OPK's

This is the first time I have ever used opk's. I noticed on Christmas day it was the close to the same color as the test line and we had DTD xmas eve. The day after xmas (26th) it was the same color as the test line and we DTD after a hot shower in the afternoon. The 27th I had a strong positive way darker then the test line but didn't do anything and then this morning had another strong positive darker then the test and we DTD after a hot shower.

My question is should we now stop? How many days is there a positive?

I really want a little girl and I've been on the diet now for almost 3 months although I drank a lot of champagne and did eat meat for 2 days and ate too much but stuck to really only 1 big meal. (did have a couple small snacks to tide me over)
Now that I'm home from the holidays I'm back to eating zucchini's and cauliflower.

So should the attempts stop or should I get one more in?

I know atomic says one attempt at positive opk is best for a girl. I've only used the digital opk and it usually stays positive for like 2 days and then I get negstive opk. I know this isn't really an answer for you but wanted to share that I find it so much easier to use the digital opk bc it clearly tells you when it detects the surge and when surge is not detected anymore. Hopefully AS or someone more knowledgable than myself can answer your question. I know I had like 4 days of cheating myself with christmas cookies and ovulated on Christmas Day and am now in 2ww. Trying so hard to skip breakfast this week just in case it's my month for bfp. Although not sure if this would undue my cheats.

Anyway good luck this month. Sux our ovulation fell right around christmas and same happened last month with thanksgiving for me. Good luck and sorry I couldn't be of more help.

I'm sure atomic will answer when she sees this but she just finished her new book about this subject and it is available here-

Guide to Understanding your Cycle and Using OPKs to Sway » » The Gender Selection Source

It answers a lot of frequently asked questions!!

Thanks Trishy! I know it does suck it's over the holidays but well what can you do? hopefully the 3 months of diet has worked and I have lost 11lbs thus far. I didn't want to spend the money on the digi but maybe if I don't get it this month I will next month. I guess I will ovulate in the next day or so, since this is day 2 of a strong positive.

Good luck hope you get your bfp...oh and if it makes you feel better I ate cookie dough for lunch yesterday :)

oh thanks for the link nbp!

I would guess you O tomorrow and would definitely stop BDing in order to keep sperm count low...but that's just my opinion.

I think it's best to stick to one attempt at pos OPK, but 2 attempts has still been decent results for pink, and the odds are that the third attempt was too late anyway.

Most people will ovulate 8-48 hours after first pos OPK. So your attempts on the 24th and 26th would count for attempts, the attempt on the 28th was probably too late.

It doesn't matter how long your OPK stay dark for, it's the first one that ~usually~ counts (altho you can have a false pos where your body gears up to O and then hesitates). It's like crossing a finish line, once you're over the line you win the race even if you walk back across to shake the other runner's hands.

I personally do not like the digitals and prefer people use regular OPK.

Thanks Atomic! I had a feeling yesterday might have been too late so hopefully the 2 earlier attempts did the trick. I completely missed my O last time so glad I got a couple attempts that were close this time around.

I guess what I'm confused on with OPK's is the 1st positive when it's the same color or when it's darker? The 1st darker than the control line came on the 27th and the line was the same color on the 26th. Which one counts as the 1st day of a positive?

Wow I had no idea. I used the digital three years ago for first time and got preggo right away. I just assumed they were better than regular opks. I'm just wondering why do you not like the digital opks? I've used the clearblue advanced and hated it. So now I've been using the regular clearblue digital. When done with this box maybe I will just buy the regular opks. Just wondering though why you like those better. Thanks.

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Originally Posted by atomic sagebrush

I personally do not like the digitals and prefer people use regular OPK.

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I had a whole nightmarish cycle with OPK's while on Clomid, I had no idea when I ovulated as the OPK's kept coming back as dark as control line, making me believe it was a positive, I had them for days and then I just about gave up DTD'ing as DH had nothing left, then after 9 days of dark OPK's I got a very dark one, but ignored it as I had had enough for that cycle, so I missed my window (had another DTD later on but by then it was too late to catch the egg). Following cycle I got a digital and BAM, straight answer, DTD'd on that day and am now pregnant. I would also go with digitals to avoid all that stress.

MIND YOU, I'd still double check with internet strips when unsure because I believe digitals miss your surge because of the FMU instructions. I got negative with FMU but the line was sooooo close to being positive I took another one with 2MU with an internet strip, which was quite dark, then did digital again and it was positive, with 2MU not FMU as recommended. In that regard it can fail you big time if you just trust the digital. Fortunately internet strips are cheap and good to have just for a 'second opinion'.

Paper OPK are not perfect to be sure but on the whole I have seen way less issues with people using the cheap paper OPK than the digitals. The digitals have a whole different set of problems PLUS also have all the same problems that regular OPK have (in terms of false pos and false neg.) and plus are super expensive. I only recommend regular cheap OPK (Wondfo brand is best) and NOT fertility monitors or digi opk.

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Originally Posted by aidansmum

I had a whole nightmarish cycle with OPK's while on Clomid, I had no idea when I ovulated as the OPK's kept coming back as dark as control line, making me believe it was a positive, I had them for days and then I just about gave up DTD'ing as DH had nothing left, then after 9 days of dark OPK's I got a very dark one, but ignored it as I had had enough for that cycle, so I missed my window (had another DTD later on but by then it was too late to catch the egg). Following cycle I got a digital and BAM, straight answer, DTD'd on that day and am now pregnant. I would also go with digitals to avoid all that stress.

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I think that was the fault of the Clomid and not OPK.

People on Clomid can avoid the entire dilemma by DTD every 4 days with one additional attempt at positive OPK for the first 3-4 months of TTC, then switching to SMEP for the last 2-3 months of their time on Clomid.

