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It seems very important for pregnant women to constantly monitor their health by checking and confronting their pregnancy symptoms with those that should occur in a given week of pregnancy. In this case, the best way to find out is to use the available calendars describing each week of pregnancy in turn. Observing symptoms, however, can tell you little about what week a woman is actually pregnant. For this purpose, and to calculate the date of delivery, you can use home methods of calculation. About them below!
The beginning of pregnancy – when do we start counting?
The very moment of fertilization is called the beginning of pregnancy. Sometimes it’s hard to put this one day in time. Especially if the couple had intercourse often (daily) trying to conceive a child. However, this is not so important, because it is difficult to really calculate the date of pregnancy effectively, down to the day. It is worth to perform tests often when trying to conceive, which will later help in determining the day of conception.
Remember that ovulation lasts only about 24 hours, and this day occurs about two weeks after the last menstrual period (from the last day). Therefore, the period of pregnancy is most often calculated from the last day of menstruation, and not from the very day of conception! This is especially important for women whose cycles are irregular.
So it is enough to calculate the number of days (e.g. using the calendar) from the period of menstruation to today. In this way we will find out in which approximately week of pregnancy we are!
Pregnancy age: what you need to know!
- A human pregnancy lasts approximately 267 days, or 38 weeks (9 months). However, these actual calculations are not taken into account, and slightly rounded – precisely because it is usually impossible to determine the exact day of ovulation. So we assume that the hypothetical pregnancy will last 281 days (40 weeks).
In order to calculate the hypothetical date of delivery, it is necessary to move forward in time by approx. 281 days from the last day of the last menstrual period. It must be taken into account, however, that usually the calculated day will not directly mean the day of delivery. Add and subtract +/- 5 days to this day. In this way, we will calculate the possible time of birth that may occur within this period – 10 days. However, this method is very simple and does not always give good results.
Naegele’s rule
It is also better to use the formula designed by the German doctor Franz Naegele, it looks like this:
- Due date = first day of last menstrual period + 7 days – 3 months + 1 year
The downside of the above rule is again the assumption about the regularity of the woman’s cycle. It works only for women with a 28-day cycle. This formula was invented by a doctor living at the turn of 1778 – 1851 and although it is still used by gynecologists, it also does not give 100 percent. results!