Is it possible that irregular menstrual cycle makes you less fertile?

Every woman's menstrual cycle can get thrown off by a number of factors at some point in her menstrual history. Our article answers some pointed questions about abnormal menstrual cycles and how they might affect a woman's fertility.

Why is my period irregular?

Your best friend can set her watch by the arrival of her period; the fourth Monday of every month, between 4 and 5 PM. You, on the other hand, bounce between four-, five-, and six-week cycles. You may even skip a menstrual cycle every once in a while. What's going on here? It may reassure you to know that somewhat irregular menstrual cycles are actually more common than regular ones. Your cycle may fluctuate for a variety of reasons, including illness, travel, stress, exercise level, and significant weight loss or gain. Adolescents, women who are breast feeding, and those who have recently stopped taking birth control pills also commonly experience fluctuations in their menstrual cycles.

Should I worry if my menstrual cycle is irregular?

Are you less likely to get pregnant than your punctual friend? Not necessarily. Fertility depends on ovulation; the release of a healthy egg from the ovary rather than on menstruation. As long as you're ovulating normally and can determine when ovulation occurs, your chances of getting pregnant won't be affected by irregular periods.

The exception to this rule is if your cycles are very long. It's mathematically obvious that women who ovulate every six weeks  or about nine times a year  have fewer opportunities to get pregnant than those who ovulate monthly. For this reason, women with long cycles are sometimes given fertility drugs like Clomid to regulate ovulation. Women over 35 and those who don't ovulate regularly are more likely to be candidates for drug therapy than are those who simply have irregular cycles.

Tips for Maximizing Fertility

If your cycle is irregular, it's impossible to guesstimate when ovulation will occur. You must use ovulation predictor kits, examine your cervical mucus, or take daily basal body temperature readings preferably some combination of the three.

If you exercise a great deal say, if you work out every day for several hours, or you're in training for a marathon peak to your doctor to determine whether you need to cut back. Women need a certain level of body fat in order to ovulate normally. If you're seriously overweight, speak to your doctor about starting a gradual weight-loss program. Obesity may affect hormonal signals to the ovaries and interfere with ovulation. In addition, increased weight can cause insulin levels to climb, causing the ovaries to overproduce male hormones and stop releasing eggs.

WHEN ARE YOU MOST FERTILE?

Believe it or not, you can look at fertility in much the same way as businesspeople look at economics large scale (macro) and small scale (micro). On other levels, of course, we wouldn't wish to compare the deeply personal and intimate act of creating a child with the cold world of industry and commerce, but when it comes to the issue of conception timing, you really have to look at what's happening with the big picture of your life as well as the month-to-month details.

Following this line of thinking, the large-scale, or macro, viewpoint of fertility looks at the period when you're most fertile during your childbearing years. The small-scale, or micro, perspective focuses on when during any given month you're most likely to conceive. If you're a woman, you're at your most fertile from the ages of 20 to 24. Of course, in our current society, many couples are choosing to start families later. And while you can't deny biology, not having a child in your early 20s doesn't mean you're not capable of having one later on. By the time you're 40 years old, your odds of getting pregnant have dropped from 90 percent to 67 percent. This means that you still have a chance although not as great of a chance of conceiving.

Regardless of where you are in your reproductive years, there's another, smaller-scale guide to your fertility, and that is your monthly cycle. Women tend to be most fertile in the days leading up to and during ovulation (when a matured egg is released and ready for fertilization). Ovulation occurs toward the middle of your menstrual cycle. Once released, a typical egg lives 12 to 24 hours, and generally only one egg is released during each cycle. So, if pregnancy is your goal, take advantage of the days around ovulation when your body is at its most fertile.

TRACKING YOUR FERTILE DAYS

The methods for preventing pregnancy are fairly direct although not always foolproof. When it comes to conceiving, however, you may find that there's a lot more planning and even guessing involved. How can something so natural take so much work? Fortunately, it may be easier than you think to find those magical days of ovulation when you're most fertile. There are a number of options, and most can be done on your own:

Bodily observations: Ovulation isn't nearly as conspicuous as menstruation, but if you pay attention to your body, you can sometimes tell you're ovulating. Signs might include light spotting, slight abdominal pain on one side and increased sex drive.

Calculating your cycle: Ovulation generally occurs in the middle of your cycle, and can be anywhere from day 11 to day 21. To pinpoint this phase, count from the first day of your last menstrual period. There are many online ovulation calculators you can use to help with this.

Charting your basal body temperature; when your body releases an egg, it also releases progesterone, a hormone that thickens your uterine lining and also slightly increases your body temperature. You can find basal thermometers at most drugstores, and use them to see if you can detect a rise in temperature during certain times of the month.

Tracking the luteinizing hormone (LH); this hormone is responsible for releasing an egg during ovulation. Ovulation kits that check for LH levels in your urine provide a fairly accurate means for determining ovulation.

Now that you know how to find your most fertile days, your next step is to take advantage of them. And don't pressure yourself to find the exact day of ovulation; viable sperm can live in the reproductive tract for up to three days.

FACT: Age affects men's fertility also

A lot of emphasis is put on women's fertile years probably because it's a narrower window of time, but men are also less likely to reproduce as time goes by. Like women, men become more infertile as they age and more prone to producing children with illnesses and birth defects.