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The issue of childbearing sooner or later arises in the life of any woman. It becomes especially relevant when a woman who dreams of becoming pregnant has problems or irregularities in the menstrual cycle. Many are also concerned about the need for contraception and pregnancy planning. Ovulation is a physiological phenomenon of a woman’s body, inextricably linked with the above issues.
Methods for calculating the ovulation period
The term “ovulation” means the process of maturation of an egg and its release into the fallopian tubes. Female reproductive cells mature once a month. Ovulation is the best time to conceive a child. Having accurate information about the timing of her ovulation, a woman has the opportunity to independently plan her pregnancy, calculate the best time for sexual intercourse and create favorable conditions for pregnancy with a child of the desired gender.
By basal temperature
How to calculate ovulation based on basal temperature? To do this, every day in the morning, using an ordinary thermometer, measure your temperature rectally for seven minutes. Record the results obtained in a table, where you write down the days of the cycle horizontally, and enter temperature readings in the vertical column. For reporting, select a special diary. The day before ovulation, the basal temperature will drop, and immediately after ovulation it will rise by 0.3-0.6 degrees (37 degrees Celsius and above). The temperature will remain at this level until the onset of menstruation.
The calculation of basal temperature is influenced by factors such as illness, stress, alcohol or sexual intercourse.
Test strips
Self-calculation of ovulation using test strips involves determining the level of luteinizing hormone (LH) in the urine, which increases 24-36 hours before ovulation. Using test strips and reusable portable devices is very simple, because the principle of determining ovulation using tests is similar to the test method for determining pregnancy, the only difference is in the chemical reaction.
Place the tip of the test strip under stream of urine for about five seconds. In a few minutes you will get the finished result:
- If the test line is paler than the control strip, then the LH level has not risen and testing should be continued.
- If the result line matches the color of the control strip or is darker, it means you will ovulate soon.
Do the test in the morning, afternoon or evening, but try to do it at the same time each time. Four hours before the test, try not to go to the toilet so that the concentration of the hormone in your urine is sufficient. To get the most accurate results, do not drink a lot of water.
Calendar method
To calculate ovulation using the calendar method, you should determine the duration of your menstrual cycle for six months to a year. During this time, keep a diary with a corresponding sign, where you regularly write down the dates when menstruation begins and ends. We must not forget to record all the dates of the cycle, because the effectiveness of planning the long-awaited pregnancy will depend on the accuracy of the data.
To calculate the onset of the fertile period, that is, a favorable time for pregnancy, you should use an ovulation calculator or simple arithmetic operations. Subtract 18 days from the shortest period of the menstrual cycle - this will be the beginning of ovulation. The last day of the fertile period is calculated by subtracting 11 days from the longest cycle.
How to accurately calculate the day of ovulation to conceive a child
Calculating the exact timing of fertility will help a woman properly organize the planning of a child. To determine the sex of the future baby, the difference between the behavior of male sperm X and Y plays an important role. The sex of the child directly depends on what type of sperm meets the egg.
To conceive a girl
To calculate ovulation to conceive a girl, you need to increase the possibility of X-sperm meeting the egg. Male sperm contains them in smaller quantities. X-sperm move at low speed, but are resilient. It is necessary to reduce the amount of sperm and try to create an acidic environment in the vagina. The right time for intercourse is a couple of days before ovulation.
To conceive a boy
The conception of a boy is due to the activity of Y-spermatozoa, which are characterized by increased mobility, but short life span. To maximize your chances of getting pregnant with a boy, you should try to conceive during or immediately after ovulation. On the first day of ovulation, the chances of conceiving a boy increase significantly.
Correct calculation of the fertile period will allow you not to make mistakes in choosing a favorable time for conceiving a child of the desired gender, as well as to avoid regrets about the negative consequences of an unplanned pregnancy.
How to correctly calculate the date of ovulation with an irregular cycle
Measuring basal temperature rectally is one of the possible ways to calculate ovulation during irregular periods. To accurately calculate the timing of your fertile period, you will have to measure your temperature regularly every day for three months. It is important to monitor temperature changes daily and listen to your sensations, since even a jump of 0.3 degrees Celsius is a sign of the end of ovulation. Only a careful and responsible approach to calculating all temperature indicators will bring the long-awaited motherhood closer.
