Blue Sway Folic Acid QQ - Please help!

[atomic sagebrush]

Thank you so much!! I did take yesterday off and we had a really nice time, thanks! Hope yours was great too!

Many, many of us have unsupportive husbands who really do not even want another child. We have found over time that most of what matters is what WE do. We have to carry a pregnancy, nurse (at least in nature), women tend to raise the children while men (again, historically) don't have to do that - so our environment is by far and away more important than what the men bring to the table.

If I had anything up my sleeve that could sway more blue for you I would already be having you do those things.

I don't have the data to compare the difference between things like hot baths vs. summertime weather. We just don't have any hard evidence to enable me to compare the two across the boards like you're thinking of it.

I would simply focus on what you CAN control - which is your end of the equation - and let DH do what he's gonna do. We have found that the more you pressure them to do this or do that, the more rebellious they get, even to the point where they're going behind your back or worse, actively fighting with you over it (which for a blue swayer, can be defeating and stressful in the kind of "I have no control over this" way that is bad for blue sways). Worst of all, some men end up actually getting so fed up they refuse to TTC after all. So I would focus your energies on controlling the things that will pay dividends - the stuff YOU can do personally.

If he's willing to try in January, try in January. One of the things that has been predictive of husbands who refuse to try, is making them skip months. They get in a "we're TTC" mindset and when you start skipping months for anything other than complete act of God (like your illness) they start feeling like it's really not very important to you and all too often have ended up refusing to try when the woman feels like the time is right.

[ruby_blue]

Okay thank you, that’s super helpful and reassuring.

I feel like he is the most rebellious he’s ever been at the moment! He has that personality type unfortunately, that the more he’s told to do something the less likely he is to do it… And so recently I’ve been trying to stop him drinking as much beer or vaping or cycling and he just tells me he’s going to do exactly as he wishes - like a wilful child (massive eye roll). You can imagine the arguments in our house! And yes, I was thinking that it leads me to a kind of hopeless stress which is not very good for me.

I suppose I was just thinking of delaying because if he does quit at the end of December, and stays a non-smoker then the longer the better I guess? I read somewhere on here (and now can’t find where) that 3 months plus is optimal time to quit. But as I’m swiftly learning there is really no such thing as a perfect month. This is the girl mum in me isn’t it, putting it off enough indefinitely!!

Glad that you had a lovely Christmas, you deserve a good break! Xx
Ps that email address for payment on the other thread, is it a PayPal account? X

[atomic sagebrush]

I would just not argue with him any more. It doesn't help (because that rebellious personality type, or as I like to call them, men, does not respond well to that kind of approach) and actively hurts sways - for pink swayers, the wives get all control freakish and try to outwit their husbands, and blue swayers are more prone to just feeling like they can never win and that nothing they do can possibly make a difference. He's gonna do what he's gonna do.

Right, but keep in mind that every time you delay, swaying gets bigger in your mind till it starts taking over your every waking thought (for many blue swayers, this is overwhelming and causes them to shut down and feel like they can't get swaying "right" and their sway is doomed to fail, which is exactly the opposite of the mindset we want you to have for TTC a boy) and then what happens if he DOESN'T quit? You're back at square one, only now you're feeling like this is impossible, you can't succeed if every duck isn't in a row, so why even bother, it's in the hands of fate, etc etc etc.

Yes that is EXACTLY what I see with blue swayers - putting it off and off and then quite a lot of the time, blue swayers put it off so long they end up having an oopsie in a month they weren't ready and they'd skipped over all those other months for really no real reason. My gut instinct is that barring another complete Act of God like we had this month, be ready to roll next month.

Yes that's our PayPal account!! So you'd have to use that in PayPal. I don't have any other way to donate set up, we just use PayPal. Thanks for asking!

[ruby_blue]

Hey Atomic, so things have been really strange around here and I’m wondering if I can ask for advice.

I’m going to completely rewrite this post now, because it was previously a ramble about me thinking I’d started my period. In actual fact, I’ve had symptoms of thrush, which unfortunately I’m prone to, for a few days. On Wednesday night I used a pessary to treat it. I didn’t see any evidence of the pessary until this morning, when I woke up with lots of bright red blood around me.

I thought it was an early period, but an unusual one because I usually get some sign of it coming first. And then after a few hours I passed what initially I thought was a blood clot but on closer inspection appeared to be the Pessary, covered in blood! Sorry, really gross I know.

I was really freaked out for a while. I’ve used them before and never had something like this happen so not quite sure what was going on, but I guess my body just thought it was something else and then expelled it? Thought I should mention it and ask whether you still think I’m okay for January…

And happy new year! Xx

[atomic sagebrush]

My suspicion is that you actually ovulated sooner than you thought (meaning, it wasn't as delayed as we thought) the later positive OPK was a false positive, and now your period is coming. Thrush outbreaks prior to period arriving are SUPER common and that fits in with the timeline. And even if you normally get symptoms prior to period arriving, there are always off months when you don't.

Can you think back 10-14 days? Is it at all possible that ovulation happened at that point in time?

It is also possible that the pessary caused some irritation which lead to bleeding, but the way you're describing this is pretty heavy flow - seems like a period to me.

Pessaries can come out on their own, and I think the bleeding just made it easier for the pessary to come out. The bleeding did not happen because your body was trying to get rid of the pessary, though - just want to be clear on that. Either the pessary might have caused irritation that led to bleeding (and 99 times out of 100 that type of bleeding is very light and short lived, and not what you're describing) or the pessary was "washed out" by the flow.

