Elderberry Pavlovas Unite - the over 30s TTC number 1 (thread 3)

[Bunnygirlie]

Hey ladies, we're over here!

bunnygirlie, 32, TTC since June, AF coming around New Year!
Twinklestar 2, TTC1, cycle 16, BFP was due 19/12
BraveLilBear,TTC
Lolcbcb,TTC
Aquarius,TTC
Happylass 34 cycle 4 BFP due Jan 1st
Navis176, 35, TTC #1, cycle 3 (this time around), bfp due around 19 Jan (I think?)
Neshie, 31, TTC #1, on cycle 9, after stopping the pill 18 months ago (took 10 months for AF to return!) BPF due 12th January Fx
MotherOfCleo TTC#1, cycle 3, 5dpo, BFP due New Years Day.
Viviennewestwould, 41, childless hag, TTC one year (mmc in March), on Clomid, ovulating today!
Pipbin 37 cycle 16 BFP due 26/12

Zombies, 32, almost 3 wks pg (by my calculation)- per standard
measurement from LMP, 6 weeks pg, PCOS.
MeanMrsMustard 31, 5 weeks pregnant.
Quod,33, PG
Purplemonster, PG
Janey 38, 12 week scan on Christmas Eve
HazleNutt, due June 21st
Rach, 34, 13+4 pg, due 26th June

Apologies if I've missed you or got something wrong

Sorry about AF Mother, how frustrating but at least you aren't in limbo any more and can plan your next bout of intensive shagging

I don't know anything about progesterone readings Viv but your temperature rise sounds hopeful. FX

I definitely wouldn't have bought a doppler Hazle and Janey for the same reasons you describe, but having been given one I just can't resist using it! I was obviously just really lucky when I heard the heartbeat on my first attempt and will try not to get disheartened by not being able to find it now. I definitely have a very fast and loud placenta though! I will try again later and if I still can't find it I will ask DH to go hide the doppler in the garage for a few weeks for the sake of my sanity.

Have any of you second trimester ladies got your energy back yet as promised in all the books? I am still absolutely whacked most of the time and no sign of it letting up yet, although I don't think the holiday we just went on particularly helped. DH's Nike Fuelband says we walked the equivalent of a heavy gym workout every day while we were away I want to join a couple of local antenatal exercise classes but I'm so tired I just don't know if I can motivate myself to get off the sofa and go to them.

Except for a few days a couple of months ago, I haven't actually had any problems with energy levels. When did you get back, probably still jet-lagged?

But exercise really helps, I feel a lot better when I drag my backside to the gym or out for a jog. Hopefully I can keep doing my normal classes at least for a few more months.

DH is smugly telling everybody that oh those pregnancy books are full of it, talking about tiredness, aches and pains, horrible nausea and being emotional - as I haven't really had any of this, I feel totally fine. I am trying to explain him that I've just been lucky and many women indeed have all that and more, not sure he believes me though.

hazel janey and rache please please please can I join your club this month???

rache fret not, I am already planning the intense bout of shagging to come.

Did any of you try temping? opks? Just wondering if you had any insider info?

mother - please do join our club, we're recruiting new members

rache - I haven't actually suffered that badly with tiredness compared to stories from my friends, but this last week or two have been ridiculous. How come my tiredness seems to be starting in the second trimester rather than the first?! I too wondered if it was to do with jet lag but I've been back since 24th so should really be fine by now, and I was absolutely fine when we flew out there...

Oh, and no, didn't do temps. OPK's were my friend though.

Mother You most definitely can join our club, it's certainly not exclusive! I struck gold on my first month of using OPK and temping so I would definitely recommend given them a go. I used a Clearblue Ov Test and just got a cheap BBT thermometer from Amazon.
I would recommend joining Fertility Friend to chart your temperatures. It's free and there's loads of temping advice on there.

