How To Track Your Cycle To Not Get Pregnant

When Should You Use Fertility Apps

If you get a period, you should use a fertility app. Reproductive health tells women a lot about their overall wellness, including their hormone and thyroid levels, mental health, and dietary, sleep, and exercise needs.

That said, a fertility app is not a substitute for regular visits to an OB/GYN or reproductive health physician. If you have tried to conceive for more than one year without achieving pregnancy, have extremely painful PMS symptoms or excessive menstrual bleeding, have irregular periods, or think you may be pregnant, make an appointment with a doctor.

Remember, too, that all the technology in the world cant guarantee the accuracy of a fertility app. If you rely exclusively on an app to avoid or achieve pregnancy, you may not end up with the results youre expecting. Fertility apps should be a tool used to supplement your knowledge about your reproductive health, not the final word on your fertility.

Why Do I See A Period I Already Deleted In The Fitbit App

If you delete a confirmed period and you have predictions turned on, youll still see the predicted period for that cycle. For more information about the icons and colors on your menstrual health tracking calendar, see How do I read the menstrual health tracking calendar in the Fitbit app?

View your cycle trends to see your average period and cycle lengths, average estimated ovulation day, and graphs of your past cycles and details. Note that you wont see your average estimated ovulation day if you turned off fertile window predictions. You must log at least 2 periods to see trends.

To see your menstrual health trends:

To see the trends for each detail you logged during a cycle:

If your cycle is longer than 60 days, swipe left and right or tap the arrows to scroll through your cycle calendar.

When Is Your Fertility Window And How Long Does It Last

Sperm can live for up to five days in your body after sex. Certain cervical mucus changes during this time create an environment more friendly to sperm. So although an egg only lives for up to 24 hours, your fertility window includes both the lifetime of the sperm and the egg about six days. occurs the day before and the day of ovulation.

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How To Use Your Fertile Window As Birth Control

Ovulation will occur one day during your fertile window. The egg released is viable for 12 to 24 hours. That doesnt mean you can get pregnant every day during this window. But if youre trying to prevent pregnancy, its a good idea to abstain from sex without a condom or another barrier method during the entire fertile window.

Tracking Menstruation: How It Helps Your Reproductive Health

Knowing your cycle length is beneficial for a number of reasons. For women trying to conceive, understanding the timing of your cycle is valuable for determining the time you are most likely to get pregnant.

Women are considered fertile when an egg has been released from the ovaries and is able to be joined by a mans sperm. Because of how long both the egg and the sperm survive inside a womans fallopian tubes, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecology says you can become pregnant if you have sex anywhere from five days before ovulation until one day after.

Generally, ovulation is said to occur about 14 days before the start of your next menstrual period. But every woman and every cycle are different. Knowing when you might really be ovulating and having intercourse around that time can enhance your odds of getting pregnant.

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What Should You Expect And Track During Each Phase Of Your Period

So, youre on board with the idea of tracking your period. But how do you actually do it?

The average menstrual cycle is 21 to 35 days long, Lewis says. During this time, your brain , ovaries and uterus are a part of a hormone feedback loop that controls your menstrual cycle and prepares you to either conceive or menstruate.

You can track your cycle using an app or go the old-fashioned route with a pen and calendar. At bare minimum, youll want to note the day you start your period, but you can also include things like symptoms, cravings and sex drive to give you a fuller picture.

Ready to get started? Heres what to know and track during each phase of your cycle.

Track Your Period With Cycle Tracking

With iOS 13 and watchOS 6 or later, it’s easy to track your menstrual cycle, so you can get a better picture of your health.

You can track your menstrual cycle in the Health app on your iPhone or the Cycle Tracking app on your Apple Watch. And you can turn on notifications to tell you when your next period or fertile window is approaching.

The Cycle Tracking app is part of watchOS 6. watchOS 6 is compatible with Apple Watch Series 1 and later. Upgrading to watchOS 6 requires an iPhone 6s or later running iOS 13 or later.

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Traditional Calendar Rhythm Method

The traditional calendar method of birth control relies on you to track data from your previous menstrual cycles to predict your fertile days.

The traditional calendar rhythm method includes the following steps:

• Track your menstrual cycle on a calendar for at least six months before using the rhythm method.
• Each month, mark the first day of your period, then count the number of days until the first day of your next period. The days between your periods may vary. For instance, one month it might be 28 days and the next month it might be 27 days.
• Find your first fertile day by finding the shortest number of days between periods and subtract 18. For example, if your shortest day was 28 days, subtract 18 to get 10.
• Use that number to count the days from the first day of your period. That is likely your first fertile day.
• Find the last fertile day by finding the longest cycle you tracked and subtract 11. Say your longest cycle was 30 days, so subtract 11 to get 19.
• Use that number to count the days from the first day of your period. This is likely your last fertile day.

The calendar method gives you a rough idea of when you may be fertile, but it is not precise or 100% effective.

Frequently Asked Questionsexpand All

If you noticed cervical mucus today or yesterday, you most likely are fertile. To prevent pregnancy, you should avoid sexual intercourse or use a barrier method of birth control. To promote pregnancy, you should have sexual intercourse every day or every other day when you notice secretions. If you did not notice any cervical mucus today and yesterday , pregnancy is less likely.

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The Rhythm Method: Can Period Tracking Help Keep You From Getting Pregnant

When it comes to birth control, weve come a long way since the Pill was introduced in 1960. Women have more options than ever to prevent pregnancy. Yet, some women still rely on the rhythm method. That is, they turn to their calendars not their medicine cabinets for birth control.

Natural family planning has been around forever, says OB-GYN Carrie Sopata, MD. Its a good option for women who are sensitive to hormones or for those with religious objections to birth control.

The question is: Does this old-school approach to birth control really work?