[ruby_blue]

Hey, thanks for your reply. So initially I thought that, and two weeks ago was, weirdly, the time that I was supposed to ovulate. It’s when I kept writing loads of messages asking what to do and flip-flopping! But it’s definitely not the start of a period.

I don’t have any other signs and the bleeding has just completely vanished now. I guess I’ll just have to wait and see what happens. It feels like my body is choosing the most inconvenient time to rebel…. Like it’s taking tips from my man…. ! Who is currently smoking up a storm as he’s going to ‘quit’ tomorrow. *siiigh*

Happy new year dear Atomic! Xx

[atomic sagebrush]

Yes that's what I remembered, and then reading this post I figured that must be what happened.

I will say that sometimes we do see a little blood flow a day or two or three before the period arrives, but it may be simply coming from the cervix and irritation from the pessary. Keep me posted!!!

[ruby_blue]

Seems like I tell a lie… After a day of nothing, I’ve started to bleed again tonight. But it’s very stop start. And DH and I attempted some intimate time which, well let’s just say I didn’t really go to plan! Could I have ovulated twice?

I started testing from CD 14 and they were all negative up until CD23. On that day, I took two ovulation tests, one clear blue and one Premom, and both were clearly positive or peak. And yet here I am on CD 32 with what seems like it may be a period.. (I’ve also stiiiillll got my cough. Ugh! Falling apart).

It’s really annoying not being able to plan And I am aware that this type of mindset, feeling overwhelmed, it’s not really going to help with the sway. I wish I knew what was going on!

Anyway sorry for griping, HNY x

Update: I seem to be treating this thread as my personal diary, sorry! Just thought I would update that after last night, the bleeding has completely stopped again and there’s been nothing today. I don’t think it was a period, just something very weird going on… I normally have an achy feeling in my lower abdomen on my period and I didn’t have any of that. When I was intimate with DH, he said he could feel that my cervix was low and hard.
It felt v uncomfortable for me. But like I said, it’s now completely gone. Hopefully I’ll get my period in the next couple of days. Such a weird day honestly… maybe 2021’s last sucker punch my way!! X

[atomic sagebrush]

It's not a lie, it's just confusing when periods arrive in these patterns. But a day or two of bleeding/spotting, then nothing, then full on AF is a very common pattern we see quite a bit. It is also possible to have, just as you have had, off and on periods over the span of a few days. I actually personally have this pattern quite a bit which is why I'm so familiar with it. It is most likely that your body is just a bit weird and having an unusual period this time through. It is also possible, (though I think it's unlikely) that you didn't ovulate and are simply having a breakthrough bleed where your estrogen drops and the lining comes off. The reason I do not believe this is happening is that generally speaking, breakthrough bleeds tend to happen NOT when we expect our period to come. Since they're not caused by ovulation, they are more random, and the vast majority of the time when there is bleeding at the point in time we expect a period, it means you ovulated, even when your period is unusual and not the norm. The good news is that no matter what whether it's period or breakthrough bleeding, it acts as a reset on the cycle and you will start over again as if it was a normal cycle. (Now, you can have another weird cycle, or it may be normal. My point is, it's a do-over, a new cycle is starting no matter if the next cycle is normal or still a bit off, and any weirdness this past month does not carry into the next month, generally speaking.)

Another distant possibility is that you somehow conceived and this is early pregnancy bleeding so you may want to take a pregnancy test but I don't think you had any attempts at the right time, correct??? Or did you?

You cannot ovulate twice more than 24 hours apart (and usually it's more like 8-12 hours.) This is because when the egg is released, the hole the egg comes out of makes hormones that stop any more eggs from being released within a very narrow time frame (it takes a bit of time for the hormones to be made, but not that long). So there is no way you released one egg, then a couple days later another one. It just doesn't work like that - the first egg would have stopped any more from being released after just a few hours.

And, this type of bleeding cannot be caused by double ovulation anyway. I assume you were thinking that the first egg might have been ovulated, caused a period, and now the second egg is causing another period??? That just cannot be. The way the menstrual cycle works is that your progesterone, and later on and to a lesser extent, your estrogen levels, rise in the second half of the cycle. If you get pregnant, the egg sends a signal to your body to keep those levels high, and you do not get your period. If you aren't pregnant, when the body does not receive that signal, hormone levels will drop and then your lining will start to come off. There is NO setting where one egg makes a period and then another egg makes some other period. Either the hormones stay high (pregnant) or they drop (not pregnant). The lining stays, or it comes off.

The most likely thing that is happening is that your lining is just coming off in fits and starts and taking its time. It happens sometimes.

Now, as for your positive OPK on CD 23, this is actually something that happens quite a lot. For whatever reason you missed your first peak (and I would strongly suggest starting to test sooner than CD 14! you could have easily, easily missed the peak if you didn't start testing till then! But it is ALSO possible that you just never got a positive in your urine tests, even tho the levels in your blood were enough to trigger ovulation) and caught a false positive at the time of the secondary estrogen surge. The secondary estrogen surge happens about a week after ovulation, and it is very common to have ovulation-type symptoms and a false positive on OPK at the same time. But the egg was already released. I know this sounds unlikely - a false negative and a false positive in the same month??? - but truly, it happens all the time to people and so just be aware that it's possible.

[ruby_blue]

Hi, thank you again for such a detailed response. There’s been no bleeding since Friday at all, also no CM to speak of. I actually read your message late last night and then panicked about the possibility of being pregnant.

I took a test this morning and it was clearly negative. Which was actually a relief as I’d like to feel a little bit more in control and know what’s going on (for once)! So I guess I’ll just wait for this period to show up… I wish I could somehow look inside my body to see what exactly is going on. I will let you know as soon as there is any movement or certainty x