What to expect when you're expecting by Heidi Murkoff, Sharon Mazel Read Free Book Online

that if your test is positive, you can be, too. The other good news: Because HPTs provide a very accurate diagnosis very early in pregnancy—earlier than you would probably consider consulting a physician or midwife—they can give you the opportunity to start taking optimum care of yourself within days of conception. Still, medical follow-up to the test is essential. If the result is positive, have it confirmed by a blood test and a complete prenatal checkup.
    The blood test. The more sophisticated blood pregnancy test can detect pregnancy with virtually 100 percent accuracy as early as one week after conception (barring lab error), using just a few drops of blood. It can also help date the pregnancy by measuring the exact amount of hCG in the blood, since hCG values change as pregnancy progresses (see page 140 for more on hCG levels).Many practitioners order both a urine and a blood test to be doubly certain of the diagnosis.
    The medical exam. Though a medical exam can be performed to confirm the diagnosis of a pregnancy, with today’s accurate HPTs and blood tests, the medical exam—which looks for physical signs of pregnancy such as enlargement of the uterus, color changes in the vagina and cervix, and a change in the texture of the cervix—is almost beside the point. Still, getting that first exam and beginning regular prenatal care isn’t (see page 19 ).
A Faint Line

    “When I took a home pregnancy test, it showed a really faint line. Am I pregnant?”
    The only way a pregnancy test can give you a positive result is if your body has a detectable level of hCG running through it (or in this case, through your urine). And the only way that your body can have hCG running through it is if you’re pregnant. Which means that if your test is showing a line, no matter how faint it is—you’re pregnant.
    Just why you’re getting a faint line instead of that loud-and-clear line you were hoping for has a lot to do with the type of test you’ve used (some are much more sensitive than others) and how far along you are in your pregnancy (levels of hCG rise each day, so if you test early, there’s only a little hCG to tap into).
    To figure out just how sensitive your pregnancy test is, check out the packaging. Look for the milli-international units per liter (mIU/L) measurement, which will tell you the sensitivity of the test. The lower the number, the better (20 mIU/L will tell you you’re pregnant sooner than a test with a 50 mIU/L sensitivity). Not surprisingly, the more expensive tests usually have greater sensitivity.
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    Testing for the Irregular

    So your cycles don’t exactly run on schedule? That’ll make scheduling your testing date a lot trickier. After all, how can you test on the day that your period’s expected if you’re never sure when that day will come? Your best testing strategy if your periods are irregular is to wait the number of days equal to the longest cycle you’ve had in the last six months—and then test. If the result is negative and you still haven’t gotten your period, repeat the test after a week (or after a few days if you just can’t wait).
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    Keep in mind, too, that the further along in your pregnancy you are, the higher your levels of hCG. If you’re testing very early on in your pregnancy (as in a few days before your expected period or even a few days after your expected period), there might not be enough hCG in your system yet to generate a no-doubt-about-it line. Give it a couple of days, test again, and you’ll be sure to see a line that’ll erase your doubts once and for all.
No Longer Positive

    “My first pregnancy test came back positive, but a few days later I took another one and it came back negative. And then I got my period. What’s going on?”
    It sounds like you may have experienced a chemical pregnancy, a pregnancy that ends practically before it evenbegins. In a chemical pregnancy, the egg is fertilized and begins to implant in the uterus, but for