When to count first day of period

[Elixabeth]

Hi, I wonder if anyone can advise on this.

I'm tracking my cycle, and unsure whether I should count my first and last days of my period from spotting or full flow. I tend to get 2-3 days of spotting, 2-3 days of full flow and then spotting again until day 7, so it's making ovulation difficult to estimate.

Thanks 😊

I believe it's first day of full flow :). That's what my midwife friend told me anyway.

So I always used to count the first day of any blood as day 1 but I’ve since realised that’s incorrect! I spot for anything up to 7 days before full AF.

This was so confusing as it meant my Flo app was saying I was ovulating during the heaviest part of my period and I was like WHAT. But since using an OPK this month I can see when I’m ovulating (along with ovary pain, EWCM) and it makes SO much more sense now with my ‘new’ day 1.

So now I’m marking anything other than full flow as spotting, and then when the full thing kicks in I mark that as day 1.

That you, that makes a lot of sense, I was a bit confused because including spotting it still adds up to around 7 days. It's our first month tracking and TTC so it's still all very new, definitely going to look at using an OPK to make it more clear 😊

I’ve always used first day of full flow/using a tampon. And if I start in the evening, I count the next day as day 1