If you are born with an abnormally high egg or sperm count, have an extremely regular cycle, or have many healthy eggs in older age, you could be “super” fertile.
Overall, many women experience the time of highest energy and best mood when their fertility is high and ovulation is approaching! One study found that women naturally cycling experience positive mood changes around ovulation, relative to those on hormonal contraceptives (not ovulating).
The prime time to have sex is on the day of, or the day after, ovulation. However, the presence of wet or slippery cervical fluid is a strong indication of fertility, and sex on the days prior to ovulation can result in pregnancy.
You ovulate about 12 to 14 days before the start of a new menstrual cycle. Your fertile window is the five days leading up to ovulation, plus the day of ovulation and the day after ovulation — so about seven days in total.
Cramping
Ovulation can cause mild discomfort in the form of light cramps or twinges in the lower abdomen. You may feel ovulation cramping on one side of your abdomen (on the side that's releasing the egg). This is known as mittelschmerz (German for "middle pain").
During the average woman's menstrual cycle there are six days when intercourse can result in pregnancy; this “fertile window” comprises the five days before ovulation and the day of ovulation itself. Just as the day of ovulation varies from cycle to cycle so does the timing of the six fertile days.
Ovulation pain, also called mittelschmerz, happens when people experience ovulation cramps or other pain when they ovulate. Ovulation pain isn't harmful. Most of the time, you can treat it with pain relievers from the drug store, heating pads and warm baths.
Human males also detect the high-fertility (ovulatory) period in women by bodily odour [4], which may act as a form of sexual stimulant for men [5, 6].
Once the sperm enters the reproductive system, it can take about 30-45 minutes to reach the egg. For this, it is important to have a healthy sperm which has the right kind of motility to reach the egg and fertilize it. Once inside the body of a woman, a healthy sperm can live up to 2-5 days.
Some women may notice symptoms as early as 5 DPO, although they won't know for certain that they are pregnant until much later. Early signs and symptoms include implantation bleeding or cramps, which can occur 5–6 days after the sperm fertilizes the egg. Other early symptoms include breast tenderness and mood changes.
The 'fertile window' is the day an egg is released from the ovary (ovulation) and the five days beforehand. Having sex (intercourse) during this time gives you the best chance of getting pregnant.
You are more likely to get pregnant from sex that occurs on just three days out of the month. At most, you are potentially fertile for seven days each month.
You have a regular cycle with 27 days between periods.
You will most likely ovulate on day 13. Your most fertile days are day eight, day nine, day 10, day 11, day 12, day 13, and day 14.
Therefore, it is also possible to get pregnant in the 2 days after ovulation, but this is less likely. As a result, there are around 21 days in the menstrual cycle on which pregnancy is less likely. The days before and during menstruation are the least fertile days of the menstrual cycle.
Track Your Most Fertile Days
Generally, the best chance of pregnancy is when sex happens 1-2 days before ovulation. If you have a regular 28-day cycle, count back 14 days from when you expect your next period to start. Plan on having sex every other day around that time -- say, days 12 and 14.
Within 24 hours of ovulation: Sperm fertilizes an egg (conception occurs). About six days after fertilization: The fertilized egg implants into your uterine lining. Around day 21: If conception and implantation occurred during this menstrual cycle, you're pregnant.
You may experience a lot of milky or pale yellow vaginal discharge during early pregnancy. Once sperm and egg meet, the volume of discharge can increase as your vagina tries to get rid of bacteria that might be harmful to the new pregnancy.
After ovulation, estrogen levels drop down while progesterone takes the stage until period. In the right levels, progesterone has a balancing on estrogen and prevents many signs such as breast tenderness.
The most reliable way to know if sperm has entered the egg is by taking a pregnancy test a few days after the anticipated start of your period. This test measures the level of human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) in your urine, which is only present if your body is pregnant.
The sperm enters the egg in the fallopian tube. It can happen even 3-5 days after ejaculation. There is no way for either of the partners to know if the sperm entered the egg. The only way to know for sure if the sperm did enter the egg is after a positive pregnancy test.
It takes just one sperm to fertilize a woman's egg. Keep in mind, though, for each sperm that reaches the egg, there are millions that don't. On average, each time men ejaculate they release nearly 100 million sperm.
You are most likely to experience increased libido as you approach ovulation and a drop in libido once ovulation occurs. According to research, this phase of increased sexual desire lasts for around six days and coincides with the production of luteinizing hormone (LH).
Because estradiol was lower in the early follicular phase relative to the other two cycle phases, our findings are consistent with the possibility that within-women increases in estradiol produce subtle increases in face shape attractiveness.