Preconception planning - anyone want to join?

@Pebbleinthesand you could always just keep not using protection and see if anything happens but not specifically aim for your fertile days, it’ll be like you’re a newlywed in the olden days 😂 Then it’ll just be a nice surprise if you do fall, and if you don’t then you can start TTC properly on your original timeline

@CookieMonster3001

I hadn't thought of YouTube- must be the only place left on the internet that I haven't googled about conceiving a child haha

@Pebbleinthesand yep i had zero idea at first but Im finding it all so fascinating!! I spent the last half an hour watching youtube videos on ovulation test strip progression lines haha

@CookieMonster3001 that's the approach we took with DD and likely what we'll do again. Tbh if I found out I was pregnant this month I'd be happy but at the same time I don't think I'd be too disappointed if I wasn't which I suppose is a nice place to be in.

I've never used OPKs before. I don't even think I'd understand what I'm looking at 😂

Well and truly caved out of pure curosity. Peed allll over my hand (gonna have to get used to that) and did my first OPK! I was suprised at how small they are! The interesting thing is that looks quite close to a positive and im CD 11 and my last 3 months my app has said I have ovulated on CD 15-17 so very interested to see when it actually surges!

@Pebbleinthesand i agree just go with your gut feeling! If you are ready then just go for it. Or a lot of people dont try but dont not try if that makes sense!

Thank you @queenatom. It doesn't help that I'm a big over thinker and I'll try and plan every detail and predict every different outcome.

I think it's the fact that it seems a trivial thing to wait for that's bothering me but you're right, if we decide to wait a bit there's nothing wrong with waiting for one last blow out weekend. I'm also planning on running a half marathon (not a proper race, just on our own) with my friend at the end of August which would obviously be made a lot more difficult with first trimester fatigue.

Weight wise I'm happy where I am, having lost 3 stone since I got pregnant with my DD but I've only just bought some vitamins so ideally I'd like to be taking them for a bit longer first.

I honestly give myself whiplash with all this back and forth 🤦‍♀️

@Pebbleinthesand I think you just have to go with your gut on this one, to be honest. For me, I'm waiting a little longer for two reasons - 1) because I feel its the right choice for my body to give it a little time for my cycle to regulate (so I'm not stressing out when it doesn't happen immediately), to take my vitamins and hopefully lose a little more weight and get healthier and 2) because my husband wants to wait a few months longer and I'm happy to make that compromise, particularly given point 1.

I do think that if you have the sort of crowd who notices these things, they may speculate whenever you aren't drinking at a time you otherwise would, and there's no guarantee that when it happens you won't encounter one of those situations. That said, there's nothing wrong with wanting to have one last big blast of fun before going into trying and pregnancy, particularly given the past few months! I don't think there's a right or wrong answer.

Hi everyone,

I'm really struggling this week with my resolve to wait until the end of September. I spoke to by Best Friend about it and the weekend and she (quite rightly) pointed out that after the weekend of the hen do I'm holding off for, I won't care and work friends are likely to speculate when I don't drink at the wedding or work Christmas do so did I really care if they knew and the more I think about it the more I don't think I do care.

I'm a years time when I have a new baby I'm not going to be thinking about that hen do and whether or not a few colleagues guessed. I know that I'll still have a laugh with everyone without alcohol so that side of things doesn't really bother me.

I'm scared to wait assuming that I'll get pregnant straight away like I did with DD and then struggle to conceive for ages.

We had unprotected sex at the weekend but given that I only got my coil out last Tuesday, I would be very surprised if that amounted to anything.

Can anyone talk me down from this baby making cliff or should I just go for it?

Also someone mentioned pregnancy and baby books for Dad's. My DH read my pregnancy book (I can't remember which one) while I was being induced and found it really interesting/didn't find it weird that it was aimed at women so it might just be worth trying him with the one you have read before paying out for a different one.

Happy Monday, gang! Hope we all had good weekends?

Things have finally settled down downstairs after the issues I was having last week - I think it was just a bout of thrush although I haven't yet tested out the condoms so will just need to wait and see. I'm very glad to be feeling better, it was all a bit grim!

