Question about temping.

[housecarder]

Is it more important to test the same time every day or to have at least three hours of sleep before testing? During the week I get up at 5am so I've been getting up on the weekends to test at this time too. My problem is that I don't sleep well and often wake up at other times and can't fall back asleep right away. Should I be temping when I first wake up or try to fall back asleep and test at 5 even if I've only been asleep for an hour or so?

[teraiin]

I don't sleep well either. What I've found that seems to work for me is that I temp when I wake up after what is probably my biggest chunk of time sleeping. Ex. I technically get up at 6, but a lot of times I wake up at 3:30-5:30ish to pee or just because. I will often temp when I wake up because it is a larger chunk of time that I had spent sleeping.

However, I do know that some people need to temp at the same time in order to see a shift. For me it seems better to get the solid sleep.

You could always temp a cycle with each method (one whenever you wake up and one cycle with the same time) and see which seems to work better for you...

[yummybunny]

You can try it both ways for a solid cycle each. I wake up at 6am through the week from my husband's alarm. So I temp then, and I also set my alarm on weekends for 6am. It works best for my cycle. However I do often sleep poorly and wake up a lot in the night. So I ignore that and go with timing because often when I am awake at night I stay in bed and don't move much. That works for me.

You can work through which way works best for you.

[3houlagirl]

You'll have to try them both out. MH has bis alarm set for 4 AM every day. I temp when he gets up, and then go back to sleep. Even if I get up to pee before then, I still see a shift.

[Sparkly]

For me the time is important. If I wake up early I try to stay in bed and move as little as possible.

[TrickyJedi]

This cycle I kept waking up at odd hours and I would temp when I woke up. It was always after at least 3 hours of sleep but not at the same time. FF was able to detect my O.

[housecarder]

Thanks. I'll try both and see what works.

[lovegrilledcheese]

For me it's just having three consecutive hours of sleep. I temped for year woke up at different times and FF was always able to detect O. I know for others it's more about the same time. I would try both ways out.

[Deleted]

To add to everyone else, I think its also important not to sleep too long. By that I mean, my temps were all over the place last month when I slept in during my days off (getting the requisite 3-4 solid hours at least since last wakeup). I've found that setting my alarm for 7 on all days and doing it then worked fairly well. I also stopped temping in my LP (after I figured out this wasn't the month with temps dropping) and now during AF to let myself sleep through, but will start temping again on Monday, ugh.

[pismoduo]

Im gonna go with special snowflake. I temp at the same time every day unless I wake up only a little earlier than usual (like a half hour), and if I temp later than usual it's always artificially high.

[kariann12]

Jan 18, 2015 11:27:23 GMT -5 pismoduo said:

Im gonna go with special snowflake. I temp at the same time every day unless I wake up only a little earlier than usual (like a half hour), and if I temp later than usual it's always artificially high.

This is the same for me. Through trial and error I found that time is more important than 3 hrs of sleep. After over a year of temping I always wake up around the same time, temp, and fall right back asleep if its the weekend. 

[cateyes]

For me, it really depends on getting 3+ hours. I can temp anytime I wake up after the 3 hours, but those 3 hours are crucial. Like others have said,it is really trial and error to figure out for you what your body needs.

[butlerfan]

Me too...mine is high if I take late. Mine this morning is artificially high due to late temping because I drank too much last night. Oops.

[traversity]

my temps are always in an hours time, so like 7-8 or so
I would aim for that.

[Sparkly]

Jan 18, 2015 11:27:23 GMT -5 pismoduo said:

Im gonna go with special snowflake. I temp at the same time every day unless I wake up only a little earlier than usual (like a half hour), and if I temp later than usual it's always artificially high.

Exactly this.

If it's 15 minutes either direction, not a huge deal, but for me early temps tend to be rocky (because they are often due to poor sleep) and late temps are at least .2-.5 degrees higher than usual. .2 doesn't necessarily make a huge difference, but .5+ does.