What are the best days to Get Pregnant?
Although conceiving is possible at any time of the month during your menstrual cycle, there are several days when your chances of getting pregnant increase exponentially. If you are looking forward to getting pregnant, it might be helpful to plan your menstrual cycles and the frequency of sex.
What is a Fertile Window?
Your fertile window is the one most fertile week of every month when your chances of producing a baby are extremely high. This week-long period is known as your fertile window. And it begins 2-3 days before ovulation. Having sex in this fertile window can lead to pregnancies.
What is Ovulation?
Ovulation is the biological process during which the ovary releases a mature egg in the fallopian tube. This egg stays in the tube for around 12 – 24 hours to meet the sperm. The sperm, after entering the female body, meets this ripe egg, and the fertilization takes place. Contrary to the egg, the sperm stays around in the female body for up to five days, which means having sex 2-3 days before the ovulation process can substantially increase the chances of conceiving a baby.
The ovulation period differs from woman to woman, depending upon their menstrual cycles. However, it starts around day 12 or 14 in a woman with a usual menstrual cycle of 28 days. You cannot be completely certain of your ovulation as it can start as early as day 10 or even as late as day 20 of your menstrual cycle, depending upon its regularity.
How to know that you’re ovulating? Well, it is complicated, and hence, you need to look for a few signs.
Best days to get pregnant – Ovulation signs to look for
As aforementioned, having sex two to three days before ovulation is recommended to increase the chances of conceiving. Here are the signs that can help you know that you are ovulating:
Egg-White Consistency of Cervical Mucus
The sporadic discharges down there can tell a lot about when you should have sex to get pregnant. When you are ovulating, the cervical mucus can feel like an egg-white. It is sticky and slippery. It even stretches for a few inches. When you are having discharges of cervical mucus of a similar consistency, it might be a sign that you’re ovulating, and you might prefer having sex instead of doing anything else. It might sound weird but monitoring your cervical mucus and keeping a regular check of your underwear can help you with the process.
Feel your cervix to check if you’re ovulating
You can use a clean finger to feel your cervix to check if you are ovulating. Your cervix changes over the month. If you are ovulating, you will feel that your cervix is more soft and open, while if you are not, it is more firm and closed.
If you often feel uncertain about your menstrual cycle and your ovulation time, then you can try inserting a clean finger inside your vagina and track the feeling.
Basal Body Temperature
Your basal body temperature is your body temperature at rest i.e. at the time when you wake up in the morning. When your progesterone hormone rises in your body, your basal temperature tends to rise too. Your progesterone level rises after you have ovulated.
Track your basal body temperature using a basal body thermometer. When you see a rise in the temperature and notice the same rise until your next period, it means that you ovulated when it first rose.
Use Ovulation Predictors if Confused.
If you wish to be more sure about your ovulation, you can use ovulation predictor kits. They are somewhat similar to the pregnancy tests and give you results about your ovulation. To use the kit, you need to pee on the stick, and the strips react with your urine and reflect the result. These sticks test your luteinizing hormone (LH). When you have a high LH, it signifies that you are ovulating.
How often to have sex to conceive?
People often believe having more sex can improve their chances of getting pregnant. However, having sex more than once a day can contrarily lower the quality of the sperm. It is recommended to have sex every day during the fertile window to improve your chances of getting pregnant. Furthermore, if the male has a low sperm count, in such circumstances also, it is preferred to have sex every other day during the fertile window.
If you are trying to get pregnant, but none of the methods are helping you, then you must consider taking professional help. Visit a reputed gynecologist and find a long-term solution for your problem.
