Posted by My OB said WHAT?!?.
Dec
30
Posted by My OB said WHAT?!?.
“But When Was Your Last Menstrual Period?”
“But when was your last menstrual period?” – Midwife, with wheel in hand, after mother (who did not have a 28 day cycle) had told her her ovulation date and estimated due date.
There are 60 comments to this post.
Heather P had this to say,
Dec 30, 2011 @ 4:58 am (Quote)
This is when you say “hand me the wheel” and set it at your due date, then give them your new adjusted lmp.
I was pretty lucky. With my OB my first pregnancy and with my midwives the next two, they took the edd I gave them without question.
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Jane Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 5:12 am (Quote)
Hah. I did that in my second pregnancy. Why should we have to lie to our care providers in order to receive adequate evidence-based care?
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Rachel Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 9:05 am (Quote)
when i was trying to get in with a group of midwives I had lost my Ipod that i was keeping track of that on but I remembered the due date I had looked up … so I told my due date and she used the wheel backwards giving me the LMP 
I still gave birth 3 weeks early
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Christy had this to say,
Dec 30, 2011 @ 5:56 am (Quote)
This could have been my post. Scheduling first prenatal with clerk and the clerk didn’t want to use my ovulation date (charted and ovulated around cd25). Loved that my first visit with midwife (with same hmo) she was willing to listen to me and confirmed with ultrasound – I was 1 day off haha. Stick to your guns, it pays!
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Erica douglas had this to say,
Dec 30, 2011 @ 6:25 am (Quote)
I was thinking of lying to my ob and giving a later lmp to buy myself extra time before interventions. But I did IVF and knew the exact dates! It didn’t matter…my ob is AMAZING and would have let me get to 42 weeks before we discussed induction. And then my darling baby came at exactly 40 weeks anyway!
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Nica Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 6:57 am (Quote)
Same here. Both my babies are IVF babies, so I know not only the day, but the HOUR of conception. LOL! THankfully, my OB and RE have a good working relationship. Whatever due date is the one on the files he sends over is the one that is used. No further questions asked. No lies needed!
I still really don’t understand what docs’ fixation is on LMP. Who do you know that has a perfect, 28 day cycle every single month? Certainly, not me and my cycles have changed (significantly) over the course of my childbearing years…
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Hahahaha. I didn’t have a period for a couple of years before I got pregnant. The only two I had were from progesterone my OB put me on, but I then stopped because I wanted to loose weight first. I finally found a way to loose weight after years of personal trainers and nutrition changes and got pregnant what must have been the first cycle because I never had a period on my own. I was due in April and my LMP was in February! I would tell the OBs, nurses, hospital admissions people, I will give you my LMP but it has nothing to do with my date of conception and they would not beleive me. It was always an issue lol ugh very annoying
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My LMP with this pregnancy was May 2 but I didn’t O until day 31 of my cycle and when I told the Early/High Risk pregnancy clinic I was dealing with that they didn’t believe me and tried to convince me that this baby too was a BO preg. and I should have a DC. Well I’m 32+2 today and funny enough our little girl dates exactly where I said she should she just 2 weeks behind where the medical professionals feel she should be. Those wheels are so dangerous, it’s why with our first MC last year I waited 2 weeks and re-did a dating ultrasound before I would take the Miso. to cause the mc.
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Can you just see the smoke coming out of her ears as the wheels in her brain grind around, trying desperately to make sense of the info the mom is giving her?
“But… but… *sputter* *sputter* (I don’t know how ovulation dates relate to pregnancy) but… when was your LMP?!”
It’s like she can’t deal with anything that’s not on her script. Robot-midwife?
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After my first birth with a group of MEDwives, I was so happily surprised when the midwife for my next baby adjusted the due date based on what I told her instead of using the wheel. This put it about a week later than it would have been using the LMP method. My son was born 30 minutes before his adjusted due date.
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I have a feeling I’ll deal with this with our next child. We’ll be trying to conceive soon and as of right now I ovulate CD18-21. Definitely later than that little wheel assumes. With my first I wasn’t charting since I was on birth control but my daughter always measured right along with the due date the wheel had given (of course the doc “wouldn’t let me” go past 41wks so I was induced – lesson learned there).
