Can anything highly influence whether you conceive

[MrsBigBadBeck]

Hi,

I'm very new to mumsnet so don't understand abbreviations that are used on these threads, apologies!

Anyway, today is my first pill free day and me and hubby are now ready to try for baby number one. I started Folic acid two weeks ago, am knocking alcohol out not that I drink a lot, trying to eat fruit and veg daily and going to try and avoid fattening snacks and too much sweet stuff. Is there anything either of us can do to improve chances of conceiving? Also, I'm 23 and hubby is 31, not sure if that makes a difference. Obviously plenty of sex, but do the pregnancy vitamins help like Pregnacare?

Thanks! :)

The main thing you can do is have regular sex aim for 2-3 times a week throughout your cycle.

Providing you have a healthy lifestyle you will be doing the best you can. There is an element of luck in TTC - sometimes, even if you do everything absolutely right it won't happen. It doesn't mean you have done something wrong, there is just an aspect that is out of our control.

Good luck

Vitamins do not get you pregnant. Jizz does.
pregnancy/conception vitamins are good for you and are good for the baby if you do get pregnant. But vitamins will not fertilize your egg.
As frankelly says, the best thing to do is to have plenty of sex. You are very young still and you are at the peak of your fertility. Nevertheless, it is perfectly average even for a healthy young whippersnapper like you to take 6 months to conceive even if you have sex 3 times a week. It's just down to luck. On average you have a one in four chance each month if you have sex enough at the right time. So if you get pregnant in less than four months then you are luckier than the average woman.
Obviously giving up smoking is very important if you are ttc. No need to give up boozing entirely in my opinion but keep within sensible limits.

observe vaginal mucus - read up on the billings method, I wouldn't recommend it as contraception but found it useful when trying to conceive. Also have sex before you think ovulation occurs usually about three days. Not sure if I would attribute this to our success but both children conceived as soon as we started trying, but also if you've been on the pill awhile it might take a bit longer for your body to get rid of all those artificial hormones.

I disagree that it takes time for the Pill to leave your system. If that was the case then no women would fall pregnant whilst on the Pill. If your cycles take time to return after coming off the Pill it is far more likely that you have a problem with your cycles that the Pill was actually masking, which turned out to be my issue.

I must admit I have the same thought on the whole thing of how long it takes to get the pill out of your system. If you have to take it at the same time everyday and you have a minimal amount more than the 99.9% chance of falling pregnant then surely once your first pill free day occurs it could be WHAM you have a bun in the oven.

Did u watch fertility wk on this morning? They said your most fertile whilst just coming off contraception!

"Vitamins do not get you pregnant. Jizz does."

Best line ever!

Guess its the truth oh really?! Did they say why?

Hi Mrs welcome and good luck on your journey :)
I think the others have pretty much said it all but what I will add is - as well as monitoring your CM (cervical mucus) you could use OPK's (ovulation predictor kits) so that you get the timing in the right place. They won't tell you ov (ovulation) definitely happened but gives you a sign that it's about to, which is good enough at the start of ttc (trying to conceive) when you don't have any problems that would make you think you weren't ov'g.

More abbreviations -
AF - Aunt Flow = period
BFP- big fat positive = positive pregnancy test
BFN - big fat negative = negative result
DTD - doing the deed = shagging
2WW - two week wait = the seemingly never ending wait from ovulation to when you can test for pregnancy or your period arrives :).
POAS - piss on a stick = do a pregnancy test.

You'll see many use CD1 etc - Cycle day 1 = first day of period
Also DPO 1 - Days past ovulation = first day after ovulating.

Hope this helps :) You'll remember them as you go along.

Ah thanks dondon HUGE help:)

See I've just stopped the pill, and am only on my third pill free day but AF hasn't made an appearance yet but CM seems more than normal, or maybe it's just changed as I've come off the pill?

There's no harm in starting to try :) after all many women fall ON the pill as someone mentioned above.
The CM you're seeing is a direct result of the hormones leaving your body, one of the pills jobs is to thicken CM up in the cervix - to stop the swimmers getting through - kind of a first line of defence, if you like - so the fact you have more than normal today indicates it's thinning = good sign :)
When you get AF (CD1) you should maybe start testing with opk's around cd8 and continue until it either shows you are going to ov or it doesn't, even if it didn't show and you don't ov on the first cycle doesn't mean you won't the next.
OPK's can be pricey but I know some of the girls here buy them online, I'm sure if you posted a new thread asking where, they'd tell you. I'm not in the Uk so don't have a clue where.