You should not place high hopes on other methods and try to apply other methods of calculating fertile days, because monitoring the growth of follicles using ultrasound will help determine the onset of this period. This is one of the most popular methods for determining the appropriate period for conception. The first ultrasound procedure should be performed on the 7-8th day of the cycle, and the second and all subsequent ones - at your personal request or as directed by a doctor. Ovulation occurs when the follicle reaches a size of 18 to 21 mm. To get pregnant with irregular periods, you need to follow all the instructions of the gynecologist.
Deciding to have a child with your loved one is no small thing. But it is also important to take the issue of pregnancy planning seriously, because the slightest wrong action can delay the appearance of the long-awaited baby.
Online ovulation calculator
The ovulation calculator allows you to quickly get the most accurate result of calculating the menstrual cycle and the best period for conceiving a child. The calculator provides a unique opportunity to calculate your ovulation schedule for free, choose the best time to conceive a child, or avoid an unplanned pregnancy. To obtain accurate data, it is recommended to keep a special calendar for six months - a plate in which you need to enter all the dates of menstruation by week. Using monthly data recorded in the calendar and an online calculator, you will calculate the most accurate results.
For several months ahead, use our calculator! You can include a forecast of the sex of the unborn child in order to additionally highlight in the calculation results the days on which the likelihood of conceiving a boy or girl is higher.
Ovulation calculator with baby gender prediction
Ovulation is the phase of the menstrual cycle during which a mature egg is released from the follicle and enters the cavity of the fallopian tubes for fertilization by sperm.
Nature allots only a day for conception, but it is quite difficult to guess exactly on which day of the cycle ovulation will occur, because there are many factors influencing this process: hormonal imbalance, diets, diseases, medications taken, etc.
Today, there are many methods to determine and calculate correctly “day X”, i.e. ovulation. With their help, you can not only find out the favorable day for conception, but also prevent the onset of an unwanted pregnancy.
Methods for calculating the day of ovulation
Calendar method
Everyone has long known that a woman’s menstrual cycle has a clear cyclicity and regularity. Of course, we are talking about healthy and normal periodicity without obvious deviations. If this is your case, then ovulation can be calculated literally in your head, knowing the exact number of days of your cycle. Due to individual characteristics, each woman has her own cycle duration - one has 28 days, the other - 32. In both cases, the values fit into the norm, since they are within 21–35 days. Experts have found that ovulation occurs exactly 14 days before the start of menstruation.
If your menstrual cycle is as clear as a clock, then to correctly determine “day X” you need to solve a small arithmetic operation:
M – 14 days = O
Where M– the day of the next menstruation, and ABOUT- day of ovulation.
For example, if the date of your next period falls on June 20, then you need to subtract 14 days from this number. As a result, we get June 6th. This date is the day of expected ovulation.
Online calculators are built according to the same computational scheme as the formula described above. To calculate ovulation, you only need to enter certain data about the menstrual cycle, and it can calculate the rest itself.
By basal temperature
Basal temperature (BT) is the lowest body temperature observed after a long night's sleep. It must be measured immediately after waking up, without getting out of bed, using the rectal method. Using BT, you can track the process of changing the temperature of a woman’s body depending on the phases of the cycle. During the follicular phase (first), the temperature remains low, ranging from 36.3–36.8˚C. The day before ovulation, the temperature rises, and on “day X” it reaches 37.1–37.3˚C and remains in this position throughout the entire luteal phase (second) until the arrival of menstruation. With the onset of a new cycle, everything repeats itself in a circle.
In order for BT indicators to be reliable, it is necessary to follow all measurement rules when calculating and take into account the state of the body. Any illness, fatigue, taking medications, or drinking alcohol can affect the BT schedule.
By ultrasound
Ultrasound examination can accurately calculate the release of an egg from the dominant follicle. With a regular monthly cycle, an ultrasound is performed 2-3 days before the expected date of ovulation. For irregular cycles – 4–5 days every 2 days.
