[ProudMomof2Boys416]

Hi Everybody!. I'm new to this board but I've been a member of JM for just over 3 years now!. I was wondering if I would be able to join you since I will be charting until we start TTC in May 2010

My name is Lindsay (27), I am married to my DH, Tim (29) and we have 2 boys together, Aiden (2.5) and Caleb (10 months).

I was using OPK's but found them to be a little too hard to read for myself. I want to get the digital OPK's but they are so expensive!. So I decided to try and chart my BBT. Last night was my first time doing it. I woke up at 5am, rolled over and took my temperature immediatly. I'm surprised I remembered not to get up or talk or anything!. I was supposed to wake up at 6:00 but for some reason, I woke up at 5:00 out of the blue and decided to do it then. The only problem with that is, I can't remember if that gave me a good 3 hours of uninterupted sleep. I am on the heavy days of my period so I needed to get up to change and I believe it was around 1:50 when I got up....but I can't remember what time I fell back asleep.....so I'm not sure if I got the full 3 hours you are supposed to get before you test. Would that be a problem?. My temperature was 97.52.

That brings me to my other question though if you don't mind. If I get a reading like the one I got last night, do you round the numbers?. If so, how do you do it?. Is anything 4 and under, you round down and is anything 5 and above you round up?. I did notice on FertilityFriend.com (which is what I'm using) you can actually put in the exact number you got. So I was able to put in the whole 97.52 reading I got last night. Do I need to round up since I can do it that way?

Thank you so much in advance for your help!. Hope to get to know you all better soon!

[Coley]

Hi Lindsay!! I'm Coley (Nikki) the host of this board!!!
You are absolutely more than welcome to come and join us!! We've got a nice little group of girls here who are fantastic at answering questions and both interpreting and stalking charts!!

As for your temp... I would put in the reading that you got, but change the time of day it was taken. This will give you an Open Circle, meaning the temp was taken outside the normal window of time. You can then check the Sleep Deprived box down below.

FF will probably say something about temps being rocky due to one or more temps being taken outside the normal time, but that's not a big deal. It happens to everyone.... you sleep in on a weekend or wake up early, life happens.

I wouldn't worry too much about it right now anyway because temps can fluctuate pretty wildly during AF... so these aren't temps that are going to mean a whole heck of a lot later on down the road.

As for rounding. NO. You do NOT want to round. If you round, 97.71 and 97.74 will look like the same thing on a chart when they clearly are not. You would see a chart that appears to be full of "flat temps" when in all actuality the temps are indeed increasing.

Welcome again and I look forward to getting to know you much better over the coming weeks!! Here's a bit of Super Concentrated Fertility Charting Baby just to get you started!!

[HopefulMommy81]

Um yeah, exactly what Nikki said LOL. I wouldn't ever round your temperature and during AF your temps are going to be all over the place, so don't worry if that happens.
Hi, Lindsay, I'm Jacque (28) and DH is Jason (29) and we are TTC our first after two early losses. I think it's great that you are starting to temp BEFORE TTC- I wish I had done that LOL Good luck and feel free to ask any questions you might have- we all ask a lot and love to answer them, too

[ProudMomof2Boys416]

Thank you both so much for your warm welcome and your help!. You both really helped me out alot!

[Admin-pattyandthemoos]

Sorry I am getting to this so late but I wanted to welcome you to the board. Nikki did a great job answering your questions. We have a lot of ladies on this board that have been charting a while and can help you if you need anything.

I hope you like it here. Stick around!