We got back yesterday morning Hazle. I slept for most of the day yesterday and then for 11 hours last night! Thank goodness I am not back at work until Monday.
My pregnancy is quite badly timed on the exercise front. I used to go to the gym regularly but my gym relocated too far away so I ended my membership. I was thinking about joining another one but was quite lazy for a few months when I fell pregnant so I didn't end up joining one. I have been half heartedly exercising at home but I do feel I want to do more now. The two antenatal classes I have seen won't take women under 13 weeks so with Christmas getting in the way now is my first opportunity to go. I think you have to pay for them up front so I think I will just book them and then force myself to go!

Ahh thanks rache maybe I'll look into tempting too then?

I don't have a gym membership but I do a Bokwa class once a week at a gym I never would have known was their as it's tiny, but it has a studio and you can just pay for classes. I also used to do zumba and combat but dropped those as we got a puppy and I spend more time walking her now.

Hope you feel better soon

Mother, yes, use the fertility friend website and go to Amazon to buy a basal body temperature thermometer (a few quid). Basal body temperatures are a reflection of progesterone levels and, as such, can tell you if/when you ovulate. There is a distinct shift in temperature the day after ovulation which remains elevated throughout the luteal phase until progesterone plummets (if there is no pregnancy), temperatures come down and AF arrives. Unfortunately, charting cannot tell you in advance when you are going to ovulate, however, taking a retrospective look at previous charts can give you an excellent picture of when your fertile window is likely to appear the following month. OPKs are a godsend IMO (unless you suffer from PCOS in which case they are unhelpful). You simply POAS from around CD10, start bed-rocking every other day untill you get a positive OPK and then have sex for the next three nights consecutively.

Google the Sperm Meets Egg Plan. Foolproof except you have to really, really fancy your husband

Has everyone read read Zita West's Guide To Getting Pregnant? You may think I'm trying to get you to suck eggs but, seriously, it's a revelation and hugely readable. ZitaWest is a fertility expert and clinician and claims that the majority of women who come to her with fertility issues are simply not having enough sex and not at the right time. There's lots of information about weight (hugely significant when ttc although we'd like to ignore that), supplements, male fertility, hormones, the lot. I couldn't put it down. Get it from Amazon for under a tenner.

Just read sperm meets egg thanks viv I shall be taking up that advice this month

Mother, bear in mind that lots of articles would tell you that, by the time some women get their positive OPK, it is too late to get plenty of semen positioned at the fallopian tubes just prior to ovulation, by which they mean that it's better to have tons of sperm in situ ready for the egg to be released as opposed to waiting for your LH surge. I really think that's the mistake I've been making for many months. Unfortunately, with DP's ejaculatory issues, it just is not feasible for us to shag like rabbits throughout my cycle. We do, however, follow the Sperm Meets Egg Plan as closely as his 'issues' will allow. I reckon sex on the day of ovulation (as early as possible) is the key, with plenty of sperm already in situ.

I haven't viv no, but have also heard it's really, really good.

The more I think about it the more I realise that it really is a lot trickier to get knocked up than you believe when you're at school, when you're made to feel that you can get pregnant at the drop of the hat! I remember getting the fear about dry humping as there was this tiny, tiny fear (not logical I know) that just one determined sperm would somehow work his way through clothes to impregnate me!

Mother I tempted for about 6 months using the BBT thermometer from Amazon and fertility friend. My charts are here: www.fertilityfriend.com/home/pipbin
I found that it really helped me understand my cycle and what was going on.
However, I stopped because I found that I was never free of TTCing. Taking my temperature every morning meant that TTCing was the first thing I thought about eery morning and the last thing I though about at bedtime.
I have stopped temping and now use a Clear Blue Fertility monitor.
I have found that really helpful as it warns me when I am about to OV as well as when I am OVing, I still use fertility friend to track DTD and CM but not temping really.

Ultimately, in my honest opinion, all of these things are really like hiccup cures, all they do is make you feel like you are actively doing something about it while nature takes it's course.
The best way is to shag every other day really. No amount of temping, special lube, charts or OV sticks are going to help you if you've got bocked tubes like me. But still I do it! Makes me feel better.

