When do pregnancy mood swings start? Emotional turbulence tends to hit hardest during the first trimester, as your body is adjusting to changing hormone levels. For some women, mood swings are one of the earliest signs of pregnancy, starting as soon as week 4.
Mood swings are mostly experienced during the first trimester between 6 to 10 weeks and then again in the third trimester as your body prepares for birth.
Mood swings can start to happen pretty early in pregnancy, but they can also be a normal part of non-pregnant life as a response to stress, lack of sleep, or a mood disorder. Here's what might be triggering your pregnancy mood swings (with those pesky hormones in tow).
Does a pregnancy test appear positive at 2 weeks? Typically, at-home tests will not start to register a pregnancy until at least week 4 or after a woman misses her first period. Pregnancy tests help determine if a woman is pregnant by measuring the presence of certain hormones.
In many cases, you might get a positive result from an at-home test as early as 10 days after conception. For a more accurate result, wait until after you've missed your period to take a test. Remember, if you take a test too soon, it could be negative even if you're pregnant.
Obviously, a bad mood could be caused by many things, but mood swings are one of the early signs of pregnancy, experienced as early as three weeks after conception. “Some people feel more irritable,” says Dr. Celestine. If you're feeling anxious or depressed, you're not alone.
Apart from sickness and tiredness, it's common to have mood swings and feel tearful or easily irritated (Society for Endocrinology, 2018). Once the body has adapted to the higher levels of these hormones, the symptoms usually wear off. However, some women will experience them throughout their pregnancy.
Some people have no pregnancy symptoms at week 1, while others may experience symptoms such as fatigue, breast tenderness, and mild cramping. Typically, medical professionals measure pregnancy week 1 from the first day of a woman's last menstrual period.
Unfortunately, no matter how much we feel that we may know our bodies, pregnancy cannot be self-diagnosed. The only way to know whether or not you're pregnant is through a pregnancy test.
You may notice a few subtle hormonal changes, like having a better sense of smell. There may be light red or brown spotting on your underwear. You may need to urinate more. You could start to feel fatigued as your body starts changing.
Every pregnancy is different, so it's hard to predict if you'll notice changes in your body, especially just two weeks after conception. Early pregnancy symptoms such as tender breasts, tiredness and feeling sick, are easy to confuse with signs that your period is coming on.
Week 4 of pregnancy
For example, a fertilised egg may have implanted in your womb just 2 weeks ago, but if the first day of your last period was 4 weeks ago, this means you're officially four weeks pregnant! Pregnancy normally lasts from 37 weeks to 42 weeks from the first day of your last period.
Crying during the first trimester is not unusual, as this is a time when hormone levels in the body are changing. Higher levels of both estrogen and progesterone during the first trimester appear to be responsible for some of the mood swings, manifested by irritability and sadness. Plus, pregnancy is a big life change.
But there are symptoms during the two-week wait that are specific to early pregnancy. Two-week-wait symptoms that may signify early pregnancy include light vaginal bleeding or spotting,2 nausea with vomiting and, eventually, a missed period.
Symptom 4: Changes to Your Mood and Feelings
Along with changes to your body, the hormonal surges in early pregnancy can change your mood and feelings as well. Pay attention to symptoms such as: Unexplained irritability or crankiness. Sudden mood shifts (such as feeling happy one moment and then very sad soon after)
Some women may notice symptoms as early as 5 DPO, although they won't know for certain that they are pregnant until much later. Some of the early symptoms are breast tenderness, mood changes, and implantation bleeding or cramps, which can occur 5–6 days after the sperm fertilizes the egg.
Makers of pregnancy tests advise that tests taken in the first week or two after conception could be inaccurate because pregnancy hormones may not have risen high enough to be detected.
In general, it's normal to experience some cramping in your pregnancy, particularly early on.1 That doesn't mean you shouldn't ask your doctor any questions you have, especially if it's your first baby or what you feel is different than previous pregnancies.
Very early signs of pregnancy include a missed period and implantation bleeding (light spotting resulting from the egg implanting in the uterus). You may notice these signs during the first month of pregnancy, and you may also notice some gas, bloating, fatigue, and moodiness.
Most OBs count pregnancy starting from the first day of your last menstrual period (LMP). (It's more accurate for doctors to estimate a due date this way.) So if you think you conceived about two weeks ago, you're probably at least four weeks pregnant—maybe even five. We give you permission to skip ahead to week four.
You may feel very tired and have nausea, breasts that feel tender or sore, and heightened sensitivity to smell. You may also notice light spotting (from implantation bleeding). Other common early pregnancy symptoms include mood swings, frequent urination, bloating, food aversions, and excess saliva.