How to Chart Your Basal Body Temperature

If you're looking to get pregnant, tracking your temperature can tell you when you're most likely to conceive.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Digital Thermometers
• Pencils
• Notebooks
• Pencils
• Pencils
• Notebooks

1. Get a basal body thermometer at a pharmacy, grocery store or Web site. They're more sensitive than the garden-variety ones you use when you're sick.

2. Keep a pad of paper, a pencil and the thermometer next to your bed.

3. Take your temperature every morning as soon as you wake up and before you get out of bed. You're looking for subtle changes, and even going to the bathroom can skew your results.

4. Record your temperature on your chart each morning. You won't feel the shift, but your body temperature rises by 0.5 to 1.6 degrees after you ovulate.

5. Keep your record for several months. Because body temperature rises after ovulation, you need to accumulate data before your results can be helpful.

6. Use your data: Have sex during your most fertile days - that's the two or three days before your temperature normally rises each cycle - if you want to get pregnant.

Tips & Warnings

• Taking your temperature at the same time each morning (even on weekends) will improve your record.
• Conception takes time. A normal, healthy couple only has a 25 percent chance of conceiving each month, even when they have sex right around the time of ovulation. After a year of trying, 75 to 85 percent of couples will have conceived.
• Many things can affect a women's cycle. If you have any concerns or questions, talk to your doctor.

Who Can Help:

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on 11/22/2005 As a former nurse, I recommend that a woman take her morning temperature by rectum and not by mouth. It IS more accurate and the basal thermometer can be used rectally. I now have three children.