urine (aka pregnancy incontinence) becomes more common.
We’re also more prone to during pregnancy and after childbirth, which puts even more stress on the pelvic floor and bladder, weakening the support around the urinary tract. If you’re experiencing leaks, check out our article for some top tips and advice.
Second trimester
The second trimester is usually a more comfortable one. That’s because levels of your hCG hormone – responsible for everything from nausea and fatigue to that constant urge to pee – ease off, so you should find yourself visiting the bathroom less often.
Third trimester
It’s common for that urge to pee to ramp up again in late pregnancy, as your growing baby more pressure on your bladder and slowly moves its head down to the pelvis. This extra pressure can mean you wake up needing to pee more often in the night.
It’s also normal – particularly in the third trimester – for fluid to build up in your legs, feet and ankles. The extra fluid accumulates throughout the day in the lowest parts of your body, especially if the weather is hot or you’ve been on your feet for long periods of time.
Then, when you go to bed at night and your feet are elevated, the excess fluid finds its way back into the bloodstream and through the kidneys, where it’s filtered out as urine so, again, you need to pee more.
