Track your ovulation with this free tool. Just enter your information and it will determine your most fertile days, your next menstrual period, and if you are to conceive in this time frame your baby's due date.
This ovulation calendar will show a five day window in which it is the optimal time to try to conceive according to the information you have entered.
The ovulation cycle breaks down into two key periods, each with its own ovulation symptoms: the follicular (or proliferative) phase and the luteal (or secretory) phase. Each phase lasts approximately fourteen days, for a total of twenty eight days per ovulation cycle, with the cycle beginning on the first day of your period.
The follicular phase of the ovulation cycle starts on the first day of your period when your pituitary gland signals your ovaries to begin ripening a number of ova (or eggs), often twenty or more, through the release of follicle stimulating hormone or FSH. These ova are moved into the follicles of the ovaries from which they will later be released. In parallel, your body begins increasing your estrogen level which prepares your uterus to accept a fertilized egg. About fourteen days after the first day of your period, the rising estrogen level has the secondary effect of causing the pituitary gland to issue a short burst of lutenizing hormone (LH). The LH causes the ovaries to release the most developed ova from its follicle, which is the event we refer to as ovulation. The ova makes its way down the fallopian tubes into a woman's uterus. The ova is available to be fertilized for only about 12 to 24 hours after its release from the follicle and during its journey through the fallopian tubes. If no fertilization occurs, the ova will pass harmlessly from a woman's body.
The release of the ova from the follicle begins the luteal phase of the ovulation cycle. The ruptured follicle that released its ova, will now begin to release progesterone, which is a hormone key to all phases of pregnancy. The increase in progesterone signals the uterus to prepare for an arriving fertilized egg, which will normally arrive at the uterus on about the fifth day following ovulation (about nineteen days after the first day of your period). If the uterus receives a fertilized egg, the body will continue to produce high levels of progesterone, keeping the pregnancy healthy. If no fertilized egg is detected by about the twelfth to fourteenth day following ovulation, then the body begins to shed the lining of the uterus that was produced to nurture the fertilized egg, and a woman's period begins.
In order to maximize your chance of pregnancy, you want to understand the timing in the ovulation cycle discussed above, and that your peak fertility is most likely over by twelve hours after ovulation has occurred. While the egg only survives for a twelve to twenty-four period after ovulation, the good news is that studies have shown sperm to be much hardier than eggs, able to survive for several days in a woman's uterus and fallopian tubes. In summary, you and your baby's father should time intercourse to happen once or twice in the five days leading up to ovulation, and not after ovulation has occurred.