Ovulating during period?

[emilzewinter]

Hi,
Last month, I spotted for 7 days and then got my period which only lasted two days. This month, I was supposed to get it today and I am spotting(brown). However, I have been tracking my cervical mucus and have the clear stretchy mucus(can stretch few inches). I want to believe that I am about to get my period(had a pregnant scare from boyfriend fingering me with precum). Is it possible to ovulate during period/spotting without being pregnant?

[Heather]

Ovulation and menstruation will not occur at the same time, no. It's most common to ovulate only once in a cycle, and around the middle of a cycle, but there is variation for some that includes ovulating twice, or doing so very close to a period after it starts, or very close to a period before it begins.

(And in the rare case it did happen, because off things do happen now and then, all the other factors involved beyond just an ovum released from the fallopian tubes would NOT be at play -- cervical position, available uterine lining that isn't being shed, the pH of the vagina, not to mention having to engage in sexual activity that can even pose a pregnancy risk in the first place.)

If you want to chart ovulation properly, you really have to:
a) Do a combo of cervical mucus AND basal temp daily tracking,
and
b) be doing it for at least a few months of fairly regular cycles before you can even begin to interpret that data soundly (and then the info/education to do that)

[emilzewinter]

I just thought I was ovulating since based on cervical discharge, I don't think I ever ovulated this month until now, thought that was because my period came late last month, I might be wrong. Since I did not do an activity that posed a risk, is my brown spotting just a sign that my period will begin soon? I was afraid that I was ovulating now and that conception occurred and my brown discharge was implantation bleeding.

[Heather]

Have you been charting BOTH those things -- or even just the mucus -- for at least three regular cycles, where you can look at all of those charts? If not, seriously, there's just no sense in us talking about when you did or didn't ovulate, because we can't know or at all accurately predict that from just one day's cervical mucus.

I'm thinking the answer here is no, if for no other reason than you have recently had cycle irregularity.

We also can't know why people are spotting. But as you probably already know, sometimes menstrual periods do start that way.

Once more with feeling: people who aren't pregnant don't have bleeding or spotting from pregnancy. And people who have not been part of the things that can realistically create a pregnancy are not pregnant.

If you are still feeling scared and panicked around this, it's time for some more self-care, not still focusing on stuff like this, which only keeps people in panic.

[emilzewinter]

That makes sense. Thank you, I really appreciate it. I just have to relax and not think about everything so much. I just started tracking this month so you are right, there is no point in speaking about it. I will wait for my period to come.