How Do You Know When You Are Ovulating

Create a Calendar and Keep Track of Your Menstrual Cycle

Ovulation usually occurs halfway through the menstrual cycle. For a woman with a regular28-day cycle, ovulation will likely occur on day 14.

However, every woman has a different cycle length, which can vary from month to month. Ovulation will thereby occur at different times for different women, depending on how long their menstrual cycle is. It can last from 21 to 35 days and in order to calculate the ovulation day, it is good to keep track of the exact dates of your periods for several months. This will help you figure out the precise length of your menstrual cycles.

Ovulation typically occurs 12 to 16 days before the beginning of your next period. If you keep a written record of your menstrual cycle dates, you should be able to calculate your probable ovulation time and your fertile days, which will start 4 to 5 days before your ovulation day and end about 1 to 2 days after it.

However, if your period is irregular or its length is affected by different factors, such as travel, stress, sickness, climate and seasonal changes, alcohol, drugs or other, the calendar method is not effective and your fertile phase can not be accurately predicted.

In order to know when you are ovulating, you should pay keen attention to particular changes that occur in your body during your menstrual cycle and closely observe different ovulation and fertility signs.

Chart Your Basal Body Temperature

Basal body temperature (BBT) is one of the most popular methods to keep track of your fertility days and understand when you are ovulating. It should be taken with a special basal body thermometer (more sensitive than normal thermometers) on a daily basis, each morning before you get out of bed.

As your hormone levels fluctuate, your BBT changes throughout your cycle. During the first half of the cycle the dominant hormone is estrogen and the BBT is lower. The rise in temperature occurs immediately after ovulation and is caused by the surge of progesterone.

In fact, ovulation happens when a single, mature egg (ovum) is released from the ovarian follicle. Once the egg is expelled, the follicle becomes known as corpus luteum, which starts to produce progesterone, a hormone that helps maintain pregnancy.

Charting your BBT daily, for a few months, will help you see your temperature shifts and enable you to predict when your ovulation will occur.

Keep in mind that your BBT will increase and become measurable only the day after you have ovulated. In fact, following ovulation, your temperature will increase by a few tenths of a degree (0.4 to 1.0 degrees) and stay elevated for 10 to 15 days, if pregnancy does not occur. Your most fertile time will therefore be the period of 2 to 3 days before the temperature arrives to its highest point.

Observe Your Cervical Position and Your Cervical Mucus

One visible sign of the approaching ovulation is the position of your cervix, which undergoes changes just like some other parts of your body.

During the first half of your cycle your cervix, the narrow neck-like passage that attaches the uterus to the vagina, is low, firm and closed. As ovulation and fertile days approach, it becomes higher and begins to soften and be more open to let the sperm come through. It stretches completely during delivery to allow the baby to come out.

You can check the position of your cervix by simply inserting one or two fingers inside your vagina and feeling whether it’s harder or softer, or lower or higher. When you are ovulating it is softer, more open and easier to reach.

During ovulation, your cervical mucus alters as well – it increases in quantity and changes consistency.

When ovulation is absent, your cervical fluid appears thick, sticky and creamy, or you may not have it at all. As ovulation approaches, it becomes more abundant, thinner, slippery and clearer, resembling raw egg white. If you take it between your fingers, it should spread an inch or more – the more it stretches, the closer you are to ovulation. This kind of mucus helps the sperm enter the uterus and carries it all the way to the ovum.

Pay Attention to Your Body Around the Middle of Your Menstrual Cycle

About 20 percent of women can feel the ovulation in the form of a mild or sharp pain or cramps in the lower left or right abdominal area. This mid-cycle pain is called mittelschmerz, meaning “middle pain” in German. Not all women experience it, but those who do should consider this symptom as one of the physicals signs of ovulation.