Treatments For A Late Period And Pregnancy
In general, if youve missed a period and you know youre not pregnant, you dont need specific treatment or care. However, if you were having a regular cycle and youve stopped, if youre experiencing bleeding at unexpected times, if its been more than 45 days since your last period, and if you have additional symptoms that point to other concerns, your doctor will likely look into treatment options. Depending on the cause, your doctor may prescribe hormone therapy like birth control pills or other medication, or they might be able to suggest lifestyle changes to help you have a regular period cycle.
If your late period is a sign of pregnancy, your doctor can help you come up with a treatment plan to be sure you receive the proper care and regular checkups throughout your pregnancy.
Are You Pregnant But Youre Not Sure Exactly When You Conceived
You have several options for determining your conception date:
- An ultrasound is the most accurate way to see how far along your pregnancy is. Ultrasounds provide a detailed look at your babys development and will give you a good estimate of how far along your pregnancy is.
- An online pregnancy calculator can give an estimate of when you conceived based on when your last period was. This method is not as accurate as a confirmation ultrasound.
We offer free ultrasounds at our pregnancy center. Our medical professionals are trained in limited obstetrical ultrasound and provide medical services under the direction and supervision of a licensed physician.
How Accurate Is A Baby Due Date Calculator
A due date calculator is only an estimate. Your healthcare provider will examine you and your developing fetus to confirm your due date.
To get a more accurate idea of when your baby will be born, your provider will perform an ultrasound. During an ultrasound, your provider measures your baby. These measurements help your provider determine your babys gestational age and confirm your due date.
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You Are On Contraceptives Pills
Contraceptive pills, when taken continuously for months, inhibits ovulation and stop your period from coming.
How does contraceptive pills work?
Contraceptive pills work by maintaining blood concentration of estrogen and progesterone, thereby inhibiting hormones that cause ovulation.
If youre on continuous COC pills like seasonale and seasonique, which are taken non-stop for 84 days, your period could be delayed for months.
Regular pills are taken for 21 days then a free 7 days period. If you are on active pill on your free days, it will delay your period from coming.
Nevertheless, your seven days past due period may possibly be as a result of pregnancy. This happens if you had missed your medications for days to weeks with unprotected intercourse.
When To See A Doctor
Most women who have a positive pregnancy test should wait a week or two before calling the Ob/Gyn office for a pregnancy blood test or ultrasound to confirm the pregnancy. We suggest waiting because the rate of early pregnancy loss is high, and its possible that you might have had a chemical pregnancy.
However, women with a history of ectopic pregnancy or current abdominal pain should call the doctor right away to be examined. Ectopic pregnancies implant outside of the uterus and produce hCG, resulting in positive pregnancy tests. However, these pregnancies can cause abdominal bleeding and prompt medical care is necessary. Women who have congenital heart defects or other chronic physical or mental health conditions should also see a doctor right away because treatment plans or medications might need to be altered to protect the woman and the fetus.
Advances in home pregnancy tests give women greater insight into whats going on in their bodies sooner than ever before. No matter what your childbearing plans might be, its essential to get quick, accurate results at home to plan your next steps accordingly.
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How Many Weeks Pregnant Am I How Far Along You Are
Youve just found out youre pregnant so, naturally, one of the first things youll be wondering is how many weeks pregnant am I?!
Its important to understand that a due date is calculated using a simple formula based on averages.
Not your own unique body, exactly when your baby was conceived.
So that magic, exciting due date wont be totally accurate, but itll be close.
To find out how many weeks you are, use our pregnancy calculator. Youll need to know the first day of your last menstrual period.
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With most current pregnancy test kits, hCG can be detected in the urine as early as 3-4 days after implantation, though it often takes longer. If you are pregnant, on the day you miss your period about 74% of HPTs will be positive. So a negative pregnancy test is normal in about 26% of all pregnancies, and you may have to retest until you know the most accurate results. At 10+ days after the missed period, a negative HPT result makes pregnancy unlikely. Positive pregnancy test results can show up any time before or after a missed period.
Go to the Pregnancy Test Calculator and find out more
The graph below shows the % of positive urine tests by day if you are pregnant:
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How To Calculate The Estimated Due Date
To calculate the probable due date, which should be around 40 weeks after your LMD, add 7 days to your LMD, and then count 3 months back and add one year.
For example, if the LMD was March 11, 2021, add 7 days, , then subtract 3 months and add 1 year . In this case, the estimated due date is December 18, 2018.
