Abbreviations and Fertility Terms

I realized as I was writing my last post that I had made a reference to a couple of things that might leave some folks scratching their heads. So for those of you not up to date on fertility terminology and Internet abbreviations, here is a handy guide.

• AF -- Aunt Flow, a euphemism for a woman's menstrual period. 
• BBT -- Basal Body Temperature is the lowest body temperature of the day and is usually taken immediately after waking. People who are trying to conceive may use a special basal body thermometer to measure this temperature. Recording these temperatures allows a women to determine when she ovulated during her cycle.
• BD -- Baby Dance, sexual intercourse in an attempt to get pregnant 
• BFN -- Big Fat Negative, a negative pregnancy test.
• BFP -- Big Fat Positive, a positive pregnancy test.
• DTD -- Do the Deed, sexual intercourse
• FMU -- First Morning Urine. It is usually recommended that women use their first urine of the day when testing for pregnancy.
• HPT -- Home Pregnancy Test
• OPK -- Ovulation Predictor Kit. This is a test, similar to a home pregnancy test, that detects the luteinizing hormone in a woman's urine. This hormone is highest just before ovulation and its elevated presence indicates that ovulation will take place within a day or two.
• SMU -- Second Morning Urine. Some women seem to get better results when using second morning urine to test for pregnancy. 
• TTC -- Trying To Conceive
• TWW -- Two Week Wait. This is the approximately two week period between the time a woman ovulated and the start of her next menstrual period.