Charting is wonderful and I can’t imagine why more women don’t do it (whether your trying to avoid or conceive). I love knowing so much about my body and my cycle. For instance, if I wasn’t charting I would assume I have a healthy LP since my cycles are about as long as they were before my daughter but since I’m charting I know that it’s really only 7-8 days. Of course I’m still breastfeeding my toddler around the clock so I’m not concerned.
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Same happened to me, except it was the MA who was taking a history. After telling her several times that I didn’t remember (not actually true, but if I’d told her a date I knew I wouldn’t ever be able to get it removed from the record) but knew my O date, I finally said in frustration “Well, you might as well write down XX/XX/XXXX [giving the day 2 weeks before O day], even though that wasn’t when it actually was.” Which apparently she did. Subsequently I had to fend off a bunch of people trying to give me a dating ultrasound. I switched midwife practices. Judging by my experience with the practice I ended up with, I think they won’t act this way with the next one.
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road2vba2c had this to say,
Dec 30, 2011 @ 8:15 am (Quote)
What does it say about our medical system if women are considering LYING to their doctor about their medical record to prevent unnecessary procedures forced upon them, possibly under threat of losing your children to DCF?
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Ugh, this happened to me too! I just had a miscarriage and was pregnant again 6 weeks later but hadn’t ovulated until CD32. I refused to give them the LMP because I HAD NO IDEA when it was but I knew my EXACT ovulation date. After my first scan measured to my dates exactly they finally accepted that I knew what I was talking about and put in my EDD I gave them. I inquired why they couldn’t just use my ovulation date and was told their computers don’t have a calculation based on ovulation date!!!
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Here’s the thing, I DID give a fake LMP that was 2 weeks before my ovulation date! I learned that lesson by reading here. Unfortunately, earlier on the paper it asked for an average cycle length, and I put 32 instead of 28, so when the midwife dialed into her extra-fancy magic wheel it didn’t all line up and she got very upset.
This was at my first appointment for my pregnancy, and I left it almost in tears. I had interviewed with this woman, and at the time she asked if I knew my due date, and I said yes and gave it to her. She asked her student to dial that in the wheel to see how far along I was, and I told her my week-day before the student could dial. She kind of pursed her lips and laughed. I was a bit uncomfortable with her attitude from the interview, very stuffy, but her philosophy and that of her group seemed so in line with mine I went with them anyway.
At our first real appointment I had the same woman. She asked me if she had “given” me a due date at the interview, and I told her that I had been charting for months and had already known my due date when I came in. She rolled her eyes and said, for the first of many times VERY sarcaastically, “Oh that’s right, you gave YOURSELF a due date…” Because it is so hard to count to 38 while flipping the pages of a calendar? She then looked at the paperwork, grabbed her magic wheel, and tried to make things work. She got something that didn’t line up using average cycle length (what do you know, my cycles are not all exactly “average”, and really, LMP DOESN’T MATTER ONE LITTLE BIT IN HOW LONG IS LEFT IN YOUR PREGNANCY), and looked at me kind of superiorly and mock-confused to inform me it didn’t line up with the LMP I gave her. I, thinking I could trust her (after all, she was a midwife! With a very low-intervention mindset! Surely she’d understand my desire to avoid induction by being marked as “due” a week early if a doctor later looked at my file!), said I knew, and that I had written that LMP because it was 2 weeks before my ovulation date, which I knew, and which fit with the standard 40-week model. She looked absolutely incredulous, comically so, and started browbeating me for several minutes to get me to tell her the actual LMP date. I have social anxiety disorder and am very susceptible to bullying (something I had told them), and was quickly shut down and put in my place, despite being adamant about not telling them ahead of time, and, stuttering, blurted out a date that was about right (it was actually even a day or two earlier, but while I was trying to pull up FF on my phone to get it she kept browbeating me and I couldn’t take it any longer and had to make it stop before I had an anxiety attack). She smiled smugly, dialed it in the wheel, it lined up perfectly, and she relaxed and was happy and superior.
