Why do doctors tell you to be on birth control pills to regulate your cycle in order to get pregnant?

Question

I've heard this a lot and it confuses me, so I was just seeing if anybody knew the answer. I know some people rarely if ever ovulate (and I myself seem to ovulate very sporadically). Since birth control pills regulate your cycle, but stop you from ovulating, wouldn't you still have to have some sort of method to ovulate normally? Birth control pills regulated my cycle (but made me crazy)...but now that I'm off of them, I ovulate in just as weird of patterns as I did before.

Answer 1

So that you can have a better idea of when you ovulate. Birth control regulates this, and your period so it can be easier to tell.

Answer 2

Yeah, you're right. It's dumb. Worse than that, it gets prescribed by doctors who are not fertility specialists, because it does help regulate periods. The problem is, when the women then come off the pill again, most of the time they go back to the same old irregular cycle. So all it does is delay your ability to find the real problem and fix it.

You've got a few possible options here. First, find an OBGYN who knows about hormones enough to figure out if you need tests etc. They might prescribe Provera to jump-start your periods without the other baby-spotting side effects of the pill.

Second, start charting your monthly cervical mucus. Google EWCM and read up on that (or go to fertilityfriend.com) because however wacko your cycles are, you're likely to get EWCM in the few days before ovulation. Then you'll know when to BD. That should do the trick :)

Finally, you could also chart BBTs. It's a little more time consuming, but if you suspect that you might need to visit a fertility specialist in the future, it's a good idea to take a few months of BBT charts with you (as they're likely to send you away to do it anyway!)

Answer 3

well i was in the same boat but it was like this

they will put you on it and it should get your periods regular as that is why they are 2 different pills in a pack the 7 is were you would start your period and they will then get it regular then take you off to see if you stay regular and you are more likely to get pregnant right after coming off birth control so it does work some times and some times it don't but talk to the doctor and have them to explain it step by step i would do it but it would take me a long time as how they described it to me  

Answer 4

because hormones regulate you. theres not really a better way medically of doing that.. its true that birth control stops the ovulation, but if youre not racing to catch that last egg because youve put off having kids for the last 25 years, theyll regulate your cycles before trying to guess at when you ovulate during sporadic cycles, and then when you come off it have a better idea of when the ovulation will actually occur

Answer 5

It is a stupid solution IMHO.  All it will do is delay the inevitable.  You will go back to irregular cycles after you come off the pill.  It does not solve the root of the problem, like acupuncture or something else would.  

My Dr. tried to get me to do the same thing, but she did not really care.  She just wanted to get me to try Nuva Ring so she could get a stipend from selling it to a patient.  

I did not have regular cycles for 6 months after I stopped the pill.  Now I am between 27-30 days.  

Answer 6

I was off birth control about 4 days and got pregnant. For some women it works- thats why doctors try that.