Making a baby
The womb.^119
Divide again
You don’t grow much in
the first few days. The two
cells divide to make four,
then eight, and so on.
At three days
The cells have carried on
dividing. There are now 16 cells
and they are almost ready to
plant themselves in the uterus.The future you
Each cell is unique to
you. Cells are full of
instructions about what
you will look like.Arriving in the uterus
The ball of cells plants
itself in the wall of the
uterus. In this warm,
dark place the baby
will spend the next
40 weeks growing
and developing.Where it all happens
The sperm fertilizes the egg in a tunnel, called a
fallopian tube. The fertilized egg moves down
the tunnel towards the mother’s uterus.
The journey takes about five days.
This is the uterus. It
is about the size of a
pear and has
muscular walls.The cells start dividing as
they move down the
fallopian tube towards the
uterus.This is the mother’s
ovary. It releases
one egg every month.Millions of sperm
from the father
travel up here
towards the egg.