Rough and Confusing Situation

Templar1961 · Feb 21, 2006

The pill will not give you a false pregnancy reading. You might believe this because you may have been told the pill fools your body into thinking it is already pregnant. This is not exactly true, but it is a lot quicker than explaining how it fully works. The pill works in several ways:

1) It prevents your body from releasing an egg in the first place, which means you have nothing to fertilize.

2) It makes your cervical mucus (the goo that makes your lady parts slippery) thicker so that sperm have a harder time getting to your egg, just in case #1 fails.

3) It keeps the lining of your uterus thin and unwelcoming to fertilized eggs, making it hard for them to "grab on" and grow, just in case both #1 and 2 manage to fail (quite rare). With nothing to cling to, a fertilized egg will not be able to implant and develop into a fetus.

If you take the pill consistently and generally on time each day, you should be fine. Unless you are on the minipill (Ortho Micronor, for example), an hour or two will not be a big enough disruption to tinker with the pill's effectiveness.

Now, after all that, if you have not had sex since your last period (and it was a normal one), you can't be pregnant.

The only way you could possibly be pregnant without having had sex this month is if your previous period was actually implantation bleeding, which is when the fertilized zygote burrows into the lining of your uterus.

But that is usually light enough to tip you off that something is up. You would know. And if by some bizarre chance your last period *was* simply implantation bleeding, you would now be a month along and should certainly be able to have a positive pregnancy test by now.

All that is a very long-winded way of saying you should be fine. But if you absolutely have to know, grab a home pregnancy test.

Hope that helps! And good luck!

carolinapooh, BSN, RN · Feb 21, 2006

Just my two cents...you could also be one of those folks that won't have a period, or may have a light one, after you've been on the Pill for a while. My period never started until Wednesday-Thursday, and even now that I've switched to NuvaRing (which is the most BRILLIANT thing I've ever done) I don't get it until Tuesday-Wednesday. It can also take a while for your body to "regulate" itself, so you could have start times that differ from month to month for a while. It took me a while to get regular (and even this month it snuck up on me!).

Worrying more will make it seem worse - if you're really concerned, buy a test and put your mind at ease - one way or the other. Eight-ten bucks is a small price to pay for peace of mind. I know - I've done it too!

I believe pregnancy tests check for levels of human chorionic gonadotropin - a hormone that you only make if you are indeed pregnant. Taking the Pill only elevates other hormone levels (estrogen and progesterone?) to cause all the effects noted above; it does not make you produce HCG.

SmilingBluEyes · Feb 21, 2006

I am sorry, but questions of a personal medical nature are not allowed here on allnurses.com, per Terms of Service. If you have concerns or doubts as to whether you may be pregnant or not, no one here can truly and safely, nor legally, reassure you one or the other. Everybody is different and everyone on the Pill does differently.

Please see your doctor/midwife or other health care provider for any health concerns you have. Good luck and I hope things are ok.