Ovulation After Miscarriage: Calculator, Symptoms & Advice

Pregnancy loss can affect many couples when they are trying to conceive, and it can be a different experience for each and every couple.

Some women will feel ready to jump right in and try again after a miscarriage, while others need some time to become emotionally and mentally ready to think about pregnancy. There's no right or wrong answer, as long as you are feeling comfortable and ready.

We want to talk about when your body will be ready to conceive again after a miscarriage, and how safe it is for you to try again soon after.

Please remember to always seek medical advice from a doctor if you're worried about any aspect of fertility, conceiving, or pregnancy.

If you want to know more about getting pregnant, then why not check out our piece on how long after IUD removal you can get pregnant or whether you should panic about drinking before you know you are pregnant?

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What Is Ovulation?

Ovulation is a part of the menstrual cycle when your body prepares to release an egg from your ovaries, in order to allow it to be fertilized by a sperm. This is a relatively small window that occurs each month, between 12 and 24 hours, where you are able to get pregnant.

Couples that are having sex without any contraception have roughly a 25% chance of getting pregnant each month.

Even though the 12 to 24 hour ovulation period is pretty short, sperm can live inside the womb for up to six days, so if you have sex a few days before the ovulation period, then your egg could still be fertilized.

The infertile time of your cycle is the two weeks before and the week after ovulation.

If pregnancy doesn't happen, then this is when you'll experience your period. At the beginning of this stage of your cycle, you will have gone through two weeks without any bleeding.

If you're tracking ovulation using a basal thermometer, or a fertility chart, then you'll know that day 14 marks the first day of elevated temperatures that are associated with ovulation.

Ovulation After Miscarriage Calculator

An ovulation predictor is a good way to monitor where you're at in your ovulation cycle in the time after miscarriages. If you're tracking your cycle to try to get pregnant again, then the best way to do this is with a basal thermometer, which you can buy relatively inexpensively online.

The basal thermometer is a thermometer that measures in very small increments and will monitor the rise in temperature that happens when you ovulate.

You will usually be most fertile the two days before your basal body temperature rises by 0.54 F (0.3 C), and usually, the thermometer will come with a graph to help you to chart where you are at in your menstrual cycle.

The first day of menstrual bleeding or spotting is counted as day one of your cycle after pregnancy loss, so you can expect to ovulate roughly two weeks after this bleeding. The last day of ovulation is when your basal body temperature goes back down to previous levels.

To work out where you are in your ovulation cycle, you can follow the calculator below. How to use the calculator:

Put the date that you had your miscarriage next to your period.

Start with the month before your period (this will be day one)  and count up seven days from there (this will be day eight, and the start of week one).

Count up 14 days from there (this will be day 21, and the start of week two).

Count up 13 more days from there (this will be day 34, this is when you should have ovulated).

If you're charting your temperature to figure out when ovulation occurred, then the dates should be pretty close. However, you can also calculate your due date using this method. All you have to do is count how many days it takes for your temperature to return to the same level as the previous month.

For example: If the last time that your temperature went up was on day 28 of January 2021, and you had a miscarriage in December 2020, then it's likely that ovulation has passed by now. In other words, it's likely that it will take a few days before your next period arrives in your menstrual cycle.

Signs Of Ovulation After Miscarriage

It's common and normal for women to experience some bleeding following a miscarriage, and this will count as the first day of your menstrual period. You should then ovulate around two weeks later, at which point you might be able to conceive.

However, it is suggested by the World Health Organization for a woman to wait at least six months after a miscarriage before trying to fall pregnant again. Research has shown that if you do get pregnant earlier than that, then you will have an increased chance of preterm birth, low birth weight, and maternal anemia.

However, other studies by the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology actually suggest that waiting is not necessary, and showed a reduced risk of another miscarriage and a lower risk of preterm birth. So it's important to do your research and work out what is right for you.

Most experts do recommend waiting for at least one menstrual cycle after pregnancy loss before trying again so that you can accurately work out when you ovulate, where you are in your cycle and therefore calculate your due date more precisely.

It's a good idea to ask your doctor about your personal timeframe, as your doctor might recommend that you wait a little longer before you have sex without protection, even after the signs of ovulation, to give your body time to heal and rest.

After a miscarriage, your chances of conceiving again may increase. This is because your body has undergone hormonal changes that are needed for a pregnancy to occur.

Looking After Yourself After A Miscarriage

If you've miscarried, then it's important that you take the time to look after yourself. Every woman deals with miscarriage differently; there is no normal, and whatever you are feeling is totally OK.

The chances are that you will have a lot of questions, so the best thing to do is to get in touch with your doctor. It's also common for women to experience a lot of pain as well as many other symptoms, so you might need some physical time out of work or in bed resting.

When you experience a miscarriage it is normal to feel a range of different emotions. For example, you may feel sadness, anger, or guilt.

You may also feel as though you have lost a sense of yourself and that your identity has changed in some way.

It is natural to go through a cycle of emotions that starts with shock and denial, disbelief like this is designed to help you deal with the trauma.

Then you might feel anger or guilt as you try to find something or someone to blame for this, which is completely normal. After this, a woman may experience a time of despair or depression, feeling hopeless and upset, before she is able to start coming to terms and accepting what has happened.

It is important to give yourself the chance to heal after a miscarriage. This includes physical healing but also emotional healing too. Take at least the first 24 hours resting in bed, and as long as you feel you need to recover your body.

It's a good idea to take your basal body temperature every day for the next five days so that you can monitor any changes and see where you are in your ovulation cycle.

Don't have sexual intercourse until you have stopped bleeding. Your doctor might recommend using some form of contraception in the month after your pregnancy loss even if you are trying to conceive to give your body time to rest and recover.

Any woman who goes through a miscarriage in early pregnancy or later to will need to give herself the opportunity to grieve. Take the time to cry about your miscarriage, talk to your partner or friends about it or journal, or simply take some quiet time out to process your feelings.

You might want to join a support network or talk to women who have gone through similar experiences if you are finding things emotionally hard.

Many women and their partners choose to perform a ritual to help them to process their loss, like a religious service or a small memorial to grieve the life that could have been.

Remember, most women who suffer from one miscarriage go on to have a healthy pregnancy after their menstrual cycle starts again. For most women, miscarriage is only a one-time event.

If you found this article helpful, then why not take a look at some related articles about whether implantation bleeding can be heavy, or how best to work while you're pregnant?

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