Understanding your fertility cycle and knowing when you’re ovulating will be the more powerful thing you can learn in the journey of becoming pregnant.
Not two cycles are alike! To understand YOUR fertility, it’s important to learn your own cycle and listen to your body. The average woman’s cycle is 28-32 days. However, yours could be longer or shorter.
Tracking your own cycles will help you learn what your average is and help you plan your fertility calendar. Learn more about your fertility cycle and how to create your very own fertility calendar!
Two Part Cycle
Your ovulation is divided into two parts. The first part is called follicular phrase and this begins on the first day of your last period. This first cycle can diff for women and can last anywhere from 7 to 40 days!
The second half is the luteal phase and begins on the first day of ovulation. This second half occurs for 12-16 days. Outside factors like stress and health can throw off your ovulation balance. The myth that stress can affect your period is half true. Stress affects your ovulation and thus will affect the start of your period.
The Fertility Window
The fertility windows occurs once a month during the 5 days leading up to ovulation and on the day of ovulation. If you have intercourse on any of these days, you have a 27%-33% chance of getting pregnant, so don’t worry if it doesn’t happen the first couple of tries!
Fertility Awareness
There are a few different ways to become aware of your fertility cycle using fertility awareness.
- Calendar Method
- Temperature Method
- Cervical Mucus Method
- Standard Days Method
Each of these methods are easy to learn and use! They are all free or have a low cost to start using. While all these methods are easy to use, if you’re finding that you are having trouble tracking or are not able to get pregnant after 6 months of trying, we recommend scheduling a consult with the Kaldas Center.
Below we walk through creating your own calendar to use the Calendar Method!
Creating Your Fertility Calendar
In order to start using the Calendar Method, you need to create a calendar and plot out a few things!
- Print off two copies of our calendar
- Plot out your last period
- Plot out your next expected period
- Your cycle length is from the first day of your last cycle to the last day before your next period (you may have to go back two months to find your cycle length)
- If your average cycle is 28 days, then you will ovulate on approximately day 14
- Then plot out your fertility window the six days leading up to your ovulation and your approximate ovulation day
