Hi
I have had quite a lot of fertility problems (ectopics and miscarriages) and have been pregnant five times now (I have a child and expecting more shortly :) ). I was totally addicted to POAS every month. For my most recent pregnancy it took over a year of trying.
One thing I always remember is that with all of my positive tests I have never had to hold them up to the light or stand staring at them for ages to see if I can see something. I have always been very clear that there has been a line there (always a very faint one because I would test so early, but a definite line all the same). All the times where I’ve actually been pregnant there hasn’t been any questions about it on my positive tests, which is usually 7/8 DPO when I’ve used FRER (later than that for my ectopic pregnancies). All the other months I used to spend ages looking at tests convincing myself there were lines and then testing the next day to nothing, which was disappointing.
A couple of things I did realise were that if I was temping I would only ever get a positive test after a second temperature rise in my luteul phase. So much so that I actually assumed I wasn’t pregnant this time but then took my temp as usual and it jumped a bit which made me take a test at 7dpo, which was positive. This is quite early for a positive btw but I am expecting twins.
The general advice is not to take lots of pregnancy tests because progression is not predictable. I’ve found the opposite for myself, where my tests do progress consistently when everything is fine and actually it has alerted me to ectopic pregnancies, so for me it’s been really helpful to do that.
I hope you get your baby OP, I never thought I would be able to and here we are- if you can try to get an understanding of what is causing it often there are things that can be done about it.