Charting, Temping, Tracking.. HELP?!

[brandonsgirl]

Right ladies, hubby and I will be TTC once i get the implant out at the end of the month. I've read some things about temping, charting, tracking ovulations etc? How do i get started with this and is there anything online that can help track it etc?

Thanks ladies and sending out lots of to you all!

 

[CheshireDucky]

Hi!

For temping and charting a tool most of us use is fertility friend. It's an app but you can also use it in a web browser. You can log temps, OPK, and other symptoms as well through it. It'll help predict your fertile week and the start of AF for you. It's what I personally use and really like it's set up. You'll also want a BBT thermometer to help with temping since it measures .2 decimal points instead of just one.

 

[brandonsgirl]

Hi!

For temping and charting a tool most of us use is fertility friend. It's an app but you can also use it in a web browser. You can log temps, OPK, and other symptoms as well through it. It'll help predict your fertile week and the start of AF for you. It's what I personally use and really like it's set up. You'll also want a BBT thermometer to help with temping since it measures .2 decimal points instead of just one.

Thank you huni for your reply. Does it cost anything to sign up? As I'm coming off the implant, i have no idea what my cycle is like. I've always been irregular so I'm not sure how many days it typically is. Does this matter? I've always struggled with apps that ask for your cycle length etc.

I worry about the BBT as sometimes LO will wake up an hour or two before i'm due to wake up, therefore i have to get up and go and get her. Wont this mess up the readings? Should i just take it an hour or two before the usual time i would take it and chart that anyways?

Hope that made sense? I'm still trying to make head or tail out of it all and have LO climbing over me

 

[happycupcake]

When you come off the implant you may experience symptoms like pregnancy, just a heads up. Also, your fertility can return as fast as the following day, so any symptoms you do feel, don't assume you are and don't assume you aren't pregnant as you could well be! I thought I should say in case you didn't know, as I felt every pregnancy symptom under the sun when I had mine removed but I didn't fall pregnant until my third cycle.

This brings me to my next point: you say your cycles were always irregular, if you mean current cycles then this will be due to the implant but if you mean previously then your cycles won't necessarily be as they once were. Mine were everywhere before the implant, then on removal they were 28 days spot on. So, it's completely possible for your body to regulate itself, and if it doesn't then don't worry because the app doesn't assume anything at first, it takes a while of temping to start seeing a pattern. It will start trying to predict things like next period and ovulation once it has data to work with.

I don't know whether you should wait till your first period after removal (if you see a period of course, but let's hope you don't and you see a positive test instead!) but I don't see any harm in starting right away since you will add in when you get your period anyway. It can still show you a shift in temp when you ovulate, if there's time between removal and ovulation of course.

Most seem to temp orally, but I hear vaginally is far more accurate with fewer fluctuations. I have been temping orally and I can say I have had some huge fluctuations which can be annoying.

Fertility Friend is probably the most popular app as the person above suggested, it is easy to use although it looks complicated initially, it isn't. Just take your temp as soon as you wake, enter in the info and save. Try to keep the timing as close as possible each day but don't worry if that isn't possible all the time. I have LOs who wake at all hours at times too and it hasn't hindered my ability to see ovulation happening.

The app/website/membership is free, you will probably be given a free trial of the premium version which is actually good, and will cost £10 per month (or you can pay quarterly or yearly instead and they do sometimes have excellent offers) once the free trial is up, but you can stick to the basic version which is also fine and does what you want anyway. The premium comes with a few added features which are nice but you don't have to have those to chart successfully and accurately

 

[brandonsgirl]

Wow thank you happycupcake for your reply. I had no idea about the pregnancy symptoms after, i will be sure to take it in my stride now.

I have always been irregular with my periods apart from when i was on the pill years ago. Since having the implant they've been some what irregular but it's the bleeding more than anything thats been irregular. Sometimes i can bleed for up to 3 weeks and other times it will be a week.

When i came off the pill in 2013, we fell pregnant within weeks and now have a healthy baby girl. I'm so hoping that it will be the same after the implant

Are you TTC HappyCupcake?

x

 

[happycupcake]

It can mess you about I know! First time I had it I didn't bleed. I would have occasional spotting for a day (can count on one hand how many times that happened) but this seemed to coincide when I didn't eat all day for some reason.
And then when I had it back in after the birth of our daughter I bled for a year! Which is why I had it removed. But yes we are ttc now, we weren't then, though

 

[brandonsgirl]

The stuff us women go through eh?!
Good luck for TTC. I will be sending lots of your way!

 

[CheshireDucky]

Hi!

For temping and charting a tool most of us use is fertility friend. It's an app but you can also use it in a web browser. You can log temps, OPK, and other symptoms as well through it. It'll help predict your fertile week and the start of AF for you. It's what I personally use and really like it's set up. You'll also want a BBT thermometer to help with temping since it measures .2 decimal points instead of just one.

Thank you huni for your reply. Does it cost anything to sign up? As I'm coming off the implant, i have no idea what my cycle is like. I've always been irregular so I'm not sure how many days it typically is. Does this matter? I've always struggled with apps that ask for your cycle length etc.