This calculation is not because the baby can be born between 37 and 42 weeks of pregnancy, however, it allows the parents and health care team to prepare for delivery.
What To Ask Your Doctor
Once you get a positive pregnancy test, its time to make an appointment with the OB-GYN. Theyll be able to advise you on what to expect at week 5 of pregnancy, and also determine your gestational age and due date. Theyll probably order tests, review your family history, and schedule you for an ultrasound.
Discuss any symptoms with your doctor. Theyre also the best person to answer your doubts, from recommending the best prenatal supplements to the size of your 5-week embryo.
Week 5 of your pregnancy can bring many changes, from a positive pregnancy test to the many symptoms that you might develop. Its normal to feel anxious once you find out that youre expecting, but you should also enjoy these weeks as your body adjusts to a new life. While your 5-week old baby is still a long way from meeting the world, its already growing fast inside your belly. 8 months to go can seem like a long time, but youll be holding your new baby before you know it.
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With An Advanced Pregnancy Test With Weeks Estimator
You’ve already taken one test, but here’s a reason to take another. ClearBlue Easy’s Advance Pregnancy Test With Weeks Estimator, for example, could help you figure out when you got so pregnant all of a sudden. However, it will only estimate that you are 1 to 2 weeks, 2 to 3 weeks, or 3 plus weeks pregnant, so you do have to catch it pretty early if you want to learn anything you don’t already know.
Remember, if you feel woozy, hungry, fatigued, or have missed your period, you should always take some kind of test or better yet, visit your doctor.
While catching a pregnancy in the second or third trimester isn’t ideal, there’s also no reason to feel embarrassed. With all that’s at stake, doctors will be more than happy to see you at any point in your pregnancy, and only a doctor deserving of a seriously negative Yelp review will dare to judge. If this happens to you, your doctor will estimate how far along you are in your pregnancy based on an ultrasound and perhaps a fundal height measurement. Of course, its always best to have the most accurate due date. It allows us to properly time tests genetic tests, ultrasounds, and the glucose screen and also helps us time birth. Ideally, women go into labor spontaneously and at the right time, says Resendez Bassetti. But, if a woman begins to labor prematurely, knowing how far along the baby is determines how we treat it.
Experts:
Fertilization Of Your Eggs
Your egg travels down your fallopian tube , waiting for a single sperm to fertilize it.
The lucky sperm makes its way into the fallopian tube and burrows into the egg, fertilizing it. Once fertilized, the egg changes its lining to prevent other sperm from entering the egg.
Instantly upon fertilization, your babys sex and genes are determined.
The sperm decides whether the baby will be a boy or a girl: if the sperm has a Y chromosome, your baby will be a boy while if it carries an X chromosome, your baby will be a girl.
So, if you were hoping for different sex, talk to the father!
Once fertilized, the egg starts to divide from one cell to many cells.
It continues to divide as it moves slowly from the fallopian tube into the uterus, where it is looking for a home. Below is a microscopic image of the egg roughly 24 hours after fertilization.
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Key Indicators Of A Possible Pregnancy
Many women experience one or more pregnancy symptoms during a normal menstrual cycle, so you shouldnât panic if youâre a little nauseous, tired, or experiencing cramping. If youâve noticed several of the indicators below over the last few weeks, however, itâs worth a closer look. These signs often signal a pregnancy, but only an official pregnancy test or doctorâs visit will be able to tell you for sure.
What Do I Need To Know About Using A Pregnancy Due Date Calculator
A due date calculator may not be completely accurate. This is especially true if you arent exactly sure when you had your last period, you have irregular periods or you dont know when you conceived. You should see your provider for a more precise test, such as an ultrasound, to confirm your due date.
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Calculate Using Your Last Menstrual Period
The formula for calculating how far along you are is simply the number of days since the first day of your last menstrual period divided by seven:
Days since start of LMP ÷ 7 = # of weeks pregnant
Wondering how to calculate your number of months pregnant?
Days since start of LMP ÷ 30 = # of months pregnant
How Do Urine Pregnancy Tests Work
Pregnancy tests look for the pregnancy hormone hCG, which increases as a pregnancy progresses. The normal range for hCG levels in pregnant people can vary widely. It’s possible that your levels arent yet high enough to be detected .
An early pregnancy test might pick up very low amounts of hCG. However, its possible that you dont have enough circulating hCG to get a positive result even on a sensitive test.
This doesnt mean anything is wrong. How much hCG you have isn’t important rather, it’s how quickly your levels double and increase .
