Tracking your cycle and possible BFP using RHR - part 6

[Juno231]

Hi ladies,

This is for all of us with heart rate monitors who wish to help each other analyse the RHR patterns throughout our cycles.

Early research shows there's a correlation with increasing RHR and BFPs - so let's try and spot some together!

@NJOBX
@GlassLily
@lucyrp
@mumof23188
@Kona84
@LS2020
@justwant2beamum
@gezelligheid
@Marvellouslymadmum

Ovulation is marked by the red arrow, and AF is due today. Is the rise looking promising, or am I pretty much out cos it dropped after O and took a while to rise?

Not got any tests so will have to go get some and do one tomorrow if AF isn't here. What do you think?

@LS2020 congratulations on your scan! Wonderful news!

@Kona84 congratulations, she is gorgeous!

@gezelligheid yes that looks exciting, has it ever been this high before? Fx for you! I don't think the drop after o is relevant, given it shot up around potential implantation time and stayed up.

GUYS I got a BFP on the poundland strips this afternoon. Gonna go get a FRER and use it tomorrow. Oh my god. Can't stop smiling!

Here's the picture!

@gezelligheid congratulations! Hope FRER goes well in morning 😊

Does the line look okay for being taken in the afternoon on the day AF is due?

@gezelligheid amazing!!! Congratulations 😍 looks like a great line to me. Good luck with your FRER. So exciting

An update, today's test for line progression. Used the last of my poundland strips so just gonna use my frer so I can see that nice pink line and hopefully stop testing then aha.

Heart rate has increased again today

Amazing news! Congratulations @gezelligheid!!🎉

@gezelligheid awesome! What a great line!! So happy for you

Had some period-like cramps today. Is it normal? At what point should I be concerned?

@gezelligheid super normal! Spotting too. Congratulations!!

RHR has stayed the same as yesterday today. Is that normal? I thought it would just keep rising tbh

@LS2020 how are you lovely? It will go so quickly! Time literally flys! Glad you had a lovely holiday.

@gezelligheid amazing!! Huge congratulations to you ☺️. Period cramps are really normal! Also I got my BFP in early January and my HR didn’t really rise much at all until March.

@gezelligheid I had period cramps about 13-15DPO. I drank lots and lots of water and got plenty of rest to try and ease them. I was terrified and in bits as that sort of cramp was the beginning of the end for 2 of my previous pregnancies. But after a couple of days the cramps got better instead of worse, and went away, and all was fine

Lots of pregnant women get cramps at that stage so I think it is just a normal pregnancy symptom and not a predictor of anything sinister. Rest up and look after yourself!

@Juno231 how are you doing?

@gezelligheid and as for when you should be concerned - if you're just getting cramps and or spotting, don't worry. Keep hydrated and take care of yourself.

If you start getting contractions/flow of red blood then that's a concern for the pregnancy outcome. Most importantly, watch out for ectopic symptoms like severe/sharp pain in your abdomen or shoulder - very unlikely, but can be life threatening, so important to see a doctor immediately if that happens.

@GlassLily my last pregnancy was ectopic unfortunately in September 2020 so I'm just being hyper vigilant I think!

@gezelligheid It’s hard but I wouldn’t overly worry on the RHR. I took mine off because it was flat and dropping as I was waiting on my test result and it stressed me out but everything was absolutely fine. Even now at 13 weeks, I was expecting my RHR to be loads higher and it’s just not. I’m like at my high end of where Pre AF would be and still have the normal drops when I’ve had a big sleep at weekend and not a stressful time at work etc.
also again had loads of cramps as everything insides moved - totally normal. Blood is the main thing to look out for!

@mumof23188 im good thanks, I swear I have the longest/slowest pregnancy ever but my stomachs proper popped out now and still a bit unwell but so much better and a lot less tired. Feels ages til 20 weeks scan! How are you all getting on?

So it's normal not to rise every day? It's plateaued again so I've been at 69 for 3 days now. Thinking I might just take it off cos the worry isn't gonna help

@gezelligheid yeah the second I decided it was stressing me out I’ve been taking it straight off and putting it away for points and I relaxed so much. You got to think there’s only so much the hormones are going to impact, you’re going to hit your top RHR eventually. Also you still get influenced by fact it’s weekend so you’ve slept longer, more likely to have gone into a deeper sleep etc. I found watching line progression and then doing the weekly digitals helped me the most as I could see something tangible moving on

I don’t think my graph helps as not a lot of pregnancy data but hopefully assures doesn’t need to be massively high. The pink peak is two days before BFP, it dropped two days before I got mine and it upset me so I took it off as was feeling super positive.
The yellow was after my 6 week scan and things were ok so I put back on, unfortunately that’s the time placenta starts to kick in so you get a drop but it freaked me out so I took off but can see not loads higher.
Then green is my last week since my 12 week scan, just sat between 61-63 really, not doing a lot! But as I said, it’s only on the high end of my normal cycle, not specially high x

Thank you for the reassurance @LS2020 I'm just so worried because I want this baby so much, yknow?

I did more tests (frer this time) to see line progression. Top is today, bottom yesterday. Looking okay?

@gezelligheid it’s so tough and it doesn’t get any easier if I’m honest, this weeks actually felt worse because we’ve now announced and you can’t take that back. Which is ridiculous because I’ve never been this far pregnant so why should anything still be wrong!

Looks fab! Remember HCG only doubles every 48 hours so don’t worry if day to day doesn’t look to have overly moved as they get darker. I stopped FRER once I went darker than control and then just used digitals once a week 😊

@gezelligheid so sorry about your ectopic! Your lines are looking great. Have the cramps continued? I think some people get them for quite a while. It's so hard not to worry isn't it. If you find mantras helpful, I found this one at the start of this pregnancy: "different egg, different sperm, different pregnancy - different outcome"

Ultimately there is more chance of you coming out of this with a live baby than any other outcome so while plenty could go wrong, there's a better chance that it will be ok.