Many times, couples fail to get pregnant simply because they don't understand the timing involved in the precise, delicate process of making a baby.
Our training to always use protection if we want to ward of pregnancy leads to a misconception that a woman is capable of getting pregnant at any time, which is simply not true.
In fact, there are only about three or four days during a woman's menstrual cycle that intercourse is likely to make her become pregnant.
Understanding exactly how this works can give you more confidence in your ability to conceive, as well as a better chance to get pregnant easily and quickly.
So, if you're ready to be savvy about your menstrual cycle, get pregnant, and have a baby sooner than you thought possible, read on.
The Cycle Begins: Preparing the Egg for Conception Much of a woman's menstrual cycle is spent getting her egg ready for fertilization.
Unlike men, women don't constantly manufacture reproductive materials, and they are actually born with all the eggs they'll ever have.
However, it takes several days - usually about two weeks, in fact - for an egg to mature enough to be viable for pregnancy.
Here's a quick review of how it works: *A menstrual cycle begins on the first day of a woman's period, and at this point, the body is simply cleaning out the uterus to get ready for the next possibility of a pregnancy.
*Shortly after the period is over, the body begins producing more estrogen, a hormone that helps stimulate the follicles, which hold the eggs, to make the eggs more mature.
*On the day that one egg is ready, it will burst from the follicle into the fallopian tubes, and the corpus luteum, which is the decaying follicle, will start producing progesterone, which helps get the body ready for pregnancy.
*The egg can stay alive without being fertilized for about twenty-four hours, and after that, it will either implant in the womb or dissolve back into the body.
*If the egg is fertilized and implants, progesterone levels will stay high, since this hormone supports pregnancy.
If the egg dissolves, progesterone levels will fall, which will trigger the cleaning of the womb once again in preparation for the next egg.
You might be wondering how the egg ever gets fertilized if it lives for such a short time and why we said that women have three or four fertile days.
Well, here's where some of the functions of estrogen come in and where we talk a bit about sperm.
Know How Sperm Works In Fertile Days of Cycle for Pregnancy To Occur Unlike women, men are constantly producing reproductive material in their sperm.
They can run low if they ejaculate too often, but healthy men with normally-functioning reproductive systems will always be able to replenish that supply within just a couple of days.
Sperm also last longer than eggs in a receptive female body.
Here's how this can work: *One of the things that estrogen does in a woman's body is to cause the vagina to release certain substances, known as vaginal mucous.
At the beginning of the cycle, there will be little mucous, but as estrogen does its work, the mucous will get more and more conducive to sperm.
*A couple of days before ovulation, mucous will look like an egg white - very similar, in fact, to semen.
When the mucous is like this, it actually helps nourish the sperm and can keep it alive for a few days.
In fact, in ideal conditions, sperm might be able to survive for up to a week! Given this fact, it's easy to see that you can actually get pregnant from intercourse that you have a few days before you ovulate.
Your body is designed to take advantage of this fact by keeping sperm alive as long as possible, especially just before ovulation.
The Fertilization Process for Conceiving When you're trying to get pregnant, you'll be most likely to achieve your goal if you have intercourse at least every other day for a few days leading up to your ovulation and again on the day that you actually ovulate.
Your body will pull sperm into its system, and the egg will actually be fertilized in the fallopian tubes before it ever reaches the uterus.
The egg can take a couple of days to travel down the fallopian tubes after it is fertilized, and you won't be considered pregnant until it implants into your uterine walls.
This means that you can have intercourse on Tuesday, have a fertilized egg in your fallopian tubes when you ovulate on Friday, and not be pregnant until Sunday!