Really confused with clear blue opk! Ttc girl!

Hi everyone,

Not sure if I've posted in the right section or not but I've been using the clear blue digital opk for two months last month I got 2 days of flashing smiley faces followed by the solid smiley on day 3 (cycle day 14) - last month was a practice run as I've never used opks before so this month I tested a bit earlier as I didn't want to miss anything so cycle day 11 was negative and I expected to get the flashing smiley on the morning on cycle day 12 (same as last month) only it was negative again, I re tested about 3 hours later and got the solid smiley face so we dtd about an hour after, by the evening I tested again (I have two monitors) and it was completely negative, I didn't hold my wee so I thought maybe it was too diluted I tested this morning and now I have the flashing smiley face, I'm so unsure as to what is going on? Can anyone help.
Thankyou
☺️

Are you getting this on two different monitors?

It's totally possible to go right to solid smiley but this sounds more like a misfire. You did exactly the right thing having attempt, and now I want you to start BD every 4 days from here on in to cover in case of delayed O. The attempt you had yesterday will cover you for the next few days, but count every 4th day starting from that attempt and have another attempt until you're 100% sure you've ovulated (even if htat means going all the way thru till next AF!)

Yeah I have been reading way too much today! Haha and I got the empty to solid smiley on my reader I've always used and then opened the new packet and got the negative, flashing smiley and the a solid smiley on the new reader so I thought what you've just suggest, even though I'm sure it's my mistake by using two different readers I thought to be safe seems as we dtd on the 3rd to do it again on the 7th? And continue every 4 days x

Yes you can't switch the readers in the middle like that. The Clearblue detects CHANGES in hormone levels and so the new reader can't detect any change, it thinks you're starting off earlier in your cycle and it can tell your fertility is high, but it can't know if this "high" is higher than it was before (meaning, peak) or if it's still going to go UP from there (meaning, peak is yet to come.)

Most people will run the e4d every 4th day, so 3rd and then 6th but you don't HAVE to do it that way. You can stretch it the extra day and go to the 7th, will be lower odds of conception, but possibly better odds of pink. Totally up to you, and it's fine to do one thing this month, and change it up in the future.

Yes you can't switch the readers in the middle like that. The Clearblue detects CHANGES in hormone levels and so the new reader can't detect any change, it thinks you're starting off earlier in your cycle and it can tell your fertility is high, but it can't know if this "high" is higher than it was before (meaning, peak) or if it's still going to go UP from there (meaning, peak is yet to come.)

Most people will run the e4d every 4th day, so 3rd and then 6th but you don't HAVE to do it that way. You can stretch it the extra day and go to the 7th, will be lower odds of conception, but possibly better odds of pink. Totally up to you, and it's fine to do one thing this month, and change it up in the future.

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Hi atomic, could you please have a look at my chart as I have posted on a few different forums that do a lot of charting but haven't put that we are trying for a girl so I don't think they can really answer my question properly!
On the morning of cycle day 12 I got an empty smiley, followed by a solid smiley at around midday so we dtd not long after that, however the FF chart has said that I had already O'ed by the morning of the 3rd before I got my +opk? I kind of feel that I actually o'ed cycle day 13 but that doesn't match the temps that I've put in? We've done what you said and been dtd every 4 days but I am so confused as I know I didn't miss the peak as my 8am test that day was negative! And somehow if I had and didn't get my +opk until after I've ovulated did we miss out chance? I'm not sure if you can answer this or not? Thankyou x

I manually put in my own lines to say that I ovulated on cycle day 13, but when I put it on the default setting it moves the lines back a day to day 12 x

Well, you can have false negatives on OPK if the hormone in your urine is not the proper concentration. And with most strips, 8 am will be negative no matter what since the hormone peaks in the middle of the night and then takes till midday to come out in the urine. It's totally normal to go from totally neg in the morning to positive at mid-day and honestly in future months I'd not even bother testing in the morning.

The thing with charts like this is that you can have one temp that throws the whole thing off. So take that first low temp - let's say you just had a freaky low temp that day for some reason (not related to hormones.) it happens. So then that confuses the FF algorithm and it gives you crosshairs on the wrong day.

But I can't tell from here if that WAS a freaky low temp or if it was a totally correct temp and you did O more in line with the OPK. I THINK you Oed earlier than that chart says, but I can't pin it down to the day. Just not a chart that I can easily read for certain.

We could prevent this in future by doing e4d all thru the month, then no matter what you're in with an attempt - but it's fine to give it a few months with one attempt at pos OPK too!

Thankyou for replying! Even if I did O cylce day 12 like it says! Hopefully I haven't missed my chance? As at 11:30am I still had a solid smiley and probably dtd around 12, so I could have still caught the end of something? All of this stuff is confusing! Yeah I think next month we will just go e4d I will probably still use the cheaper opks because I like to know what's going on - all though ironically using them has caused more confusion than if I hadn't used them at all lol! Thankyou for replying x

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This is what it does when I put it back to the default settings, does that look more accurate to you? This is my first month charting so I don't have a clue! �� Maybe I did O before my +opk who knows! I just hope I was in with atleast a bit of a chance x