TTC Myths Exposed!

PS Switty, yes tis I Aries!

Calm down Abody. Didn't see the original mockee's post i.e. yours! Just agreed with the post above me. This is a tough enough game and over the last year or so my humour has darkened. Apologies if I offended you :)

thatlldo I know it says any time but the reality is your wee is more concentrated first thing in the morning because your body builds up the hormone in your wee overnight. Hence why I suggested you test with FMU.

How about- back on the original theme of the thread - you don't necessarily ovulate exactly halfway through your cycle like ovulation calculator would suggest. I ovulate much earlier than that most of the time according to OPKs/charting.

Oh nice, thanks panda & ariel. I guess I asked for that. I hope mocking me has cheered you both up today.

treats definetly agree with you.

I didn't use FMU, I did the test in the evening. But that doesn't make any difference - it said on the packet quite clearly that the test could be done at any time of day, and surely if I was 14 or so days post ovulation, it would have picked up a positive result whenever I did it. It's supposed to be almost 100 percent accurate at that time. It wasn't as though I was testing mega early.

Before I did the test I would have bet my life savings on being pregnant. There was no doubt in my mind - I knew I was. And not in a wishful thinking kind of way either - I knew it and was bloody terrified! I'm a single mother and have no idea how I'd cope on my own with a new baby as well as the three children I've got. Not to mention what I'd tell friends and family!

To be honest I'm a bit upset. However much I would not have chosen to become pregnant deliberately, there was a part of me that wanted the baby as soon as I 'knew'. We're a loving family, I thought, we'll manage. Now I feel a fool. And as though my body and mind have betrayed me - does that sound ridiculous?

This has certainly been a very unusual cycle for me. I never suffer from PMS. I have often known nothing of my period coming until it's actually there IYSWIM. The most I ever get is a bit of cramping on the day it actually starts. This month I have been experiencing cramping and an imminent sense of it coming on and off for a week now. I woke in the night with cramping and that funny 'draggy' feeling last night. Still no bleeding though. This has only ever happened before when I have been pregnant. My nausea has massively dissipated today though - was sick as a dog yesterday and only a few very mild waves today.

I don't know what's going on

Alabama - possibly we are overanalysing it. But I think it's valuable to think about what is clearly, provably true about ttc and what is myth and personal experience. It's a very emotive time for lots of people - the more so the longer it goes on - and it doesn't help if people are misinformed or encouraged to think they might be pregnant when they aren't.

I don't think anyone's disputing individual experiences of early pregnancy symptoms - just that things vary from one woman to another and symptoms shouldn't ever be thought of as conclusive 'proof' that you're pregnant.

Ariel (Aries inspired MN name? If so: secret handshake!) and yeah I guess I am, in a fairly head in the sand kinda way. Though my old obsessing skills are surfacing, if a little rusty. TTCing what happens...

Sorry large proportion not rage.

Everyone is really over analysing this. some women experience symptoms before a positive test and other, the majority, don't. Science speaks tor the rage proportion of women when it says you can't detect any ymotons until implanting, but it's not exhaustive of everyone's experience.

Really I think it's narrow minded to say that NO women at all whatsoever experience very early pg symptoms before a pos test. Clearly it is a small percentage but some, including myself, do/did.

NOPE not nop.

Nop, me too!

Where's the foetus going to gestate? Are you going to keep it in a box?

"I don't really appreciate being belittled for defending a woman's right to have whatever symptoms she has at whatever point she happens to have them."

Am I the only person who thought of reading that? (safe link!)

Read the article on Early Pregnancy Factor properly now. It says that implantation occurs anywhere from 6 to 10 days after ovulation. Which - allowing for a few days to enable the HCG to build up - explains why some pregnancies can be detected earlier than others. Either from symptoms or from HPTs. Most pregnancies can be detected at 14DPO, but a few could be detectable from as early as 9DPO. Which also explains why some people get early symptoms and others don't.

Akshully the egg starts implanting about 6 ish days post ovulation, this is why first response can give you a bfp at 9dpo. Before implantation takes place it must surely be impossible to have any pg symptoms as your body and the fertilised egg have not yet joined forces.

Fuckitthatlldo - I wonder if you're actually proving everybody right though?

• We kind of all agreed that an egg doesn't implant before 14DPO so up until that point you can't actually 'be pregnant'. So any symptoms you experience are not actually pregnancy symptoms.