@CookieMonster3001, that's very organised! I've been feeling rotten so have fallen off the wagon on temping - I was waking two or three times a night so not sure they'd have been of any use anyway. Need to get back on the horse. I have been checking OPKs and no sign of anything yet, barely getting a second line.

@CookieMonster3001 I’m an organisational freak too (typical project manager lol!) so am having to go against what I really want to do which is literally determine when I’m ovulating RIGHT THIS SECOND but I’m going to try and take it easy and just do it “naturally” (i.e. the lots of sex method 😂) for the first 3 cycles and hope that works! My husband doesn’t like to plan things too much so I know he would be against me getting that organised and it would likely make him not want to do it if it was too regimented! I love getting a new diary, and especially exciting that you’re going to use it for TTC! I would defo recommend the book, have you got a kindle because then you could download it in the kindle store and I doubt everyone who uses your account would be able to see it?? Or I could try and figure out how to lend it to you as I think I you can transfer it to another kindle for 2 weeks 🤔

That's great that your DH wants to get involved in the journey just as much! I tried to get my DH involved but he really isn't interested in the ins and outs of the whole process! I think for him he just doesn't like talking about it much. Yesterday we went to a friends house for a BBQ and they have kids and all he could do was talk about parenthood and how it is and it was so lovely to see that side of him!

Just purchased a diary planner for 2020-2021 (we do academic years at work!) as I am planning on documenting my journey and I am going to track my ovulation 2/3 months ahead of TTC so I have a real good idea of ovulation dates. I am an organisational freak, so I plan to track cycle days, period and keep a record of all my OPK's in the diary.

I am actually really bored at work so trying with all my will in the world not to pee on a stick just for the sake of it! MUST WAIT ANOTHER MONTH!!!

Would you recommend the book you read? I really wanted to pick some books up from amazon, but everyone has access to my account which is annoying!

@Lollipop87 I‘m almost finished too :) I really enjoyed reading it and got some valuable information I think. Eg Not to freak out in the early days although that might be hard to remember :D

@CookieMonster3001 how great that you can work from home as long as you want for now :)

@CookieMonster3001 I’ll be crossing my fingers for you in Nov! I know exactly what you mean, July is absolutely flying by! I think our office is allowing people to come back fully from Sept with the odd day in Aug if you want to, I’m actually looking forward to going back but we’ll be allowed to work 2 days from home so hopefully if I have bad sickness I can do that! My DH is a permanent home worker but I hadn’t thought of the any time of day BD’ing 🤣

I’ve finished the bible! I thought I had lots more to read as it was only at 60% on my kindle, but there was some more to read in the appendix and then loooads of pages of sources! My DH has expressed an interest in getting a dad-to-be book (they do ones explaining TTC and pregnancy in a way men will get, and I especially want to get one on how best to support your partner and what not to do/say 😂) Has anyone’s partner / other men you know read one they’d recommend? I’ve had a look at the reviews on Amazon but they’re quite mixed. TIA 😊

Afternoon all! Back at work and so much easier to catch up on the messages on an actual computer rather than my phone!

Had a chat with the famalam last night and although we are still wanting to go to Greece in October, we are going to wait to see what the situation is like in August September before booking anything! Hoping we can go as it would be an amazing date before starting to TTC. Checked my dates over, and if we TTC beginning of November and catch first cycle, it puts me at 14 weeks at my sisters wedding, which I think sounds perfect, so Nov is hopefully going to be our month!

Already thinking of all the exciting ways to tell DH were pregnant at Christmas! It would be such an amazing gift!

We also found out today that although Boris is encouraging people to go back to work, our employer is in no rush, and it doesn't look like we will be going back to the office this year, which for me is good because 1) we can BD any time of the day!! and 2) if we do get pregnant, I can manage any uncomfortable symptoms whilst at home not having to worry about going into the office and work.

Hope all you ladies are doing well! I do feel the time is flying! Can't believe we are nearly at the end of July... which means we are all getting closer to our TTC Journey!