According to the phenomenon of saliva crystallization
A woman’s hormonal balance is characterized by a certain ratio of hormones at different periods of the menstrual cycle. In its first part, estrogen predominates, which decreases with the onset of ovulation. The second part is characterized by the predominance of another sex hormone - progesterone. Saliva is similar in composition and nature of processes to uterine mucus. During ovulation, the level of salts in saliva increases, which is easily monitored under a microscope. It is these salts that will help you determine and calculate the exact date. Today, special devices-microscopes, similar in appearance to lipstick, are actively sold. Just a minute and you yourself can find out your readiness to conceive by examining the patterns of saliva composition through the eyepiece of such a microscope test.
Hormonal fluctuations in sex hormones are accompanied by characteristic changes in saliva crystallization. About a week before the onset of ovulation, saliva begins to form blurry accumulations, in which signs of the image of a fern leaf or spruce twig are noted. With the arrival of ovulation, this picture takes on the intensity of crystalline clusters. After three days, the image begins to lose clarity again.
This method gives a 99% guarantee, but only under certain conditions: no inflammatory processes in the oral cavity, no smoking, no eating 2 hours before the test. For greater reliability of the result, it is better to conduct testing immediately after sleep, even before brushing your teeth.
In addition, using a microscope you can monitor the general hormonal state of the body. Intense or blurry accumulations of crystals throughout the entire cycle, monotony of the pattern without visible changes at the right time, shift in the timing of ovulation and other suspicious processes - it is necessary to consult a doctor.
Using the test
This is perhaps the most popular way to determine ovulation today. In addition, there are no obstacles to purchasing the test - there are plenty of them in every pharmacy. The principle of operation is similar to a pregnancy test, only to determine ovulation, it is not human chorionic gonadotropin contained in the urine that is needed, but luteinizing hormone. The same two stripes, as a positive result, should appear on the ovulation test, one strip – a negative result.
The test cannot give a 100% guarantee, since the hormonal “situation” can be influenced by many factors. In addition, two immature follicles can give a positive result at the same time.
According to health and discharge
Some women do not need to turn to auxiliary methods for help to calculate the day of ovulation. Their nature and individual characteristics will themselves show signs of the onset of “Day X”. During ovulation, women may experience short-term nagging pain in the lower abdomen, swelling of the mammary glands, increased libido and the appearance of specific vaginal discharge. During the ovulatory period, discharge becomes abundant, transparent and viscous, reminiscent of egg white in consistency. During the “tear” test, a string of cervical mucus will stretch between two fingers.
Of course, unusual behavior of the body or nagging pain may indicate a health disorder, but women for whom such phenomena occur from month to month are able to correctly determine where the ovulatory signs are and where there is a violation of the general condition.
As we see, our body itself answers all questions; it is only important for us to learn to correctly recognize its signals and signs. How to count ovulation? The main thing is to be able to calculate your menstrual cycle, and progress will do the rest.
Perhaps all this may be quite difficult to believe, but doctors say that it is a fact. Namely, they say that in the whole month there is only one single day on which a full-fledged, absolutely healthy woman of reproductive age can successfully become pregnant. And in some exceptional cases, such a day can occur twice directly during one single menstrual cycle. However, in the overwhelming majority of all existing cases, this very “hour X”, favorable for a full-fledged conception, lasts only one day, and these same days are called, as you probably already guessed, ovulation.
Directly on the day of full ovulation, which we will now teach you how to correctly calculate, a planned release of an already fully mature egg occurs directly from its house or follicle, which at the same time ruptures. And within 24 hours this most mature egg, released from the follicle, will await its fertilization, and, unfortunately, if it turns out to be simply unclaimed, it will subsequently die, as Mother Nature intended this process to be. The horror, however, is only 24 hours in a whole month, and even then all this is in the most favorable best case scenario. Sometimes it happens that full ovulation does not occur at all. It should be noted that with a completely regular menstrual cycle and with the absolute health of the woman herself, on average, young women who never experience any gynecological or reproductive problems experience only ten such ovulations per year, we can say that this does not happen every month .
