Posts Tagged ‘Ovulation’
Here We Grown Again! Hopefully.
I think I’m insane. Completely. I remember having my first baby and thinking to myself (very clearly) “never again!” As a matter of fact I think I actually said that to pretty much everyone I managed to come into contact with those first few months. That feeling had nothing to do with my awesome daughter. It was all the pregnancy, labor and delivery. I was sick of being sick, and terrified of labor and delivery again. Plus I was still healing. So, every move was accompanied by pain.
Well, like “they” say, you really do forget the pain. So, since the baby was 6 months old I’ve slowly been starting to long for another little one. Two things kept me from actually getting started on one though: a) my cycle hadn’t returned, I was still breastfeeding a lot, and b) the man of the house needed some convincing. With the economy and politics the way they are he wasn’t on board with the idea of having to worry about supporting another person. I’m still a stay at home mom. So, we’re operating on a one parent income and things can be pretty tight; Especially now that we actually own a home.
After much deliberation we’ve decided to go ahead and try for number two. My cycle returned 2 months ago after I started giving the little one a small bottle of milk before her evening feed. We just started trying this cycle. I’m on cycle day 15. We’ve essentially done things the same as last time. I keep forgetting to use the ovulation predictor kit. I think we’ve covered my usual ovulation days this month though.
Signs that I might be pregnant:
*Fatigue!!!
*The Nose is back. All sorts of smells are much stronger and bothersome. I had to throw away the garlic I had sitting on my counter and move the air freshener I had sitting by my sink. I couldn’t bare to eat more than a nibble of the homemade fig newtons I tried to bake yesterday because all I could smell was citrus from the orange peel I added.
*Loss of appetite and sudden cravings. I’m not really hungry most of the day right now. I was doing really well eating 5 times a day, 3 healthy meals and 2 snacks. My only cheat day was on Sunday when I bake something new. Lately I just don’t want anything except the meaty spaghetti I cooked earlier in the week. I have a big bowl for lunch every day. I majorly started craving Oreos all of a sudden. I found a recipe and made them (tasted EXACTLY the SAME!) and couldn’t eat any. I ate a piece of one to test the results, but haven’t touched them since. I just don’t want them.
*The ache. I have this slight ache when I do certain activities. It’s in the same area where I might feel PMS cramps, but it’s always there.
*My deodorant has suddenly stopped working. Maybe a hormonal change? The same stuff that usually lasts me all day is melted away by the time I’m done with my morning errands.
All of this may just be my body still adjusting to getting my cycles back. Maybe it’s just bad PMS. Mine usually starts around day 14 and is a beast. So, we’ll see. I can test a week from this Tuesday. 
~crossing my fingers~
Cycle Day 23 – What's wrong with me?!
Lately, besides the whole UTI thing, I have been having some pretty wierd symptoms! Today worse than ever. The biggest thing I’ve noticed is fatigue. It comes and goes though. If it was a little more persistant I’d worry enough to get my thyroid level checked. For now, it’s just wierd and sudden and something I’m mentally chocking up to PMS. Next on the list of unusuals is this sudden rash of teeny tiny bumps on my entire face! I was worried it was from these ginger chew candies I’d been eating here and there (in the past I broke out after drinking Hansen’s all natural ginger ale and had my tongue start itching intensely after having a ginger Altoid in my mouth for barely a second! I’ve never had problems with any other kind of ginger ale or actual ginger -in cooking, sushi etc.), but I’m not sure. I’m laying off of them just in case. It’s nothing noticeable to anybody else but me. I actually only noticed them that morning when I was washing my face. Over the next few days I’d itch once or twice, but only in the same spot on my left cheek. Today, however, the trouble started when I had a sudden hot flash (which has consistently visited me from then (about 1:30pm) until now. Then, I was all of a sudden queasy and dizzy at the same time while on the way to lunch with my mom and sister. I’ve been careful to both stay very hydrated since the whole UTI thing started and get plenty of rest (8+ hours a night) so it wasn’t from dehydration or exhaustion. I had a nice breakfast of: a veggie omelet, turkey bacon and a piece of whole wheat toast with a little jam on it. So, that rules out startvation for me too. I wrote the date, time, and symptoms in this tiny leather purse journal I bought from Target a while back. Just in case the symptoms persist and I have to explain to my Dr. when and how they started. Around 7pm tonight I started feeling axhausted and dizzy too. I’ve also been feeling a bit crampy and bloated, and even though the bloat and cramps are different from my usual PMS symptoms, I’m still convinced that I’m not pregnant. It’s probaly just a defense mechanism so that when I get my period in a couple days I can tell myself “I though so!” and feel ok with it. 
)~ I’ll keep you posted!
-Jessy
Day 9 and Something Wrong!
Story! More insights into my health I guess. During the last week in April this year I had to deal with a monster UTI. My doctor actually thought it might even be a stone. So I had an ultrasound and all that. Spent my days drinking tons of water. Had a reaction to one antibiotic and had to be placed on another. So, overall it was yucky and drawn out, but it went away in the end. So, you can imagine my panic when yesterday morning I woke up feeling another one coming on. Ah! My Dr. had warned me to make sure and call her at the slightest hint of a UTI to prevent another yucky experience. So, that’s what I did. Her office got me in the same day and I left there with a perscription in case it got worse over the next couple of days. So, right now that’s what I’m dealing with. My fault totally I’m sure though. I live in the desert (100+ degree weather most of the summer) and I know I don’t drink enough water. You’d think I’d learn my lesson!