I couldn’t shake the near-anxiety-attack feeling the whole appointment. She made snide sarcastic comments and talked-down to me throughout. I almost left the group after that appointment, but didn’t, deciding the give the other midwives a try. One was fine, I didn’t click with the other, and a few weeks ago at 18 weeks pregnant, I switched to another group. I left the LMP spot blank on their form (though they’ll get my records from the first MWs) and they didn’t bat an eye. They already knew I had a due date based off of ovulation, and they were happy about it. They even commented on how great it was that I knew so much about where I was in my pregnancy when I could tell them my weeks/days along without missing a beat. SO glad I switched! I know this comment is far from the worst thing that’s been on this site, but I felt like if this browbeating and power-play went on with something as stupid and simple as getting my LMP, I didn’t want to see what would happen during labor!
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Eileen Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 9:40 am (Quote)
*cough* Evidently brevity isn’t my strong suit. Sorry ’bout that.
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Jane Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 10:29 am (Quote)
Congrats on switching! You might want to write a letter to the practice you left to put in writing that you were bullied by their midwife over your LMP and her tactics of yelling and badgering constitute harassment by a medical care provider. It’s only your word against hers, but enough of those complaints will form a pattern.
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Eileen Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 10:34 am (Quote)
Thanks! The head midwife (the one I got along with) actually did call me to ask why I switched and I did tell her (though not in such detail). She was very good and took what I said very seriously, and said that if that had been my experience it was good that I was switching because it was important I feel comfortable and after that I probably couldn’t. She said she would be talking to the two midwives I had bad experiences with. So hopefully they’ll get more mindful!
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Nica Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 12:04 pm (Quote)
Sounds like leaving was the right decision for you. Glad you found a better fit…
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Dee Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 2:50 pm (Quote)
Sounds like you made a smart and well informed decision! I am a firm believer it is the practitioner and not the initials that make the difference. Many times on here we’ve seen midwives who are intervention happy and medical doctors who are very supportive of low intervention birth. It’s the person, I think, not merely their path of training.
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Brittany had this to say,
Dec 30, 2011 @ 10:34 am (Quote)
With my first, I got pregnant while using the pill that let’s you go 3 months without a period so I had no idea when I got pregnant. My due dates were all over the place. This time around I charted for months before getting pregnant. I ovulated on day 19 and adjusted the LMP to fit the ovulation date. However, my midwife encourages charting and the OB I saw for my assessment (legally have to do that in our state) said she never questions a woman when she says she knows when she ovulated. Wonderful doctor and fantastic midwife. It’s so unfortunate that after all the training and schooling care providers go through, they only pick and choose which evidence-based facts they will accept and which they disregard. I really wish they would start teaching FAM in medical and nursing school.
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Eileen Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 10:56 am (Quote)
They do! They teach that FAM is something that crazy religious kooks do that doesn’t work at all, so just tuck a pack of BCP in the pocket of any patient who claims they’re using it before they leave.
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Aron Reply:
December 31st, 2011 at 5:56 am (Quote)
Well, that’s not strictly true. They teach the three cardinal signs, and that some women use them for keeping track of their cycles. They also teach that many fertility clinics ask clients to track their symptoms. But once that part of the lecture is over it really isn’t emphasized again, meanwhile you can expect one or two questions on the exam about calculating due dates using Nagel’s rule. So the biology is taught, but it gets lost behind the convenience of the Due-O-Meter.
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I’m curious about charting ovulation. I can go anywhere from two weeks to six months between periods. I didn’t have trouble conceiving, but I was very relaxed about it… I figured if it didn’t happen, we could always try again.
But then my doctor told me I wasn’t ovulating at all (January 2010). Apparently I was, because I got pregnant in May…
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Jane Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 4:56 pm (Quote)
Call your local Catholic hospital and ask if they offer an NFP class. They’ll teach you the basics of how to chart and how to use your charts to seek pregnancy or to avoid pregnancy.