Another common reason for getting a false negative is not having enough hCG in the urine you test. In early pregnancy, you can dilute the hormone concentration in your urine if you drink a lot of water before testing.
This is more likely to happen in very early pregnancy when you take the test later in the day. The hCG concentration is higher when youve held your urine for a while, which is why it’s recommended that you take a pregnancy test in the morning.
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What Is A Late Period
If your period is late or youre wondering if youre pregnant, the days can tick by rather slowly. How long do you have to wait before taking a pregnancy test? The instructions on home pregnancy tests often talk about your missed period. What do they mean?
In the world of pregnancy testing, a missed period means you expected your menstrual bleeding to have started yesterday, and it still has not started. The day of your expected period depends on what your normal menstrual cycle looks like and when your last period started.
The menstrual cycle is the time from the first day of your period to the day before your next period starts. The average cycle is 28 days, with a pattern that looks something like this:
Some womens menstrual cycles last the same number of days every month. These women can accurately predict the day their period will start. Other women have a menstrual cycle that is a little different each month. Your period is still considered regular as long as it comes every 24 to 38 days.
How Is My Due Date Calculated
There are several ways your due date is determined. If you happen to know the day you conceived, you can count 38 weeks from that day to find your due date.
But very few expectant moms know exactly when they conceived. Even if you only had sex once during your fertile period, you wouldn’t conceive on that day unless you happen to be ovulating. Sperm can live for up to five days inside your fallopian tubes. So, it could be up to five days after you have sex that you release an egg and it gets fertilized by a waiting sperm. That’s the day you conceive.
So, without knowing the day of conception, how does anyone determine a due date?
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I Had Sex Two Weeks Ago But My Doctor Says That Im Four Weeks Pregnant How
88 things nobody tells you about being pregnantIf you have a standard 28-day period, you will likely ovulate around day 14 and are most fertile around days 12, 13 and 14when you had sex to conceive. It takes about nine days after ovulation for implantation to occur, which brings you to around day 23. It takes a few days for your pregnancy hormone levels to be detectable by a pregnancy test, bringing you to around day 28. How far along you are in your pregnancy isnt calculated from conception or implantation but from the first day of your last normal period. If you had your period four weeks ago, then ovulated and had sex two weeks ago to become pregnant, youre currently four weeks pregnant.
Rare Causes Of Test Malfunction
A rare, counterintuitive cause for a false negative is that you are too far along in your pregnancy. For example, if your period is weeks to months late, a pregnancy test might come up negative. This is called the variant hook effect.
Another unusual but possible reason for a false negative is that youre expecting triplets or even twins. In this case, a false negative pregnancy test can be caused by what is known as the high dose hook effect. Ironically, unusually high levels of hCG can cause a pregnancy test to give a false negative result.
A very rare cause of a false negative pregnancy test is when the hCG hormone in your body does not react with the anti-hCG chemicals in the test. In this case, you might need to wait a few more days before you can get a positive result or need to have a blood test.
You might ultimately need to have a serum pregnancy blood test or ultrasound to confirm pregnancy.
If you still haven’t gotten your period after a few more days, try the test again. If subsequent tests continue to show a negative pregnancy test result, you’ll want to talk to your healthcare provider about further testing.
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Whats Happening To Your Immune System
You might be catching more colds than normal, as your immune system is slightly impaired while pregnant.
While the common cold isnt an issue for little bubs, other infections can cause problems for unborn babies .
Try to avoid people with these viruses while pregnant.
Unfortunately for me, I was plagued with a cold the entire time coupled with 3 sinus infections!
NO FUN.
I am sure the reason was from the work environment I was in being around chemicals and such
Weeks Pregnant: First Ultrasound
You wont necessarily be having your first ultrasound when youre 5 weeks pregnant. In many cases, your doctor will schedule an appointment and ultrasound around weeks 8 or 9.
If there are any risks associated with your pregnancy, you might still get an ultrasound this week. A specialist is able to see the fertilized egg approximately in week 5 of the pregnancy. The heartbeat can be heard in week 6.
Usually, during pregnancy, an ultrasound is carried out using an abdominal sensor, but during the early pregnancy stages, a doctor can still perform a transvaginal examination.
The first ultrasound examination helps to confirm the heartbeat of the fetus and the fact that the pregnancy is not ectopic. Later, it allows you to see the location of the placenta and the umbilical cord, as well as to assess the overall condition of the child. Ultrasound enables one to monitor a successful course of pregnancy.
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