Hmmm. Timing confusion.

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Originally Posted by Flava

i also find this http://genderdreaming.com/forum/show...-Thread/page73 very interesting!
I think it says that sperm capacitat when O accur or just right after O. Also lot's of other interesting stuff to read in it!

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Sperm take a certain number of hours to capacitate after being deposited, and this number can vary (4 hours is the commonly quoted time, it's at least this long but for most sperm, much longer.). Most sperm don't fully capacitate right away - there are always some that are capacitated and others are at varying stages in the process, so there are always some available to fertilize the egg. (sperm seem capable of communicating in some way we don't understand.) When the egg arrives, whoever is capacitated right then, swims to the egg and fertilizes it. If they don't make it, the egg continues to send out a signal to the other sperm and more keep capacitating and swimming to the egg, again and again, until the egg is fertilized and begins to send out a different chemical signal and changes the outside of the egg so no more sperm can fertilize it. This is the most awesome site ever, you can actually take a course in embryology online. http://www.embryology.ch/anglais/dbe...ung/weg03.html

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Originally Posted by zanacal

If a lady was looking to do an O+12 she wouldn't be doing it when she had EWCM, so I wouldn't worry about doing it after you O if you still have it (I wouldn't worry anyway but I understand!).

If I was ttc a boy I think I would try to arrive at my most fertile time with a decent 2-3 day abstinence and then DTD every day I have EWCM - O-1 and O in most likelihood. The way I see it, the sex on O-1 would be the most important because DH would have high sperm count after his 2-3 day break, I'd have lots of EWCM and those sperm would get the headstart on any sperm released on O day because they'd get the first sniff of the egg (and you also know you're not going to completely miss the egg which is a risk waiting for O day!). The sex on O day would seal the deal by adding even more sperm to the (hopefully) huge numbers from the day before :D

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Couldn't have said it better myself! :agree: another option would be to DTD at O-2 and again on O or even O-2, O-1 and again on O. Remember that it takes 7-10 days of frequent BD or several DTD in a row in a 1-2 day period for compressed frequent BD. DTD three days in a row will not make your husband's sperm count super low unless he had very low sperm count to begin with. Plus, you'll have higher numbers on hand and pH that may help sway blue as well.

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Originally Posted by gizmo77

what does it mean when a sperm capacitates?

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I really need an essay on this but it is going to be very involved! o.O

Capacitation means that the sperm go from being round and fat to being skinny and pointy. They lose some chemicals out of their cap. Before that happens, they can't fertilize an egg.

Around four hours is the soonest that they can become capacitated and able to fertilize an egg, but they don't all become fully capacitated at this point. There are always some in the process of capacitation and others that aren't totally capacitated that are just hanging out and waiting. Once the egg shows up, the capacitated sperm begin to make their way to the egg and try and fertilize it, but if none of them do, there are more sperm that are capacitating all the time lying in wait. More go up to the egg, over and over, until one of them finally does manage to fertilize the egg. Then the egg changes chemically in a way that does not allow any more sperm to fertilize it.

PS - for those who don't know, Shettles mistook capacitated and uncapacitated sperm in a microscope and decided that the fat ones were X and the skinny ones were Y. His entire timing theory was based on this mistake.

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Originally Posted by zanacal

I *think* I'm right in saying that they can't capacitate until they get a sniff of the egg though - and until then they're all just hanging out together un-capacitated!!

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My understanding is that they're always capacitating in the hopes that the egg will show up (so some are always ready and able to fertilize), they just don't all capacitate at the same time. (that's why doctors can capacitate sperm in the lab even thoguh there's no egg handy...it's the CM and chemicals in it, that trigger the process to begin.) Some are always at the ready, others are awaiting their opportunity, some are past their prime and dying/dead, so whenever that egg appears somebody is ready to roll.

Here's another link.http://www.vivo.colostate.edu/hbooks...fert/fert.html

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Originally Posted by Flava

Hobber- I don't think you should look when is O +12 just by CM! I could never do O+12 like that for sure because I have EWCM at least a day after O! This month I got 2 days ewcm after O.
I remember IG guru said you know when you O'd exactly because you get creamy cm 12 hours after O so you just watch that and count back 12 and you got O. Well maybe for some women is like that but she just didn't listen to us ( what a surprise..)when we told her lot's of us get ewcm way after O.

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That has never made a heck of a lot of sense to me because our bodies are all so different from each other and are even different from month to month. Isn't it the hormones that are making that happen and what happens if your hormones are a little different from month to month?? AF certainly isn't the same every month, why would EWCM be the same?? Plus throw swaying into the mix and our cycles are totally different than they were anyway.

I know for a fact that I keep making EWCM for at least 2 days after O some months.

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Originally Posted by Hobbermittens

I want to avoid O+12 at all costs. I think my youngest daughter may have been an O+12 by accident, but I won't ever know (she was an "oops" anyway). I think I might get creamy CM a day after O, but this last cycle I had EW after O for sure. It all confuses me!

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A day after O, your egg is dead and gone (unless you release 2 eggs a full day apart and that is very unusual). So if you think you had creamy CM when your daughter was conceived, that had to have been less than 24 hours after O.

I was paying very close attention during my last cycle and I 100% for sure had stretchy EWCM for 2 entire days after O (plus several days before O!)

Wow, this is such an interesting post. Thanks for explaining that all Atomic!

Do you remember the study which looked at the effect on sperm of releasing every 8 hours, where it said that adenylate cyclase increased by the 3rd release, reached a peak at the 4th release and then decreased - and I asked what adenylate cyclase was and you said it was something to do with capacitation? (Of course you do, you have every post committed to memory right?!). Any idea what this is saying? Do XX and XY sperm capacitate differently or at different speeds that we know of?

Actually I remember a disconcerting number of posts - then forget to mail my electric bill in. :p

We don't know whether X and Y sperm capacitate differently or not. That is one thing I wonder about because aside from all the speculative things that seem impossible to my mind (like, how could a man eating sodium or not eating sodium get translated into the genetic programming of the sperm themselves??? and at different rates between the two genders??? wouldn't such a thing have to affect all of the sperm or else none of them???) it does seem possible that something that could be genetically programmed into the tiny sperm cells, for them to lose their caps at a slightly different rate.

This is great info! I had no idea all of that happened with the sperm.

And thank you all for easing my mind about the O+12. We will most probably DTD when I get my first +opk, and then the next day as well. Possibly even the day I get the fade in? It is hard to decide when to tell DH to start his abstaining, since I can't predict O day exactly. Hmmm. I usually O sometime between day 13 and 16, so I guess he should start abstaining on day 10? Then we can DTD on CD12, and see from there?

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Originally Posted by atomic sagebrush

Actually I remember a disconcerting number of posts - then forget to mail my electric bill in. :p

We don't know whether X and Y sperm capacitate differently or not. That is one thing I wonder about because aside from all the speculative things that seem impossible to my mind (like, how could a man eating sodium or not eating sodium get translated into the genetic programming of the sperm themselves??? and at different rates between the two genders??? wouldn't such a thing have to affect all of the sperm or else none of them???) it does seem possible that something that could be genetically programmed into the tiny sperm cells, for them to lose their caps at a slightly different rate.

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SUPER great thread. HOWEVER,

um, hello, atomic, ever hear of online billing????