Hello,
I just thought I'd give you a little insight on my story. I am NOT TTC, but am trying to prevent pregnancy naturally by using the natural family planning method, charting BBT's and monitoring my cervical fluid. I have also been on birth control for about 6 years. I had some problems with it as it had significantly decreased my libido, so I discussed this with my doctor and I have tried several other brands of B/C and none of them worked for me so we decided to just go ahead and start to do it naturally, by charting and also we use the withdrawal method during intercourse. I had regular 28-30 day cyles before I started on B/C years ago, and this is my first month off the pill. My last period was 7/29/05 and I thought I was expected to ovulate on cycle day 14 as well due the fact that they say if you had regular cycles before your were on the pill they generally go back to that when you come off of it, so I figuered I would ovulate around that time. Well, not so. I bought cheap OPK's from the dolllar store becuase I wanted to know FOR SURE what was going on with my body the first month I am off the pill and they say not to completely rely on the NFP method until at least 1-2 cycles off the pill since they can be irregular still. So, I bought 7 tests, and I started to test on CD 11, since that was the instructions on the back of the test kit and I didn't want to miss my LH surge cause I don't want to get pregnant and I thought at least I would know for sure by testing and plus, they weren't expensive, just $1 each. So, I tested each day around the same time between 12 noon and 2pm each time and by cycle day 18 thought FOR SURE I wasn't going to ovulate this month as I still had not got a positive result but went ahead and kept testing for 3 more days just to make sure before having unprotected intercourse, and to my surprise on CD 20, got a positive result. Also, wednesday 8/17 was when I got a positive result, and 2 days later my temp spiked as expected which means I did ovulate. (when you chart, you will understand all of this more) Now with a 28 day cycle, you would NOT expect to ovulate this late in a cycle, but since I just came off the pill, I figured that's why I did, and that's why I kept on testing just to make sure because it is not uncommon to ovulate late after stopping the pill and actually it is also not uncommon to NOT ovulate at all after coming off the pill. I am expecting my period to come around 8/31-9/1 so we will see if it comes on time. Some women, don't have a period after stopping the pill, or some are late getting it, or some can get it on time or even early. Some, also have very irregular cycles for a few months. They say whatever your cycles were like BEFORE you went on the pill is generally what they will return to when STOPPING the pill. This is all due to not having those FAKE hormones in your body anymore. So, my advice to you would be to start charting if you haven't already. It really helps out and it is so nice to know what is going on with your own body instead of always guessing. Hope all of this helps and if you have any other questions I can answer please feel free to reply
Jackie