• Other posters point out that they have definitely felt symptoms before 14DPO such that they 'knew' each time they were pregnant. We agreed that they couldn't be 'pregnancy' symptoms - as per above - but perhaps it could be 'early pregnancy factor' - i.e. symptoms related to a fertilised egg prior to implantation.

• There are many factors associated with infertility. In some people fertility arises due to failure to fertilise an egg and in others it arises due to a failure to implant a fertilised egg. Perhaps you - and the others who posted about their early symptoms - don't often fertilise an egg, but when you do, it usually implants resulting in a pregnancy. Which is why you thought you were pregnant this time round although - for some reason - implantation didn't occur (or hasn't yet.....)

• For those for whom infertility results from a failure to implant, they may feel the same symptoms relating to a successfully fertilised egg every month but it doesn't actually implant, so there's no pregnancy. Therefore their symptoms are not ascribed to pregnancy, as they would have been if the implantation had been successful.

• Some people don't feel any symptoms at all as a result of getting a fertilised egg, so don't know until they get a BFP whether they're pregnant or not.

I'm putting it altogether in my mind as I type, so feel free to point out any inconsistencies in my theory. But it possibly provides an explanation for the varying experiences on this board?

As a relative newcomer, I don't think I can add anything especially helpful (I now know quite a lot about symptoms of not being pregnant but I think that stuff's pretty common knowledge on here!).

I am however whiling away the tww (which my obsessive tendencies have turned into a 3ww) by researching rubber chickens for next month and I think that this might be the one: Egglayingrubberchicken

Switty, are you going for Round Two?

Actually Havealittlefaith 's suggestion of lightly saying it was a "false alarm" is rather good I think. Allows you to keep it simple and not go down the road of pretending you actually were pregnant, but it didn't work out, which is perhaps unfair to people who really are in that situation.

Gosh Fuckitthatlldo that's a bit disconcerting. Did you use FMU? If you are confident the result is accurate, I hope that you are OK with it: sounds like you not being pregnant would be fine, given the circumstances you mention.

Anyway, you are right - it is a bit of a case in point. I don't for a moment suppose you imagined the symptoms, but if the test result is right, I guess they were caused by something else? I guess keep an eye out for AF and see what happens. Could it have been a CP?

As for the person you told, I'd give it a few days and then either tell them that you got it wrong or that you had a very early loss, I guess.

I think if AF hasn't arrived yet, I'd retest in a couple of days. Did you use FMU? If it turns out you're not pregnant just tell the person it was a false alarm!

Well so much for everything I have said on this thread. I take it all back.

I honestly don't know what is going on. I already have three children and knew I was pregnant again from about a week ago. I've had changes in my breasts, have been feeling sick (especially yesterday - had to leave a work meeting the nausea was so severe), have had period like pains from last Friday, coupled with an intense feeling of an imminent period but with no bleeding. These signs only ever mean one thing for me.

I have even told someone that I was pregnant again because I knew I was - didn't need to do a test as far as I was concerned.

I haven't been TTC, in fact was feeling incredibly ambivalent about being pregnant - very worried about how I might cope with a fourth. So it's not like I was desperately trying to convince myself of the symptoms.

But yesterday I did a test and it was negative. I can't believe it. I thought it was just a formality. I just kept staring at the test thinking, 'but I am, I know I am.'

But I can't be. Yesterday was (I believe although I could be wrong by a day or so) 14 DPO and the day my period was due. I used a First Response test that are supposed to be 60 percent accurate from six days before your period is due. And nothing. Not even the faintest of lines.

Honestly, I am so confused. And a bit bloody embarrassed as well. What on earth am I going to tell the person I told I was pregnant??!

Now I'm like an 'otters pocket' Cave but I've taken to using conceive plus just for good measure.

Right, must think of rubber chickens.

I'm currently down-regging in prep for my first frozen embryo transfer cycle ('fresh' IVF cycle in April was cancelled due to severe OHSS which blew me up like a blimp and put me in hospital). I have a scan on Friday to see how I'm getting on and am tempted to take a rubber chicken along to wave for good luck
Oh, the stuff I tried which made bog-all difference was:

• Chinese herbs
• Agnus castus
• Vitamin B supplementation
• Vitamin D supplementation
• Conceive plus lube
• Legs in air