Charting Help Please!

[chattyB]

I'm new to charting and have been taking my temp every morning at 7am, however, I've come down with a cold and woke up at 4.30am this morning. I took my temp at 4.30am and have been up and about (sneezing, coughing ect) since.

My temp this morning at 4.30 was the same as yesterday's at 7.00 - do I need to adjust this to reflect the time difference? Does anyone have the key/formulae to do this?

Ta muchly!!

 

[Smiler82]

Hiya

do you use Fertility Friend to log your temps? They answer that question on there but have copied +pasted for you below. If I were you I'd just note down your waking temp even though it was so much earlier, and put down you had a cold. If you're ill it's likely you'd need to discard that temp anyway. One 'dodgy' temp shouldn't make too much difference to your chart overall I don't think

When I wake up at a different time, should I adjust my temperature?

We are often asked whether temperatures should be "adjusted" when not taken exactly at the same time. Some simple formulas are sometimes applied to adjust for differences in waking time. We are often asked whether this is accurate or not and if it is worth correcting the chart.

We recommend against adjusting temperatures as in general the resulting temperature, though it may be more pleasing, is not more accurate. The reasoning behind our recommendation is based on the fact that the Basal Body Temperature variation with time is dependent on your own unique metabolism. While most women see a difference, some women do not see much dependence of the BBT with time and can live with a variation in time without masking their pattern. For many others even a 10-20 minute difference will have strong effects on their charts. Similarly, some women see an increase of their BBT with time while others may actually see a decrease. From the diversity of the charts that we have seen, it is quite clear that no simple generic formulas will be able to compensate for time differences.

Our advice is to use an alarm clock if necessary to try to keep the time as constant as possible. If you have an occasional waking time difference, just record the time but leave the data as measured and make a note if there are unusual circumstances. In most cases our software should be able to see your ovulation pattern despite a few inaccurate data points.

If you have inaccurate data points that are causing you to have an invalid or confusing interpretation, please ask for support to help evaluate your chart.

 

[chattyB]

Thanks for your reply!

I'll leave it as it is then I think - it had crossed my mind that I may have a temperature anyway, so even waking a little earlier than usual shouldn't make a huge difference to the results.

 

[nevernormal]

I would say leave it for now.

If it was my temp, I would adjust it according to the normal formula (add 0.1 degree for each 1/2 hr earlier you woke up, and subtract 0.1 degree for each 1/2 hr you overslept). But, I have tested this formula on myself multiple times, both ways. Sometimes if I wake up an hour or two before normal I will temp, and then temp again at my normal time. Other times I set my alarm to temp, go back to sleep, then temp again when I wake up again. The formula is usually pretty spot-on for me. But until you know whether it would work for you, I wouldn't adjust it. Like Smiler said, one temp or even a couple of dodgy temps in a row (if you continue to be sick for a couple of days) won't usually affect it too much.