Good morning! The sun is shining which makes me feel so much happier than when it’s grey 😊 Today is our first day of eating more healthily and doing more exercise, just done a morning workout and going to have some fruit and Greek yoghurt for breakfast (switched to full fat as I read that it helps with oestrogen production so will just have to have less than I normally dollop on!) Hope you all have a lovely week 😁

Oh and good morning of course :)

@Lollipop87 thanks for the idea I think I postpone the conversation as much as possible and may indicate that I have some plans :D

@butterfly5291 I know how I was conceived since it was an accident :D so my mom kind of told me several times years ago to warn me about natural cycle tracking :D funny that I use it now to get pregnant. She knows that we want to start trying soon and is very supportive I‘m just not sure I want to tell her when exactly my fertil windows are..Have to think about it.

@CookieMonster3001 That would be a great excuse but I‘m a teacher and we‘ve got summer holidays until mid September here. But maybe some conferences or staff meetings - could be worth a try :D

@sunflowersaremyfav93 Since you are the daughter I can imagine that your parents will put you first because I think your daughter having a baby is very special for many mums.. :) And I don’t think your overly sensible such thoughts just pop up once in a while even if they don’t seem to be very nice.

Do you all take calcium? Maybe I should start :D would love to have better nails at least :D

p.s. hi @AlwaysLay8 and welcome! My nails seem a lot stronger all of a sudden this week, I wonder if it’s down to the combined calcium & vit D supplement I’ve been taking?! They’re really long but not breaking like they usually do, result! Hope they stay like this until I get my nails done next week (finally!) 💅🏼

@sunflowersaremyfav93 is DHA what’s in oily fish / omegas? There’s DHA in my fish oil capsules and I’m pretty sure it was listed as a nutrient/vitamin in the tinned mackerel I had the other day. She writes about CoQ-10 in the “bible” - says that it doesn’t necessarily make you more fertile but it could help you produce better eggs that go on to be more likely to produce normal embryos. She says “Given that CoQ-10 is extremely safe and has benefits for heart health, it might be worth a try, at a dose of 200-600mg a day. Make sure to get ubiquinol, not ubiquinone.” Have you heard of other benefits of it?

@Nate1 are you working at the moment? We usually do a family trip in December but I am hoping to be preg by then so used the excuse that I couldnt get time off work to redirect them to October instead. Always works a charm for me because they never question it!

@butterfly5291 it might be overkill to add the b12 and vit d to the pregnacare but I've been known to have deficiencies in both before so thought it couldn't hurt. Pregnacare doesn't give you RDA of either, I guess it assumes that you'll be getting more from other sources.

@sunflowersaremyfav93 I'm actually loving the pregnacare, been on it for a maybe 2 months. I haven't noticed any changes to my cycle but I have noticed that my nails are looking amazing!! They normally break a lot so that's a great change. It does make my pee bright yellow though which is a little disconcerting 😂

Camambert and wine sounds amazing

@AlwaysLay8 I'm taking the same as you now, fretted about it for a week. Do you need to supplement vit d and b12 as they are in pregnacare too.

@Nate1 my mum has always been prudish about sex, we've never Really talked about it but she was the one who talked me into TTC now. I said to OH it's strange she knows we're actively having sex!!
I agree with lollipop you could tell her you have plans with friends, or say you don't fancy booking something whilst covid is still around. You'll have a pretty good idea about your cycle by then, so could you book something in your non fertile window? Is DH going with you?
Or just tell her your plans...as strange as it might be for her to her you are planning on having sex you are adults and she'd know once you tell her your pregnant....it might be nice to have someone to talk to about it in real life. She might be able to tell you about how it was for her...if you don't know already x

Been taking pregnacare conception, fish oil (omega 3) plus Vit D and also taking additional B12 since I'm a vegetarian
Made DH take pregnacare conception for men too :)
Still having the occasional adult beverage, like twice a week, and coffee no more than one a day
Been using OPKs and PreSeed ...
Ttc baby1, cycle 2