We will immediately try to warn those young and not entirely experienced girls who immediately decided to calculate their day of full ovulation for the sole purpose of protection, not everything is so simple. Remember, pregnancy will be very likely and quite possible if literally a few days before the onset of full ovulation you had poorly protected or even unprotected sexual intercourse. This can happen precisely because male sperm, unlike a female egg, is always more tenacious, and they can retain their ability to fully fertilize even for several days, or rather up to one week.
In the same case, if you are trying to calculate exactly the opposite, then you, of course, should definitely know how to correctly calculate the day of your full ovulation.
How to correctly calculate your own ovulation?
Today there is a fairly simple, but quite effective formula that allows you to correctly calculate the day of full ovulation. Moreover, it is quite possible to do this even at home and without any additional equipment. Although, by the way, today there are already ready-made specially created calculators for calculating the onset of full-fledged ovulation online, which, of course, really simplify this task, but strictly speaking, there is absolutely nothing complicated or inaccessible in such manual calculations.
So, scientists have long established that the onset of full ovulation in any woman of reproductive age with almost any length of her menstrual cycle should occur exactly fourteen days before the first day of her next period. It should be noted that the duration of the very first phase of the menstrual cycle may well change somewhat, but the period after the onset of full ovulation is a completely constant value. And if, for example, your menstruation occurs quite regularly, as they say “number to number,” then, of course, calculating your day of full ovulation will be simply as simple as shelling pears.
Namely:
Your day of full ovulation will be equal to the date of your next period, from which you will need to subtract exactly fourteen days.
Let us give you a completely classic example: let’s say that with a woman’s regular and even accepted 28-day menstrual cycle, the onset of full ovulation usually occurs exactly on the fourteenth day of such a cycle. And if, for example, this month your period began on the third day, then in the same full 28-day menstrual cycle you will need to wait for the onset of full ovulation exactly on the seventeenth day, namely exactly fourteen days before the start of your next period. If your particular cycle is slightly longer or shorter than the accepted norm, then directly to the first day of your last menstruation you will need to add the duration of your particular cycle (for example, 26 or 30 days). In this simple way, you will get your estimated date of the next menstruation, from which you will again need to subtract exactly fourteen days, and as a result of this you will get the exact date of full ovulation in this particular menstrual cycle.
And in fact, it was precisely on this principle that the so-called calendar method of female contraception was once built.
Such a calculation of the onset of full-fledged ovulation is truly quite simple, but it still has one rather significant BUT. This method may be applicable only for those women who have a strictly regular menstrual cycle. Moreover, of course, one should take into account the full schedule, well, at least for all of the last four or even six menstrual cycles, and therefore for the same number of months.
If, on the contrary, you are carefully trying to get pregnant and for this simple purpose you are looking for how to correctly calculate the day of full ovulation, then our next advice will be incredibly useful for you. Namely: if you have an insufficiently regular menstrual cycle, say, lasting from twenty-six to thirty days, your chances of a full one increase significantly if you have sexual intercourse regularly and every other day directly from the tenth to the eighteenth days of the menstrual cycle. After all, this is the very time of expected ovulation
The ovulation calculator may be wrong
As you understand, for couples who are actively planning their pregnancy, calculating the time of full ovulation is truly extremely important and necessary. However, this particular method, unfortunately, cannot be considered too highly accurate. The thing is that ovulation itself is a very labile process. And, of course, under the influence of a number of extraneous external or internal factors, and even with a fairly regular menstrual cycle, the onset of full ovulation can radically shift in one direction or another. And this, in particular, may well be caused by frequent stress, severe overwork, and even frequent colds, as well as some hormonal imbalances. And even moreover, in extremely rare cases, but still, the onset of full ovulation can occur even twice in one monthly cycle, which women should especially remember if they want to protect themselves from unwanted pregnancy.
And, of course, it is not at all possible that in any particular menstrual cycle the onset of full ovulation will not occur at all. In fact, this is precisely why modern experts strongly recommend using possible methods in combination. And first of all, in such a complex it will be important to focus on your own feelings, and also be sure to keep a schedule for measuring basal body temperatures, and, of course, use a special one. And the most correct and accurate will, of course, be to conduct a timely ultrasound examination, which will definitely be able to determine the time of full ovulation as reliably as possible.
