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What Experts Say^*

Reviewed by Steven Johnson, M.D.

Let's talk about sex. Specifically, when should you do it if you're trying to get pregnant?

"A lot of women are confused about when they're most fertile and when they should have sex," says Suzanne Schlosberg, author of "The Essential Fertility Log: An Organizer and Record-Keeper to Help You Get Pregnant.." "You need to have sex before you ovulate - ideally, within 48 hours."

What this means is that having sex before the egg is released can increase your chance of getting pregnant. Why? It all has to do with timing: A woman's egg lives only about 12-24 hours but sperm can live in the uterine environment for 48-72 hours.

That's why you have to learn how to predict your ovulatory...

Let's talk about sex. Specifically, when should you do it if you're trying to get pregnant?

"A lot of women are confused about when they're most fertile and when they should have sex," says Suzanne Schlosberg, author of "The Essential Fertility Log: An Organizer and Record-Keeper to Help You Get Pregnant.." "You need to have sex before you ovulate - ideally, within 48 hours."

What this means is that having sex before the egg is released can increase your chance of getting pregnant. Why? It all has to do with timing: A woman's egg lives only about 12-24 hours but sperm can live in the uterine environment for 48-72 hours.

That's why you have to learn how to predict your ovulatory cycles if you want to time conception.

How to Predict Ovulation

First you need to figure out how long your average cycle is. Your cycle starts on the first day of your period and ends on the day before your next period. A woman is at her most fertile 12 to 14 days before her period arrives. This means:

• If you have a typical 28-day cycle, your most fertile period is in the middle of your cycle at around day 14.
• If, for example, you have a 35-day cycle, your most fertile time will be approximately three weeks after your period arrives.

BBT Charts




Charting your basal body temperature (BBT) a great way to figure out what's going on with your body, but not such a great way to predict when to have sex to conceive. A higher BBT can tell you that you've already ovulated, but you need to have sex before that temperature change.

"By the time you detect this spike, you've already ovulated, at which point it's too late for the egg to be fertilized. That ship has sailed!" says Suzanne Schlosberg, author of "The Essential Fertility Log: An Organizer and Record-Keeper to Help You Get Pregnant.."

OPK Kits




If you're trying to get pregnant, try using an ovulation predictor kit (OPK). OPKs check for lutenizing hormone (LH) that triggers ovulation and can give you a heads up when you're about to ovulate.

See more information about tracking ovulation.

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