I just fell into a classic TTC trap and I just thought I would share the insanity with you all. So, as you know, the TTW is total torture. The patience involved is totally beyond me and it pushes me to my limit. A friend suggested that the second week is worse than the first, and I must agree. It is during the second week that my resolve always falters, and I end up wasting expensive pregnancy tests, because I am so desperate to catch sight of the elusive double line ASAP.
The strategy behind choosing your testing day is pretty simple: choose a day that is far enough out from your ovulation date to have some possibility of showing a positive result, but early enough that you aren't going insane waiting for it to be TESTING DAY. Some bionic women with super embryos have shown a +HPT as early as 7DPO (days past ovulation) or 8 DPO with first morning urine. When I was pregnant last summer, I showed a +HPT at 10DPO (faint, but visible). Many women don't get a positive result until 13-14DPO. It is very individual.
But, even with this in mind, I have been known to test on 6DPO. 6... I haven't done that for a long time, but still. Somewhere in my brain, it made sense to do that.
This cycle, because I did a trigger shot, I had to wait for that medication to clear out of my system, because it will give a false positive test. It is concentrated hCG (pregnancy hormone) and that is the hormone that home tests pick up. So, using super cheapie tests, I used those for several days watching the line get fainter and fainter. 2 days ago the test was finally stark white, so I know now that if I do get a BFP, it is for real. So, I chose 10DPO (this coming Thursday) to be my first testing day. This sounds reasonable to me because that is when I got a +HPT last July. Good. Done. Decision made.
Then WHY did I decide, in my infinite wisdom, to use an expensive First Response test this morning (8DPO) at 8am when I had already peed at like 5:30am?! Wrong day AND wrong time. Of course the result was negative. Now I am just left embarrassed and disappointed with myself.
There is a compulsion there that is difficult to understand. Imagine you have chocolate in your cupboard and you are trying to lose weight. You have told yourself, "I am saving that chocolate for Thursday. It will taste so much better if I work out for a few days to earn it. I won't touch it until then." But, you can HEAR the chocolate calling to you. You can't think of much else. You are powerless against it, and you sneak it before you can even really taste it.
I need someone to come to my house and remove all HPTs. I am a danger to myself and others. Please, call Candy Finnigan.
I was able to stick to the cheap strips because as much as I hate waiting, I hate peeing on money more. You're like peeing on $10 at a time! With the cheap strips it's like you're peeing on a handful of pennies, and I'm okay with that. I also was so used to negative tests that I began to think I could pee on a piece of paper with the same results.
ReplyDeleteOne good thing though--this means you're not likely carrying octuplets.