What do I do if I am sexually active and have missed my periods?
When you miss your periods and are sexually active, the first thought that comes to mind is that of a pregnancy. A simple pregnancy test should be done with the help of commercially available test strips. One simply needs to add three drops of urine in the well provided on the kit. A single line means there is no detectable pregnancy as yet and two lines means that you are pregnant. At times one line is faint and the other dark. In such a situation, it is best to get in touch with your doctor to decide the best option available to you.
It is advisable to check the expiry date of the strip before use and to preferably use the first urine in the morning as it is the most concentrated urine sample of the day. If you are unable to do the test early morning then any urine sample would do but if the test is negative, please make sure that you repeat the test after 24-28 hours.
If you are very stressed about the reliability of the pregnancy kit, you can go for a blood test for pregnancy which is 100 percent accurate and also tells us about the approximate time ultrasound scan should be performed to check the baby’s position in the uterus.
There could be many other reasons for missing the periods besides pregnancy and these are PCOS (Polycystic ovarian syndrome), use of an emergency contraceptive pill (like I-pill), ovarian cyst, stress, extensive travelling, medical diseases like tuberculosis and hormonal imbalances specially of thyroid to name a few.
Whatever be the reason for missed and overdue periods, one should still rule out pregnancy as you could still be pregnant even with all the above mentioned conditions.
Every woman should know how to keep a period calendar so that she knows when her cycle has gone overdue. Many a times it is a false alarm and the periods are actually on time.
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