How to Calculate Your Due Date of Pregnancy? Learn More
You should be extremely happy and excited to know that your due date is approaching nearby and within a few days, you shall be welcoming your new bundle of joy. But do you know how to predict your due date? It is easy to determine. You just need to keep a track of your menstrual cycle. Once you get pregnant, you will find that you are missing your periods. This is the time when you should mark the first day of your last menstrual period. This date will help you and your health care provider to expect the approximate due date of your baby. This will also help the physician to examine properly the growth and development of the baby in each trimester.
Calculating Due Date:
There is a proper way to calculate your due date. This can be easily found after the first day of your last period which is about 38 weeks (about 8 and a half months) or 266 days (about 8 and a half months) after the ovulation period. Your due date is 40 weeks (about 9 months) or 280 days (about 9 months) after ovulation. There are certain methods like pregnancy wheel, ultrasound, or formulae such as Naegele’s rule that will help to determine your approximate due date.
Methods Of Calculating Your Due Date:
There are several useful methods that will effectively help you to predict your approximate due date. Some of them are as follows:
1. The Naegele’s Rule:
Naegele’s rule is based on a formula that will help you to predict when to expect your due date. To know the date, first, you will have to mark the days of your period. Then add one year and seven days and then move the calculated date back to three months.
For instance, if the first day of your last period was November 5, 2021, then you should add one year to this date which makes it November 5th, 2022, and then add seven more days that will become 12th November 2022. Then your due date is approximately three months back, that is, 12th August 2022.
2. Pregnancy wheel:
The second method of calculating your due date is through a pregnancy wheel and it is frequently used by health care experts to obtain accurate results and it is easy to perform too. Detecting your due date with the help of a pregnancy wheel will be possible if you can keep proper track of your menstruation cycle. You will primarily have to place the LMP date on the pregnancy wheel and once the date lines up with the indicator in the wheel you will get to know the approximate due date.
One should particularly note that the due date that you are calculating through different methods is just an estimate of the time when you are most likely to deliver and bring home your little one. But this date can vary up to a couple of days according to your health, baby’s development, and a few circumstances.
3. Calculating due date with ovulation and menstruation:
As you are keeping track of your period cycle, it will help you to know when your ovulation has already started and when it ends. Calculating the due date according to your ovulation calendar is considered another accurate method of calculating your due date. Just track when you had your last period. If you find that you are facing any kind of irregularity in your menstrual cycle, then you should let this known to your health care expert at once, because the date of your periods and your duration of ovulation are some of the most important deciding factors of your due date.
4. Using Ultrasound:
When you are in your early pregnancy, your concerned health care expert will help you to undergo some important tests that will effectively help you to track the stages of the baby’s growth and development inside your womb and will also help you to know about the baby’s health. Ultrasound is an effective technique that will help you to know the due date based on the baby’s development. Ultrasound is primarily performed in the first trimester of pregnancy, within the 12th week to confirm the date of delivery. Transvaginal ultrasound, a kind of ultrasound is performed in the gestational period to measure the fetus’ length. Another type of ultrasound known as bi-parietal diameter (BPD) ultrasound is performed to measure the diameter of the baby’s skull bone. But still, the due dates that are determined by techniques of ultrasound are often found to vary in various cases due to a varied number of reasons.
Importance Of Predicting Your Due Date:
It is important to predict your due date while you are pregnant, through essential prenatal tests and thorough regular check-ups by your health care expert. Your due date of childbirth is the expected date of delivery that will be a mark to the end of your pregnancy. As it is said, your pregnancy will last for a little more than 38 weeks (about 8 and a half months) or almost 40 weeks (about 9 months), it is still important to know the nearby (if the exact date is not possible) due date of your delivery based on the day of your last period and the time of your ovulation.
As you tentatively come to date for your childbirth, you can have almost a four-week period to give birth to your child easily (it is expected that you will give the birth maximum, either two weeks before or two weeks after your declared due date if there are no complications in the pregnancy).
Predicting your due date is very important. This helps you and your family to have a mental setup and thus how to keep yourself and your baby safe and healthy in a hygienic environment at your home and thus to prepare your home accordingly.
Your Ultimate Due Date Calculator:
It is essential for you to know that the above calculator is just for this informational purpose only. While you are pregnant, you should always consult your health care provider to know the date of delivery and things associated with it.
If I do not calculate my last day of the menstrual cycle:
This might also happen that you forgot to calculate the last day of your menstrual cycle. If you do not remember the date when you had your last monthly period (LMP), here are some of the ways that will help the calculation easy:
- Tell your doctor when you have your LMP. At least if you remember the week of your last month’s menstrual cycle, your doctor will get a fair idea and will tell your due date accordingly.
- If you do not remember anything at all, your physician is very likely to recommend you perform an ultrasound to expect your due date of labor.
In cases of Irregularity or long menstrual cycles:
Many women today suffer from irregular period cycles due to a lot of reasons, due to their lifestyle disorders. Irregularity in period cycles and increase in the number of days of your periods, that is, if they last for abnormally longer days, then it is a problem to predict your due date. A normal period cycle lasts for 4 to 5 days and returns each month after a cycle of 28 days (about 4 weeks) on average.
The second half of your menstrual cycle which is also the period of ovulation will last for 14 days (about 2 weeks). It is necessary to keep track of the date when you had your last month’s period. If you put that date on a pregnancy wheel, you will get to know your due date.
For example, if your menstrual cycle is usually 35 days (about 1 month 4 and a half days) long and the first day of your LMP was November 1:
- Add those 21 days (November 22).
- Then cut out 14 days (about 2 weeks) that will predict your adjusted LMP date (November 8).
Why can my physician change my due date?
In some cases, it is found that the doctor concerned may change your due date based on the health and overall development of the baby. Your due date calendar may have a predicted date, but if the baby has not fully developed then childbirth in that stage can be called ‘premature birth’ which will lead to further complications related to the baby’s health and in worst cases can also cause survival issues of the newborn child. Though in the first trimester of your pregnancy, the prenatal tests and several ultrasounds will show the baby’s growth ad developments, sometimes the doctor alters the due date to ensure the baby’s health and to look after the fact that the new mother does not have to suffer during labor and childbirth.
