As of about a week ago, we've pretty much started trying to conceive. After weighing up all the pros and cons, and considering finances and stuff, we decided that we might as well start trying.

So we did.

I started charting, but I've never really kept track of my periods. Generally I get one a month, sometimes it'll work out so I get one at the beginning and one at the end of a month, I'm fairly regular. But I usually just have a feeling about when it's due, so I've never really bothered working things out like that before. That does make it a little bit tricky for charting because I had to estimate roughly when I would be ovulating. So we decided to just make like rabbits for the approximate time when I would be ovulating. Ha ha!

We only missed two days. Once because I was too tired, and last night because I have come down with a cold and felt rotten (plus J was complaining that I was wearing him out )

According to my calculations, yesterday was my last possible day of ovulation anyway, so we'll see. Perhaps we did it earlier in the week.

I'm not wanting to get too hopeful, in some respects, if it didn't happen this month, it wouldn't be a bad thing because it would give me more info for the future.

Everything's due around about Christmas (day after my wedding according to one chart ) so we'll wait and see. And keep our fingers crossed of course.

Meanwhile, I've been spending my time pricing things up, figuring out what counts as essentials, what we can do without. I like to make lists and plan things. Yesterday I worked out the best places to buy car seats, prams/pushchairs, cots and cot mattresses, because those are my main essentials. Even with those, the pushchair and cot I'm hoping to get secondhand, so long as the mattress and car seat are brandnew, I'll be happy.

Plus, thanks to places like this, I've realised that things like a baby bath aren't really so important, nor are fancy outfits or a bunch of other things. I'm actually beginning to feel quite prepared.

So we'll see how things go, and hopefully I'll have need of a pregnancy test kit in the new year.

Good luck! The 2-week-wait can be tough.

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Yeah, I'm finding that. And I'm imagining that everything is a symptom as well

I'm seriously like 'ooh I feel crampy' then five minutes later it's 'wow, I'm peeing a lot today' and then the next day I'm all tired. I swear if I was researching TB or something I would be having all those symptoms instead.

J didn't seem to realise we had to wait so long to do a test. He was wanting to buy one the other day and I had to explain that it wouldn't be accurate that soon after doing it . I think I'm more prepared for it not to have happened this month, but that's not going to stop me from reading into every little thing.

Good luck! The first time charting was horrible for me, lol. It was so difficult to not read into everything.

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Reading into every little thing is what TTC is all about lol! I hope this is a short journey for you.

I hope your journey is short and smooth!

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Jen

I really think J will be more disappointed than me if I get my period this month. I've warned him not to get his hopes up too much. He's reading into every little thing too. I've developed a cold (woo hoo, less than a week til the wedding and I've turned into the snot monster!) and last night my boobs were all sensitive, he got all excited - which is not the correct response when your other half can't stop sneezing and clearly has a temperature.

It's also around a week until I'm due on (yeah, that was good wedding planning). Normally about this time of the month I start getting these niggly cramps and I just get that feeling where you just know it's coming. And I get hormonal. I cry at everything. Seriously, everything. Someone will tell me I look nice, and I'll cry. Someone will ask me for help finding something, and I will cry. Then it'll stop. Two or three days of weird emotional moodswings and then I get my period.

So I'm kind of waiting for that now. But I'm feeling quite good just now, aside from the stinking cold.

The other day when I was at work I made a list of my main baby essentials. A cot, a mattress, a pushchair and a car seat. If we buy them all new, and go for a car seay which will last until the baby is 18kg, and a pushchair is good for a couple of years, we'd be looking to spend somewhere in the region of £210. Less if we can get the cot and pushchair secondhand.

I also measured the space at the end of the bed to check that a cot would fit in there. We didn't have a tape measure to hand so I got J (who is 6') to lie on the floor at the end of the bed. The cot would be a little over 4' so we won't have any problem lengthways. I still want to measure the width because the room is narrow and there's wardrobes at the end of the bed on either side.

I'm also wanting to clear the spare bedroom. It's got a lot of my junk in it, as well as business stuff. Think I'll save that until the new year. I've got a bit box of stuff that I was supposed to be saving to sort out. But I put it there when J moved in and I've only taken about three things out of it since then. Part of me says just send the lot to charity.

I'm also working on what I'm eating. A few years ago I was diagnosed with IBS, I'm largely set off by stress but so by diet, dairy especially, but also fatty/greasy foods. When J moved in I accidentally buried my pills in the aforementioned box. I'd gradually been reducing the number I was taking anyway, once I'd realised what foods I needed to avoid. It's now been more months than I care to remember since I took them, which is good because I want to speak to the doctor about whether I can take them if I'm pregnant, until then I'd rather err on the side of caution. The diet side of things is easy to deal with but what with wedding plans and car troubles, hopefully the stress won't get the better of me.

And you know, the more I think about it, the more excited I feel, the more hopeful I feel. Looking at a friend's photos of her baby has probably caused that. I want one of my own!

I'm happy to see that you've found a home here and are ready to start a journal. We love following along! Good luck! Are you getting married around Christmas or did you mean around when the baby would be DUE? I can't remember, although I think you've told us before what your plans are with that! I have not had a lot of time to read on here lately, so I've been hit or miss with details!

Best wishes. It is a fun journey!

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Congrats on TTC!! I hope that it is a very short journey for you!!

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Benny and Shan March 30th 2002