I worry about the BBT as sometimes LO will wake up an hour or two before i'm due to wake up, therefore i have to get up and go and get her. Wont this mess up the readings? Should i just take it an hour or two before the usual time i would take it and chart that anyways?

Hope that made sense? I'm still trying to make head or tail out of it all and have LO climbing over me

As said above it is free to sign up and use but you can pay for a paid VIP account. I personally do not have VIP as I find that it does fine at giving me information without it. When you first sign up it'll ask you about how long your cycles are but after that, it'll use the data you put in to adjust. I've read people with irregular cycles and long cycles use it with no problems.

What it's looking for is a temp spike of about .4 to tell you that you've ovulated. I even messed up my temps in the month of May and it correctly predicted CD1 for me, which is amazing.

You'll want to take your temps at the same time every day. How I work it (because my OH wakes up two hours before I do) is I wake with his alarm, take my temp, record it, and go back to sleep. You need 3-4 hours of consecutive sleep for BBT to work. If you know your LO may wake up two hours before you normally wake, is it possible to set an alarm for that time so you can take the minute to temp?

I came off birth control (oral contraceptive) back in Feb and started to temp right after my withdrawal bleed from that. Turns out it was my period returning after only two weeks finishing the pack off. I use OPKs along with temping to help me pinpoint my O since I'm still not used to my non-birth control cycles.

It sounds a lot more overwhelming than it is. When I first started to temp and test I thought it was going to be confusing and so hard but once I got into the habit of it it's second nature to me now.

 

[brandonsgirl]

Thanks CheshireDucky. It DOES sound so overwhelming lol. I'm sure I will get the hang of it though. When i get the implant out, i think i will start temping and see where i go from there and if i bleed after then or not. Do you typically get a withdrawal bleed from Nexplanon ?

 

[CheshireDucky]

I don't know anything about Nexplanon (other than it goes into your arm) to know if you get a withdrawal bleed from it or not. I did a quick google and people do report it happening, so I guess it depends on your body.

 

[brandonsgirl]

Ugh....my body lol
I have no bloody clue what my body will be doing. This charting malarky is going to be a learning curve haha!
Thanks so much for your help though ladies! I'm sure it will all come in very handy

 

[CheshireDucky]

It's a fun mystery! Okay, maybe not so fun. I was feeling the same way when I came off of birth control cause I had no idea what was going to happen. It stinks and it's stupid, but it'll get figured out.

 

[happycupcake]

I didn't get a withdrawal bleed from Nexplanon. Or Implanon. They are the same thing but Nexplanon was created with a dye in it so it can be detected easily if it goes missing.
I came off it first time and I got a period a few weeks after. Then when I had Nexplanon removed after the lovely year long bleed it gave me, I stopped bleeding, thank goodness! And then a few weeks later I got a regular period. My cycles weren't spot on for a while, but they weren't miles away. They varied a week earlier or later than apps predicted but they did eventually sort themselves out to a 24-27 day cycle with 25-26 days currently being my average.
Some have irregular cycles after, some don't. But there are things you can do to help your body regulate hormones and so a regular cycle, if you find they are irregular

 

[brandonsgirl]

What sort of things HappyCupcake?

I have been having pain yday and through the night. This usually happens around 2 weeks before i come on my period with the implant. As i'm getting it taken out in about 2 weeks, hopefully i will get that bleed and then get usual cycles after then. Wishful thinking?

xx

 

[happycupcake]

Making sure your diet is good and varied will help, exercise, taking supplements like B complex, acupuncture, reflexology, fertility yoga is meant to be good but I don't know if that helps balance anything as such, more promotes blood flow to everywhere. In traditional Chinese medicine they advise cardio except for when you have af, in which case yoga or tai chi instead as it's still moving about but it's also relaxing and gentle as they believe when af is here you should rest as much as you can.
There are loads of supplements you can try but I can't remember off the top of my head. I saw a difference in my temps after starting prenatal supplements, they were more level. And since restarting acupuncture things have improved I think. Ovulation day moved to CD13 this cycle instead of my usual CD10-CD12. It may have been a fluke but I don't think it was, since she's helping balance hormones as well as other things

 

[brandonsgirl]

Fingers crossed everything goes in your favour this month happycupcake.

I've ordered some vitamins specifically for trying to conceive so hopefully they will help too. Plus i already so yoga and light exercise daily and have been trying to eat a better diet. Hopefully this will all help

 

[happycupcake]

Thanks
It will all make a difference, sounds like you are already doing good

 

[brandonsgirl]

Thanks huni,

With our first we were NTNP but very much more not trying.
With our second we came off the pill and got pregnant instantly so I didn't really get to learn to chart much.
I'm hoping this time around will be the same as DD but want to be armed with knowledge just incase.

Xx

 

[Cookiemom12]

I highly recommend the methods from Natural Family Planning. The symptothermal method uses temperature but the Creighton and billings methods are great too.

 

[happycupcake]

I highly recommend the methods from Natural Family Planning. The symptothermal method uses temperature but the Creighton and billings methods are great too.

What on this earth did you say just then? Is this Martian? Lol! I literally haven't heard of any of this but I'm intrigued