The first thing I do with my patients is remind them of the reality of pregnancy. Women have been having babies since pre-historic times. Somehow, the species survived without all the current hoopla surrounding pregnancy and childbirth. I often ponder the reason we affix so many rules to this exciting time of our lives and I think I have an answer. We are used to being in control of our lives and bodies. We walk, run, jump and skip when we choose. During pregnancy, there is an alien being within our midst, taking control of many of our bodily functions. To compensate for this lack of power, we look for ways to fight back. Watching what we eat is a great example of control. Avoiding caffeine, cigarettes and NutraSweet are just a few of the controls we impose.
Following is some advice for those contemplating pregnancy.
"I Want to Have My Baby on Valentine's Day"
Getting pregnant can be the easiest or most frustrating event in your life. All these years you've tried to avoid pregnancy and now you are ready. The first thing to remember is that most couples will get pregnant (85% get pregnant within 12 months of unprotected intercourse). For the 15% who don't, there are a variety of tests to help decipher the cause and help them conceive. Second, it is helpful to understand the menstrual cycle and when a woman is most fertile.
Every woman has her own unique cycle. A cycle refers to the number of days between the beginning of two consecutive menstrual periods. We will use a standard twenty-eight day cycle as our example but the rules will apply to cycles of 21-40 (or more) days as well. The release of an egg (known as ovulation) occurs around fourteen days before the beginning of the next menstrual period. Ovulation is the period of maximum fertility. In the case of a twenty-eight day cycle, ovulation would occur 14 days after the first day of a menstrual period, regardless of the number of days of menstrual flow. To give another example, if a woman's cycle was 40 days, she would ovulate roughly 26 days after the first day of her period (because 40-14=26).
