livinTX

I have had a good experience on FAM. I'm on my 9th cycle using it.

For it to work best, you need to temp. at the same time daily...set an alarm clock if need be. It means waking up to temp. at 6 AM on the weekends, but that's OK, I just go back to sleep afterwards.

Some women who breathe through their mouths at night have more erratic temps. If that is the case for you, you might try temping vaginally. I use vaginal temping and the temperatures are more stable than my oral temperatures.

Also, if this is your first cycle off the pill, the temps. are likely to be more erratic and higher at times--mine definitely were. If you haven't ovulated yet, you will likely have more erratic temps. with more fluctuations too. My ovulation was delayed by about a week this cycle due to minor illness, and during the first 2 weeks of my cycle, my temps. got really jumpy, more up & down fluctuation than usual. Some women have anovulatory cycles or long cycles right off the pill and those tend to have more fluctuation in temperatures than ovulatory cycles.

Also, the first month off BCPs, your cervical mucus might not align exactly with your temperatures. You may have several patches of fertile CM as your body tries to ovulate but just doesn't quite make it. The body can gear up to ovulate and then back down. I'm assuming you haven't had a period yet off the pill?

Every woman is different, but most women find that when they start getting consistent temperatures near or above 98 degrees, those are post-ovulation temperatures. For me, it's a dead giveaway pretty much--3 days of temps. above 98 degrees and cervical mucus drying up indicates ovulation.

It took me a couple cycles to really feel comfortable with charting, but now it's like 2nd nature to me. Good luck!

Also, I see you are in the UK...if temping in Celsius is making your chart difficult to read, you might try buying a basal thermometer that reads in Fahrenheit. It might be difficult to find one there but maybe online somewhere. Fahrenheit degrees fluctuate more than Celsius so you can see bigger jumps on your chart when you graph and I think for beginners, it could make identifying ovulation easier.