Podcast EP 16
===
[00:00:00] When I left the fertility clinic, I remember being told that I had to use Op Ks and LH strips to bring my baby home. I had no idea what that meant, what they were, and how to use them. In today's video, I will be diving into how to use LH strips or O pks in order to track and pinpoint your ovulation. If you've been sitting on the fence feeling overwhelmed, maybe you've been trying to figure it all out and it's just not working, then keep listening, sis, 'cause I got you.
We are gonna dive into everything LH strips in order for you to pinpoint your fertile window, know that you've ovulated and avoid any common mistakes that I see people making so that you can see those positive to pink lines. Let's go. Hi, I'm Sophie Byfield and when I decided I was ready to be a mama, I thought it would be so easy.
Get off birth control, baby dance, like [00:01:00] no one's watching, and poof, I was pregnant. But like many of you, that wasn't my story. After months of negative tests, endless treatments, and more supplements than you can count, I realized that getting pregnant. Isn't about fixing one piece of your fertility puzzle, it's about bringing your whole body.
Back into balance so it feels safe enough to conceive. And this is where we focus on what really matters. Healing your whole body so that you can see those two pink lines. Welcome to the Heel to Conceive podcast. A la strips. La strips. La strips. Oh my. I remember when I decided to start tracking. Outside of the fertility clinic, when I was done with that process, how overwhelming the whole process felt.
I remember [00:02:00] using the digital ones because I thought it was gonna be great. It was gonna be easy, and just this happy face going from, you know, a standard to flashing and I didn't know what that meant. And what does this mean for timing? It was all so super overwhelming. One of the first things I do inside the Heel to Conceive tribe is teach you how to track your lh.
You see, the LH hormone is one of the most important hormones to getting pregnant because if your LH ain't doing what it's supposed to do, then you're not dropping an egg, and if there's no egg to fertilize, you can't get pregnant. So we are gonna dive into tracking it, understanding it, and why it's important and why timing is key.
The very first thing that you need to know, the LH hormone is the hormone that surges in your bloodstream to tell your ovary to release the egg. It starts to kind of move along. Do [00:03:00] do, do, do, do. Think of it as a train. Moving down the train tracks. It slowly needs to pick up speed. So as the train is starting to go, we know we have a little bit of a jolt, and then it starts to pick up, and then it starts to get pick up.
And once it has momentum, it starts going, LH works the exact same way. So when your cycle ends, when you stop bleeding, that is when you start tracking your lh. Now, for some people they bleed longer than nine days. I say no matter what, when you reach cycle day seven, start tracking your H with some hormones, we measure them with the first morning urine.
But when you first start tracking your lh, you actually should measure it between 10 and two or. Two to four hours after you have been awake, so not first morning urine. The reason being is LH goes through your [00:04:00] bloodstream and then is processed out through the kidneys, so it takes time for it to move through your bloodstream.
That time that it takes doesn't get captured in your urine until later in the day as you move closer to peak. So as the line starts to get darker, you want to test multiple times a day. Let me say it again. For the people in the back, as the line starts to get darker, you wanna test multiple times a day.
Because the concentration of LH in your bloodstream has risen, so therefore you will see it in first morning urine, afternoon, urine, evening urine. You will see it more, and we wanna make sure we catch that peak. So testing, you know, in the morning and then again in the afternoon will truly help you to make sure you nail it.
Hey, some of my clients have to test morning, afternoon, and evening [00:05:00] as they get closer to their peak day just to make sure they don't miss it. So if you can, we start on day seven, just testing in the morning as the line starts to get darker. We're testing morning, afternoon, and sometimes evening to make sure you don't miss your peak.
Fun fact that I learned the hard way. Drinking too much water can dilute the amount of LH inside your urine. Therefore. Making it undetectable, making the LH undetectable. I laugh because I upped my water to a gallon and then I missed it my whole entire cycle because I was drinking so much water. So make sure that your water levels are consistent throughout.
So how do we use the strips? Well, I've got my strips here, so let's, let's dive in. You are gonna open your package. Make sure you have dry hands. I like to collect urine in a plastic cup. It's the easiest thing to use, and then you can just throw it away. You're going [00:06:00] to hold the LH strip on the blue side.
We dip the strip into the urine and we're gonna hold it there for about 10 seconds. You are going to let the strip rest for three to five minutes. Before you read it, if you read it too early, you can be left confused. So what are you looking for when you are looking at the strip? The line should be getting progressively darker as you go to know you've reached peak.
You want the test line to be as dark or darker than the control line that tells you you've reached peak. If the test line is lighter than the control line, that means that there's LH present in your system, but you have not reached peak yet. Something to consider if you have PCOS or irregular cycles.
Sis, your LH may rise multiple times. People will say to you, well, LH is always present if you have PCOS. So how do you know which one is ovulation? This [00:07:00] is when we wanna use a second method like BBT to confirm that you've ovulated. Also, if you have irregular cycles or PCOS, I don't want you to stop using LH strips the first rise.
I want you to keep tracking it all the way through your cycle. So from cycle day one to cycle day one, track it all the way through so we can see the trends in patterns in your LH to get you pregnant. It's all about trends and patterns. If we can see that you have multiple LH rises, but we also use BBT to confirm, we know that you've ovulated.
If you only go off the first rise, you can be left confused, wondering if you peaked and not truly knowing if you've ovulated. So let me know below. How do you feel about LH tracking? How do you feel about the strips? Are you loving it? Are you hating it? Are you feeling completely overwhelmed? Since we dive [00:08:00] into all of this and more inside the heel, the conceived tribe, and with my course, the Ovulation Solution, I walk you through step by step exactly how to track your cycle so you can pinpoint your fertile window to bring your baby home.
But for now, let's just get you started with lh. LH is super important and really, truly understanding what is going on with your body can bring your baby home faster. Remember, you deserve to be a mom. You've got this. And when you don't feel like you got it, I got you. Baby. Death for all.