A quick review of the First Response Ovulation predictor:
Pros: Easiest to use. No messy cups and clear directions.
Cons: Unless you pee in a disposable cup (or have a nice little trickle going on?) you can get some back splash from holding the stick in your urine stream. Yucky. Only 5 tests in the box.
-Jessy
Week 1 Down!
Yesterday, still wasn’t a likely ovulation day. So far, with all these cups, strips, etc. I’ve started to wonder what it’s like to have fertility problems. I mean we’re just getting started and already I’m getting anxious to see a possible LH surge on the test results and even more anxious to see a positive result on a pregnancy test. What do I have to worry about though right? I’m fairly young and healthy. I think my main fertility concerns come from three places. The first place is the pharmacy. I worked in a grocery store pharmacy for years and, believe it or not, there are just as many younger women as older women on fertility treatments. The second concern comes from one of the reasons why that might be. I’ve been seeing articles on harful chemical substances that are being linked to infertility, childhood disorders, and a horrid amount of other health problems since the beginning if my research. I’m not sure if it has to do with growing media awareness or just the current fad of going “green,” but I’m seeing more and more articles being published on this problem. So, I worry about things that I never used to worry about; like drinking out of plastic water bottles. The third concern about my own fertility has to do with my thyroid. For a long time I just seemed to be tired all of the time. I never really noticed it, but I’d be with a family members and say “wow I’m tired” and I’d get ‘you’re always tired’ as a response. Well, beginning this past April, I stopped my birth control and started prenatal vitamins in preparation for babytime and at night and first thing in the morning I started noticing this bruised feeling in my right temple. My husband took a look and said the vein there was swollen looking. It was so wierd. I would only have pain when I put pressure on the area but the vision in my right eye got slightly worse. So, I just made an appointment with my primary care physician and waited the week it took me to get in. By the time I saw her 2 weeks had passed. She said it looked like temporal arteritis, but that temporal arteritis usually only occurs in much, much, older people (like 60 year olds). She warned me that this condition can affect my vision and even cause blindness if not treated! So, I was told not to start trying for a baby until we figured it out and put on steroids while we waited for the results of my bloodwork. The results showed hypothyroidism. She said it was really good we caught the hypothyroidism. This is what was causing my tiredness all the time. This condition could also have caused me the inability to get pregnant. So, right now, at the end of my first week and beginning of my second, those are my main concerns. Well, those are my main concerns other than getting this site choc-full-o’ info for you!
-Jessy
On your mark…get set…
Ok, so this is me right now. (Geez…OK! so this is actually me this summer…like a month ago. Right now it’s 11:39pm my time and I’m in PJ’s aka not something you want to see!) Much of the information you read on preconception and pregnancy refer to “DAY 1″ or the first day of your period. I am currently not on day one (thank ZO <–my brother and the god of technology in my life). I am on day 6. In order to provide you with some handy first-hand ovulation testing info I’ve decided to try out 4 different methods of ovulation testing. Here are the tools of the trade (so far):
They include: A basal digital thermometer, OvuCheck saliva testing strips, Answer pee (excuse me, urine) test strips, and the little plastic cup that comes with each. On day 8, or Wednesday for me, I’ll start the First Response Ovulation checker as well (which looks just like a pregnancy test).
I’ve been testing with Answer since day 5 and OvuCheck since today. Both have been negative for me so far. The pee test is kind of gross because you have to pee in this little cup (one day a woman will design these and make them big and spill proof), stick the strip in it and then set the strip on a flat, non-porous (so, not on a piece of TP, or tissue) surface and wait. The spit test is better because I get less grossed out by my own spit, but would be much more convenient if the test didn’t involve spitting into the little cup and then dipping the strip in there.
So, pros and cons to each:
Answer: Pro – comes with 30 strips so you can test the whole month & easy to follow instructions with pictures. Also comes with coupons for their brand pregnancy test. Cons – yay! I can reuse the pee cup woohoo! (ew…Or not!) & all listed above.
OvuCheck: Pro – comes with a disposable cup for each test, uses spit instead of urine, only takes 1 minute to process. Cons – only comes with 5 tests. Would be nicer if you could just stick the strip on your mouth.
Basal Thermometer: I’m using a Walgreens brand thermometer. This is actually my second (my puppies got ahold of the first one…woops.) I should’ve started on day 1, but I didn’t. I started taking my temperature about 2 months ago and got tired of forgetting to do it so I quit, but I’ll start again tomorrow. It is an important guide, and may be useful in the months to come if this month is not a successful one. The biggest cons I found with this in the past though were: the position your suppose to hold the thermometer in in your mouth is a bit unconfortable (kind of like when the devil…I mean dentist makes you bite down on those extra-sharp edged things when taking x-rays), and just remembering to do it BEFORE you get out of bed. You’re suppose to do it before ANY physical activity first thing in the morning.
K, well now it’s tomorrow so I better get some sleep.
But…I’ll be on here almost first thing in the morning (I have temperatures to take, cups to pee in and other cups to spit in yah know).
-Jessy
