new to charting/temping/keeping track question

flyliceandcoffee

This may be a stupid question for most of you, but since I'm pretty new to the whole charting and keeping track of all the things, I've got something I've been trying to understand for a bit now.

From my understanding, opks would tell you when you're having the LH surge, which would be when you're ovulating, while keeping track of your temp would tell you after you've ovulated. Why is it, or is it even, more preferable to keep track of your temp rather than using opks? It would seem to me that knowing before/when you're about to ovulate would be preferable to knowing after it's already happened?

WinoGrrl

Well - from what I've read (and I'm far from an expert) but you can have an LH surge and never actually ovulate. Tracking both OPK and Temps will give you a better picture on IF ovulation actually happened. I'm sure the more expert ladies will speak up if I'm incorrect.

tlc35

WinoGrrl said:

Well - from what I've read (and I'm far from an expert) but you can have an LH surge and never actually ovulate. Tracking both OPK and Temps will give you a better picture on IF ovulation actually happened. I'm sure the more expert ladies will speak up if I'm incorrect.

This is correct.  OPKs predict ovulation and temping confirms it.  You won't know when you ovulated with temping until after the fact so it doesn't help you "schedule" sex.  You can have a LH surge and not ovulate, so you might have a surge, not ovulate but think you did and stop having sex.  I do both so that I get the most complete picture of my cycle.

flyliceandcoffee

that makes so much more sense!

Radiantly

That's why! Then after your temp goes up you can start counting down to Testing/ waitin for AF.

lcwed

Like PP said, knowing when your period comes can save you a lot of money and heart ache from testing too early and frequently.