Not Ovulating, due to BF?

[midori1999]

DD is 18 months old. My normal periods came back when she was three months old and although they were heavier than usual, I had my normal 32 ish day cycles.

My last two periods have been 14 days long and there was a gap of 7 weeks between my last two periods too. My last period started on the 6th December and so far I haven't ovulated yet this cycle as far as I know. (ovulation tests)

There are a couple of other potential reasons for these changes, I took to mini pill for a month and have also had two Lletz procedures done (to remove per cancerous cells from my cervix). I'm going to see my GP as I also have period like cramps in between periods, but I suspect she'll try and 'blame' breastfeeding and suggest I stop if I want to conceive.

Surely it's not likely to be BF after all this time? Although I'm assuming I have been ovulating normally during normal cycles. I did get a positive OPK early on this year but only tested for one cycle.

Has anyone any info or advice/suggestions about this or TTC whilst BF?

Sorry if this is the wrong section, wasn't sure where to post.

I'm not sure how ovulation tests work, do you test every day? I know that sometimes BF can affect the luteal phase but I'm not sure what this would do to ovulation test results.

When are you getting cramping? After DD1 was born I went through a few months of having really bad ovulation pains, I wonder if it was my ovaries kick-starting.

Ovulation tests also aren't always clear indicators, especially the blue line ones - I only ever once got a positive on one (which resulted in DS2!) and that was after someone told me to test in the afternoon as that was when the relevant hormone concentration was highest, and use one of the digital smiley ones. I never got a positive on the other sort, including in cycles when I actually conceived.

Also am not an expert but it seems very unlikely that breastfeeding would have caused your periods to stop again months and months after they'd restarted - once mine came back, they were back, and I got pregnant twice while feeding. Mini-pill possibly a more likely culprit, as I know when I took it (and stopped shortly afterwards as I bled constantly on it, bah) it completely screwed with my cycle for a couple of months.

Thanks for the replies.

Eaurouge, I don't think the ovulation tests would be affected by a luteal phase defect, as they work by detecting leutenising hormone (may have spelled that wrongly!) You usually do them for 5 days or so around the time you'd expect to ovulate based on cycle length, or stop before five days if you get a positive result before then. I tested daily from day 10 (although was still spotting then) to day 21, although it is possible I ovulated after that I suppose, but I don't think so. The cramps are too random I think to be ovulation pains and they aren't localised to one side or anything. I've had ovulation pain before and it wasn't like these.

I did get EWCM for a day on CD19, but only a day.

I suppose I'll just have to see what the GP says or suggests. This is the first month we have 'officially' been TTC, although other than the one month of cerazette, we haven't used any contraception since DD was born. I'm not sure if that'll mean they do anything or not though, I may ask in the TTC forum.

Thankyou.