Sperm meets Egg.

Sperm fertilizes Egg.

Egg attaches to the uterine wall.

The heartbeat begins days later.

Getting pregnant, it seems so easy. Everyone around you seems to be pregnant, right? So why aren’t you?

If you have decided that now is the time to start or grow your family, you don’t want to waste a cycle ‘seeing what happens.’ Learn about a few different methods and give each one 2 cycles or so before trying something else! It’s hard enough having baby fever, but thinking that you are pregnant and seeing that negative test can make your heart want to explode!

When to Have Sex to Get Pregnant

Before jumping in bed, you need to learn your body. Ovulation is not black and white, occurring on the exact same day each cycle. Once you’ve learned how to track your ovulation, you will have a much higher chance of getting pregnant. You will also learn that many things can throw ovulation off or cause it to happen earlier. So tracking it each cycle will really help! (Did you know that your body can gear up to ovulate but be impacted by something -illness, stress, etc- then not ovulate for another week or so?)

A few more things to note:

• If using a lubricant, choose a fertility lubricant. This helps those swimmers stay inside of you, giving them a much better chance of reaching your egg. Most lubricants will kill sperm, so ordering one specifically for trying to conceive is key.
• You can lay on your back with a pillow under your hips after sex to let gravity help the sperm reach their goal. Do not immediately get up and use the restroom.
• Even if you time everything perfectly you only have a 25% chance of your egg successfully begin fertilized and properly implanting.
• Stress will not help. Have fun trying to get pregnant!

Every Other Day Sex

Once your period ends, or around day 8 of your cycle, start having sex every other day. You will continue this until the day your period is due to begin. This method ensures that you will not miss your fertile window no matter what. Some believe that if you are also tracking your ovulation, you can add in an extra day - three days in a row - as soon as you see a positive ovulation test. Remember that a positive ovulation test means you will ovulate within 12-24 hours.

Others believe in not having sex the three days in a row, just in case it depletes the sperm on the third day. Either way though, you are definitely going to have sperm waiting for that egg and continually arriving every 48 hours.

No Sex Until Fertile

Many couples swear by abstaining and ‘saving’ those swimmers until the fertile window begins. There are many ways this can go wrong, though, so do not attempt this unless you are truly tracking your ovulation.

Sperm can live up to 4 days, but many will die off earlier. Boy swimmers are faster and die quicker, while girls are slower and live longer. You want to have some sperm waiting as your egg releases. You also want fresh sperm arriving while the egg is waiting. This means that you would have sex every day beginning 4 days before ovulation and 1-2 days after (just in case you were wrong about your dates). Then you wait.

No matter which method you choose, the two weeks after you ovulate will always we torture!

Good luck, and have fun!