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Originally Posted by Tomgirl

Thanks Atomic! I had a feeling yesterday might have been too late so hopefully the 2 earlier attempts did the trick. I completely missed my O last time so glad I got a couple attempts that were close this time around.

I guess what I'm confused on with OPK's is the 1st positive when it's the same color or when it's darker? The 1st darker than the control line came on the 27th and the line was the same color on the 26th. Which one counts as the 1st day of a positive?

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As dark as or darker than the test line is positive and that is your first positive, you will O 8-48 hours (avg. 36) after that, regardless of whether you get darker tests later on.

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Originally Posted by Trishy74

Wow I had no idea. I used the digital three years ago for first time and got preggo right away. I just assumed they were better than regular opks. I'm just wondering why do you not like the digital opks? I've used the clearblue advanced and hated it. So now I've been using the regular clearblue digital. When done with this box maybe I will just buy the regular opks. Just wondering though why you like those better. Thanks.

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they have all the problems of the cheap OPK (can still give false pos/false neg results) plus you can't see fade ins, and they're so expensive that you will go broke testing. for anyone with short surges or long/irregular cycles, they are useless because who can afford to test with them more than one time a day??

Under no circumstances should anyone use the clearblue advanced kit, those things suck and if you get a "peak" reading, even if it's a false positive, it stays stuck on "peak" for a certain number of days no matter what and the test is then useless. YOu have to go buy another one (and they are like $35 or something like that)

There is a learning curve with the cheap OPK but once you learn how to use them they are vastly superior - there are gray areas to be sure but those gray areas are actually super useful info that the digi's do not give you.

Thanks atomic for the answer. Yeah the advanced digital was so frustrating! It skipped right over the blinking smiley and went straight to solid smiley and then I wanted to test next day to see if I was still surging and couldn't bc the smiley face doedbt go away like you mentioned. They were def not worth the hassle.

I brought the 20 pak of clear blue digital opts and they r lasting me like 3 months bc I usually get surge on second day if testing and then will test again that night following morning and night. I think for me its been accurate bc I look st the control line and test line and can tell when it's fading or darker line. According to the kit I surge for about 48 hours and then ovulate. Also my temps are coinciding too. And my period starts 14 or 15 days later. I will look into buying the wondfo kit you mentioned if I don't get preggo in next two cycles. I liked the digital opk kits bc I thought it was easier to read and took the hassles out of having to focus on control line etc.

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Originally Posted by atomic sagebrush

they have all the problems of the cheap OPK (can still give false pos/false neg results) plus you can't see fade ins, and they're so expensive that you will go broke testing. for anyone with short surges or long/irregular cycles, they are useless because who can afford to test with them more than one time a day??

Under no circumstances should anyone use the clearblue advanced kit, those things suck and if you get a "peak" reading, even if it's a false positive, it stays stuck on "peak" for a certain number of days no matter what and the test is then useless. YOu have to go buy another one (and they are like $35 or something like that)

There is a learning curve with the cheap OPK but once you learn how to use them they are vastly superior - there are gray areas to be sure but those gray areas are actually super useful info that the digi's do not give you.

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Thanks atomic for the answer. Yeah the advanced digital was so frustrating! It skipped right over the blinking smiley and went straight to solid smiley and then I wanted to test next day to see if I was still surging and couldn't bc the smiley face doedbt go away like you mentioned. They were def not worth the hassle.

I brought the 20 pak of clear blue digital opts and they r lasting me like 3 months bc I usually get surge on second day if testing and then will test again that night following morning and night. I think for me its been accurate bc I look st the control line and test line and can tell when it's fading or darker line. According to the kit I surge for about 48 hours and then ovulate. Also my temps are coinciding too. And my period starts 14 or 25 days later. I will look into buying the wondfo kit you mentioned if I don't get preggo in next two cycles. I liked them bc I thought it was easier to read and took the hassles out of having to focus on control line etc.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by atomic sagebrush

they have all the problems of the cheap OPK (can still give false pos/false neg results) plus you can't see fade ins, and they're so expensive that you will go broke testing. for anyone with short surges or long/irregular cycles, they are useless because who can afford to test with them more than one time a day??

Under no circumstances should anyone use the clearblue advanced kit, those things suck and if you get a "peak" reading, even if it's a false positive, it stays stuck on "peak" for a certain number of days no matter what and the test is then useless. YOu have to go buy another one (and they are like $35 or something like that)

There is a learning curve with the cheap OPK but once you learn how to use them they are vastly superior - there are gray areas to be sure but those gray areas are actually super useful info that the digi's do not give you.

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Trishy74

Thanks atomic for the answer. Yeah the advanced digital was so frustrating! It skipped right over the blinking smiley and went straight to solid smiley and then I wanted to test next day to see if I was still surging and couldn't bc the smiley face doedbt go away like you mentioned. They were def not worth the hassle.

I brought the 20 pak of clear blue digital opts and they r lasting me like 3 months bc I usually get surge on second day if testing and then will test again that night following morning and night. I think for me its been accurate bc I look st the control line and test line and can tell when it's fading or darker line. According to the kit I surge for about 48 hours and then ovulate. Also my temps are coinciding too. And my period starts 14 or 15 days later. I will look into buying the wondfo kit you mentioned if I don't get preggo in next two cycles. I liked the digital opk kits bc I thought it was easier to read and took the hassles out of having to focus on control line etc.

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I don't usually ovulate until after my last opk either. I'm a weirdo that way I guess lol


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If YOU like them and they work for you, then by all means carry on. I have to give a general recommendation for the average person and I think for the average person, paper OPK work best for the population as a whole. :) anyone who prefers digi tests shoudl of course continue using them.