How the calendar tracking method of natural family planning works

What is it and what it the success rate?

The calendar tracking method is one way that people track their cycle to know when they are ovulating and what phase of their cycle, they are in for both family planning purposes and body awareness. Fertility awareness methods are just as successful at preventing pregnancy; (and I would argue more so because it does not cause a miscarriage and claim that is successful pregnancy prevention for its numbers) as any other form of birth control when done properly. Although it is important to take into account user error which decreases the effectiveness from 95-99% down to 76-88%. If you intend to use these methods to prevent pregnancy and you are not confident in your ability to determine your fertility window you may want to consider reading one of my other posts on trusting God with your family and on medical birth control and then decide if adding a barrier method is right for your family and season.

So how does it work?

For this particular method it is best to be acquainted with the length of your cycle over the length of 8-12 months and will require some basic math. The average cycle is 28-32 days long with the first 2-7 days being your menstrual cycle, you can use the length of your cycle even if slightly varying to determine when your fertility window is. After you have gotten your longest and shortest cycles you will subtract 18 days from your shortest cycle to find the first day of your fertile window. For example, if your shortest cycle is 28 days then you will mark the start of your fertile window as day 10. To find the last day of your fertile window you will subtract 11 from your longest cycle. So, if your longest cycle is 34 days the last day of your fertile window you would put as day 23. this means that from day 10 to day 23 in your cycle if your shortest cycle is 28 days and your longest cycle is 34 days, would be your fertility window. If you are trying to avoid pregnancy this would be a good time to abstain from sex or to combine this method with another form or prevention (condoms, or spermicides). If your intentions are to get pregnant this is the time you will want to have sex. You aren't able to get pregnant on every day of this widow but there is a possibility that you can on any of those days and your ovulation will fall somewhere in there.

Who is this method best for?

The calendar method will work best with people who have more regular cycles (26-32 days consistently) when trying to prevent pregnancy. This method will also be best for someone who is not yet married and is not sextually active and just getting to know their body or you have the time before your wedding to prepate a cycle history because you need a history up at least 8-12 cycle lengths established before you are able to determine your longest and shortest cycles for this to be accurate. If you have already been using some method to track your cycle length then this method will work well for you too. There are other forms of FAM's that will work wonderfully with irregular cycles or people who have no history but are already married and looking to prevent pregnancy for a time, I will be talking about some of those in the next few posts.

If you're trying to achieve a pregnancy this might work for you if you are just getting started and have no disadvantages to your fertility but since it doesn't identify and exact Peak or ovulation day like other methods, it is not likely to be as effective. If you have been trying for a while with no success I welcome, you to follow along here for the next posts that help to narrow down more closely a specific 4-6 day window to aim for.

Stay tuned for more Fertility awareness methods that fit all different lifestyles, cycles and routines.