88 Week Old Baby: Your Baby's Development and Your Recovery This Week

Your toddler is starting to put the puzzle of "me and you" together this week.

At around 21 months, your toddler understands simple pronouns ("you", "me", "my") even if they don't use them smoothly yet. They can name familiar objects and pictures, speak around 45–50 words, and imitate new ones. Many toddlers at this age can catch a large ball rolled to them without falling over.

• 50+ words, roughly, but range is huge
• Starting to put two words together ("more banana", "mama up")
• Responds to their name across the room
• Makes eye contact during play

If most of these aren't happening at 21 months, no pointing, no shared eye contact, under 10 words, no back-and-forth with you, mention it at the next well-visit. The 18-month screen may need a follow-up.

• Expand what your toddler says. They say "ball"; you say "yes, a big red ball!" That's how sentences grow.
• Read together daily. Pause on a familiar page: "What does the cow say?" Let them fill in.
• Face-to-face play, swings, sitting on your lap, eye-level time. Kids learn language through faces, not screens.

• Ball play on the stairs, on the road, near water: always no. Toddlers forget everything when a ball rolls.

• Many Indian homes speak two or three languages. Your toddler may mix Hindi-English-regional words in one sentence, that is healthy code-switching, not confusion. Keep talking in whichever language feels natural; fluency in all of them comes with time.

"Me", "you", "mine": your toddler is slowly working out where they end and you begin. Watching these 21 month old baby milestones unfold is like watching a little person quietly assemble themselves. And through every new word, the voice they learn from most is yours.

Around 20.5 months. Your pelvic floor, overlooked at 6 months, more important than ever now.

Pelvic floor recovery has no expiry date

• Many Indian women never get pelvic floor PT after birth and then live with leakage for decades. The pelvic floor doesn't fully recover by itself, it needs targeted work.

Daily exercises that help

• Kegels: squeeze pelvic muscles (like stopping urine flow) for 5 seconds, release. Repeat 10 times, 3 sets a day.
• Bridges: lying on back, knees bent, lift hips, hold for 5 seconds.
• Squats: keeping back straight, lower as if sitting, return.
• Pelvic tilts: standing or on all fours, gently rock pelvis.

Worth a referral

If you have any of these:

• Urinary leakage when you cough, sneeze, jump, or laugh
• Heaviness or bulging feeling in the pelvis
• Painful sex
• Difficulty fully emptying the bladder

A pelvic floor physiotherapist can do a proper assessment. Available now in most Indian metros (A trained therapist or specialist clinic can help.

Eating well

• Three meals + two snacks. Calcium and vitamin D matter for pelvic and bone health.

Indian-mum reality

• Many Indian aunties have lived with stress incontinence quietly for years. It doesn't have to be your future. Pelvic floor PT actually fixes most cases within 8–12 weeks of consistent work.

Worth flagging

• A heavy/bulging feeling, sudden incontinence, or painful sex, these are pelvic organ prolapse signs. Treatable with PT, in some cases minor surgery. Talk to your gynae. Don't tough it out for years.

Indian-mum reality check

• Many Indian women learn to live with stress incontinence (a leak when sneezing or laughing) without realising it is treatable. Pelvic floor physiotherapy resolves most cases. Don't accept it as the new normal, book a referral.

Caring for the parts of you no one sees is still care. Booking that appointment, doing those quiet exercises, refusing to accept discomfort as your due: this is mother self care with real backbone. Your body carried a whole new life; let it be carried a little now too.