How To Know When Youre Ovulating

Knowing when you ovulate can help you plan for sex at the right time and improve your chance of getting pregnant. You can keep track of your menstrual cycles on a chart, in a diary, or on a free period-tracker app on your smartphone.

To work out the length of your menstrual cycle, record the first day you start bleeding . This is day 1. The last day of your cycle is the day before your next period begins.

• Some people think the menstrual cycle and a period are the same thing.

  A period is when you bleed .

  A menstrual cycle starts on the day when a period starts and ends the day before the next period. A cycles length is considered normal if its between 21 and 35 days. They can vary between women and from one cycle to the next.

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What Are The Limitations Of A Period Tracker App

While a period tracker app is a great tool to help you understand your body better, Spiegel notes that there are a number of factors that could interfere with your ability to get pregnant, including potential factors from a male partner. If youve been using a period tracker app for a few months without success, she recommends adding in ovulation predictor kits to get more precise.

Ovulation prediction kits can be helpful in giving more specific information about timing of ovulation, as they pick up production of luteinizing hormone, a hormone that prompts ovulation to occur, explains Dr. Emily Jungheim, chief of reproductive endocrinology and infertility at Northwestern Medicine. And per Spiegel, if that still doesnt work, talk to your OBGYN about next steps or things that might be worth investigating.

About Heart Rate Data And Predictions

In addition to the information youve logged for previous periods and cycle length, Health can use heart rate data from your Apple Watch to improve your Cycle Tracking predictions.2 Using heart rate data from Apple Watch to improve predictions is on by default, but you can turn it off at any time.

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How Long Is A Safe Period

Based on their experiences, many women believe that it is safe to have sex and avoid getting pregnant just after their period starts or before it begins. Beware, fluctuating hormones and changing schedules can make these calculations inaccurate. As a general rule, if your cycle is a regular one , then the seven days before your period should be the safe period. But do not forget that this calculation works only if your periods are regular. Heres what a missed period may mean.

Tracking Ovulation Can Help Uncover The Cause Of Unexplained Symptoms

Symptoms such as acne breakouts, mood swings, sleeplessness, weight fluctuation and extreme fatigue — especially if they seem sudden and random — can all stem from your cycle.

“More than just our ovaries and uterus react to these hormonal changes ,” Telfer said. “Some people notice changes in their hair, skin, poop, breasts, chronic disease symptoms, mental health, migraine headaches or the way they experience sex at different points in the menstrual cycle.”

For example, Telfer said that some people notice that their hair and skin are less greasy around the time of ovulation, and become oilier closer to their period. Other people may experience premenstrual mood changes that can negatively impact them during the second half of their cycle.

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What Are The Disadvantages Of Fertility Awareness

If you use fertility awareness to avoid getting pregnant, one disadvantage is that women who use fertility awareness are more likely to get pregnant than women who use other forms of contraception. It depends how strictly you follow the method. About 1 in every 4 women who use these methods will get pregnant.

It can take quite a lot of time and patience to get fertility awareness right and you need to follow instructions carefully. Even so, some women will always find it difficult to predict when they are ovulating.

Using fertility awareness methods does not protect you from sexually transmitted infections . You will need to use other forms of contraception, such as condoms, to protect against STIs.

Remember also that fertility awareness can be affected if you are ill, stressed, taking some medicines or having sex.

How To Track Your Cycle

To track your cycle from your Apple Watch, open the Cycle Tracking app, swipe to the correct date, then tap the oval to log your period.

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How Else Can I Prepare For Pregnancy

In addition to tracking your ovulation to determine your fertile window, its important to schedule preconception counseling with your doctor. There are a variety of screenings and lifestyle modifications that can help increase your chances of a successful planned pregnancy.

If youre under 35 and have been trying to conceive for more than a year, or if youre over 35 and have been trying for six months, it may be time to talk to your doctor about why you cant get pregnant.

Try Fertility Test Strips

Fertility test strips didnt accurately predict ovulation for me, but they worked well for many of my friends trying to get pregnant. Fertility strips work by detecting luteinizing hormone in your urine, or LH, which surges just before your egg heads down your fallopian tube. My OBGYN recommended intercourse in the days before the LH surge because you want your partners sperm to be waiting in your fallopian tube at the optimal time to meet the mature egg.

A mans sperm can live for up to a week in a womans reproductive system, and it takes time for them to travel to meet and potentially fertilize the egg. Test strips may not have worked for me, personally, because by the time I had the thumbs up from my test, wed likely missed that fertile window before ovulation. Again, its important to test first thing in the morning, as activity and what you eat can affect the measurement.

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Safe Period Calculator Or Menstrual Cycle Calculator

Cycle calculators are accurate in most cases. However, many people find these calculators and apps very complex. Also, most of the information that they ask to calculate the infertile period, for example, months of data about body temperature, cervical mucus and dates of menstruation may not be readily available with every woman. Put simply, to use these calculators, you would need data about your periods as well as body temperature handy. Therefore, many people prefer using simpler period calculators like the ones below, which do not ask for months of data but still give accurate results.

Why Cant I Log Or Edit A Period Or Menstrual Health Details In The Fitbit App

If a period doesnt meet the following requirements, you may receive an error and be unable to log the period:

• You can only add or edit current or past periods and details.
• A period must be at least 1 day.
• You can log a period of up to 60 days . If your period is longer, consider logging flow intensity details.
• A cycle must be at least 11 days, and there must be a gap of at least 1 day between logged periods. If you experience a gap in bleeding during your period, its still 1 period.

Note that If you attempt to log a period in the future or a period with less than a one-day gap between periods, the pencil icon is unavailable. If you dont see the pencil icon, make sure the period youre attempting to log or edit meets all of the requirements.

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