Oh and Janey. I had a friend who got pregnant without ever having had actual, penetrative sex, so it can happen!

I just wish had hadn't spent all those years preventing it!

pip I think you may be right, OH doesnt know im on here an doesnt really know I use OPKs, not that he would mind. I dont want to obsess, i told him just now the only answer was more sex.....he said he was up for the challenge lol

Sorry she got you mother. :(

Viv - I tried that SMEP plan, tiring isn't it? It's kind of what we do anyway. I use the CBFM and we dtd every other day in the highs and then on both peaks and the high afterwards so that's 3 days in a row.

Well I got a surprise this morning: cd11 and my monitor peaked! Only started dtd yesterday though. Hope that's ok. I kinda figured the dtd near OV are the most important ones hey?

Pip - has the CBFM been spot in for you? I have to say it hasn't for me. Been using it for 6 months now and 2 of those 6 months AF has come days and days after my peak giving me like a 19-day luteul phase! Last month i peaked on the monday but then i saw ewcm 6 days later so i dtd. and then af came 14 days after i saw the ewcm not after the peak.

I largely agree with what you say, Pip, however the Clearblue monitor gives 'high' readings way before ovulation in some cases - don't you run out of steam by the time you get a 'peak'? I know I would.

Temping is, indeed, horridly obsessive but is a good indicator of when AF is imminent. It's so easy to imagine pregnancy symptoms, I feel, when you're as desperate as we are to get that BFP. The amount of charts of mine which demonstrate 'nausea', 'cramping', 'tender breasts' etc are just embarrassing

Twinkle I had one month when it got it wrong. However I also used cheap opks at the time too. I used to find that I got a very dark line, but not quite dark enough at around day 14 then actually ov around day 20. The CBFM got it wrong then and said I ov'd at CD 14. I know it was wrong because I was temping at the time too.
I have found that in the last few months my ov has changed to CD14, or there about. I asked the consultant if this was a result of the HSG and he said more likely the weight loss and exercise.

Sorry AF arrived, Mother but as you said, if she is on her way, better arriving now than keeping you in limbo for any longer!

I'm interested to hear people talking about the CBFM and temping. I've been temping for the last 12 months now. I always take my temperature about half an hour before I have to get up and I have (on more than one occasion) fallen back asleep with the thermometer still tucked in under my tongue! I can definitely see clear patterns in my data... unfortunately, they're not patterns I want to see! (Low temps and 7-9 day LP) Would love to hear someone else come along and say 'oh yes, perfectly possible to get pregnant with charts like that...' but I know it's not going to happen!

I tried the CBFM for a few months but got fed up with it - it was either exactly the same as the MUCH cheaper OPKs I was using, or it was completely off! Like you, Twinkle, I sometimes would get a peak but then EWCM and a temperature rise 6-7 days later. A little inaccuracy I can handle, but that was just too confusing!

Viv - I prob get 2-3 highs before I get my peak. If you dtd eod then that's only 1-2 shags before OV.

Evening ladies, Crikey it's getting technical round here. Sorry to hear witch arrived mother

I haven't tried temping and only tried ov sticks in November so can't really comment much.

I have a feeling that our only problem is nit having enough sex at the right time of the month. After 7 years together we are hardly at it like rabbits anymore and every day would be impossible, once a week can be a struggle with job and home stress and DHs bad back and low energy levels etc...

My friend who thinks we are just about to start trying said, no pill and lots of sex helps, well lots of sex may be our problem aaaagh

I just wish I could go back to June last year and tell myself what I know now, who knew it was this tricky to get upduffed?!?!?

Twinkle, if you look at Pip's charts she sometimes gets 'highs' every day from CD8 until ovulation at CD17!! I don't bloody think so...

Viv - ah I see, yes that can be a lot of dtd! I think we average around 10 shags a month. Once we did it every other day a month! Nothing works :(

PS have managed another dtd tonight so that's cd10 and 11 done. My monitor surprised me by peaking this morning, wasn't expecting it for a few days yet.