Beginning to chart - anyone wanna in me?

[ILoveMyCats]

Hi all,
Am beginning to chart & wondered if any fellow first timers or experts would care to share their experiences.
I've gathered all the equipment - thermometer, TCOYF, fertility friend app, OPKs and clear blue monitor. My hope is that if these things don't help me conceive, they will help suggest why not.
I've been having a look at cm, but am a bit baffled by it, so will keep track over a couple of cycles to see if there is a pattern to it.
Any thoughts or experiences very welcome.

Hello Cats,
I'll join you. I started charting about a week ago but it's all a bit of a mess. I'm still bfeeding DD, who's 1 next week, during the night so temping is meant to not be very reliable for me as I don't get the 3 hours of uninterrupted sleep before. I'm still doing it though with the hope that I can see a pattern regardless to at least confirm whether I'm ovulating or not.

Am on my 3rd cycle pp. The first one was 42 days, the second one a better 29 days but with a catastrophically short luteal phase of 5 days. If I ovulated that is. Got a positive cheap ov test but as we know that still doesn't guarantee that ovulation actually happened. Hmpfff.

Am now on CD5 and have the following equipment: TCOYF, FF, cheap opk for rough guidance, digital clearblue opk to double check without a doubt if I do get a cheap +, thermometer.

I'm also on raspberry leaf tea and Vit B6 to lenghten my LP, as well as Pregnacare Conception. DH takes the version for men. Oh, and we're not even ttc yet. We're only starting in April but I'm doing all this because I know it's so unlikely I will be able to conceive while still bfeeding that much.

I'm 29, DH is 26 and we have one DD so the current effort is to conceive DC2.

Oh, and I think I get the CM thing but am seriously baffled by the whole cervix checking. I tried a few times but only felt something once I think! But then didn't have anything to compare it to.

How about you? Is this DC1 for you? Have you been ttc for long?

Hi mrs h!

This is dc1. I'm 31, 32 in April. Dh also 31. I'm taking pregnacare conception too, but haven't got him on it. Maybe we'll try that too.

This is my third cycle after coming of the pill. Previous 2 were 43 days on the nose and am now on cd 40, so trying not to think about testing....will see what happens on Wednesday. It's early days in the ttc business, but I want to give myself a fighting chance.

The cm thing is odd for me, as I think I had ewcm this week, meaning ov on cd 36 with 7 day luteal phase. But I'm not sure if it actually was ewcm. Only been checking for a week, so will keep looking.

hmmmm I've been TTC for 19 months now, maybe I should give this a go..?

Yes Soph, give it ago. Do you have TCOYF? I find it very helpful.

Cats, have you looked at the cm pictures in TCOYF? They really helped me to begin with. I hope you get your BFP this cycle already. Who knows. It might happen before you know it. I was settling in for the long haul with DD and then conceived first cycle so this venture will be very different for us. I frantically google every day to see what I can do to increase my chances. Wish we were already trying, just so I know what the score is and can get on with it but then I have to remind myself that timing is not good yet and I want DH and I to have 3 months worth of vitamins in our systems before we conceive. Oh well, can't have it both ways I guess.

Do you have many cats btw? I have an adopted weirdo cat with tons of issues that drives me to the brink of despair!

Mrs H, 3 months will fly by & you're doing all you can in the meantime. Try to focus on that. Easy to say, I know. We waited to start ttc as I had had a breakdown in May 2011 and was taking anti-depressants. I stopped taking those in June just gone, so wanted a few months to get them out of my system first. My psychiatrist said it would have been fe to have remained on them, but I was feeling better anyway....
We have 2 cats at the moment. DHs first pets, but I grew up with cats, so am used to them. Just come home to find puke and a dead magpie in the bathroom. Nice. It's been months since we've had a such presents, had hoped it was over with. Apparently not. It's very hard to tell which cat is the hunter, so have to say thank you to both....
How is your cat with dc? That's one thing I'm not sure about - cats & babies.
I have looked at the pics in tcoyf, but still puzzled about the timings of mine! Will keep going.

Soph, I think charting can't hurt. Unless you find it too obsessive, in which case it might be better not to. I've resolved to try to avoid getting obsessive, but if it's upsetting me I'll stop. I'm prone to depression, so I want to get the balance between taking control & obsession. Let us know if you do decide to go this route.

Soph - we're on our 19th cycle now and I'm starting to chart as well. Buy the book (taking control of your fertility). It's a real eye opener and I just wanted to feel like we've tried everything before starting to look at interventions. I'll keep you posted about how I get on if you like

Cats, I'm not sure how my cat is with the baby. Haha. We adopted her when DD was 8 weeks old so she came into the houshold when the baby was already there. She was fine to begin with (besides her other issues), was rubbing herself against DD etc but is now more carful since obviously DD is running and trying to catch the cat. We teach her all about respecting the pussycat etc but my cat is very stressed and we now have some toilet issues with her. I don't actually think it's baby related tbh as the cat still seeks DD out and goes to her, doesn't run away from her etc. It's any noise from outside she's terrified of. It's weird. When we adopted her, we were told she was a stray who needed to be an outside cat but when we tried to get her to go outside, she was just terrified. I think, her old owers dumped her at the rescue because of all her issues and because they didn't want to admit it just claimed she was a stray. I get the feeling, she's always been an indoor cat hence her fear of outside noises. So yes, we're now stuck with this cat who clearly isn't what we thought she was going to be but hey, we're her family now so will manage somehow.

Sorry for going off a tangent here but this cat is ding my head in. Anyway, I think cats and babies are fine. From what I hear they mostly avoid the baby for a couple of years and then become best friends. You'll probably get plenty of misguided people commenting though that you should get rid of your cats once your pregnant.

Hello Sonics,
I think charting is great when you've been ttc for a while. It might turn out you've been doing it at the wrong time all this time or something.

My period just finished yesterday so will be trying the whole charting thing again from today. Mist taking my temp in the morning but had no decent sleep anyway.