If you’d rather a book, I’ve heard many people recommend Take Charge Of Your Fertility.
For the VERY basics (and this does not constitute instruction) when you are producing estrogen, your body gears up to make your uterus more hospitable to sperm and to a fertilized embryo. Inside, it’s thickening the lining of the uterus (which you can’t see) but externally, the estrogen signals your body to begin producing cervical mucus that sperm can feed on in order to live long enough to fertilize an egg. You’ll notice it’s not there at all shortly after menstruation, and after that it will show up as tacking and sticky, and then it will become greater in volume and clearer, until it becomes like egg-white in terms of how clear it is and how stretchy it is. That stuff is like fuel for sperm; in it they can live for up to six days.
Then after you’ve ovulated, your body produces progesterone and stops producing estrogen. THe progesterone signals your uterus and cervix to stop producing mucus, and as a side effect, it raises your basal temperature a bit every day (about .4 degrees). So when a woman notices that dry-up and a temperature rise over a few days, she knows she’s already ovulated. She will generally remain in a dry-up phase for two weeks while her body determines whether conception took place, and then if she didn’t conceive, her progesterone levels will drop and her body will shed the uterine lining, which is your period.
Those are the basic-basics. Do NOT attempt to use that basic instruction as a family planning method. 
(That was enough for me to predict when my periods would arrive for about four years before I got married, but when I actually needed to prevent pregnancy, I took a class.)
If you note the ovulation date based on when you have peak mucus and/or when your morning temperature goes up, you’ll have a very accurate due-date if you become pregnant again.
Some women also chart the position and feel of their cervix. I don’t do that, although I have in the past. It’s a triple cross-check which helps determine if ovulation took place.
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WellBegun Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 10:59 pm (Quote)
Agree with the pp. Also, the really cool thing about charting is that it totally works with irregular cycles! I have PCOS, and my cycles have ranged from about 37 days (except for a couple of 14-day anomalies) to XXX days (yes, triple digits, let’s just leave it at that). Funny thing is, no matter my cycle length, I’ve pretty much always had a 14-day luteal phase (the time between ovulation and menstruation). That really reassured me that my wacky body wasn’t completely broken! 
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Teri had this to say,
Dec 30, 2011 @ 3:54 pm (Quote)
I sort of had the opposite problem. I had my due date based in my LMP but at my first scan where I should have been 13 weeks they told me I was only 10 weeks. I pointed out that would have meant I got pregnant a week before I did the test and that I was 2 weeks late at the time but they didn’t listen. Near the end of my pregnancy I was measuring big and my midwife told me off for not eating better, I had terrible morning sickness all the way through my pregnancy so I barely ate as it was but she was implying I’d sat there for 8 months scoffing burgers. My baby was a week early by their date and 2 weeks late by mine but nobody would listen to me when I said the original due date was correct.
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Rebecca Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 4:45 pm (Quote)
I was on the pill when I got pregnant with my first. The first date they gave me was Thanksgiving. The next one they gave me was Halloween. Even so, they started talking about induction the first week of November. I told them we’d discuss it after all of the due dates I was given had passed.
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Heather had this to say,
Dec 30, 2011 @ 6:09 pm (Quote)
@Jane, I wish it was so easy. I have to start charting my temperature because since the birth of my son (15 months ago), I pretty much have mucus 24/7, during period too. It seems my cervix was damaged in delivery.
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WellBegun Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 11:02 pm (Quote)
It is possible that you have an everted cervix. I do – between that and the PCOS, dry days are an almost-never for me (I also get CM during my period). There is apparently a procedure to help this, but I haven’t researched it overmuch because I’m not interested, at least until we’re done having kids. I’ll see if I can dig up my links…
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This made my first prenatal with my first child amusing. They took my LMP (which I just gave them, didn’t know any better), and said “oh, you’re due xx/xx/xx.” I said, “no, by my charts you’re about two weeks too early – my cycles are not normal, and the one in question was shaping up to be about 42 days.” Since I refused their dating, they chose to do a dating ultrasound (I was six weeks – they thought 8 – at the time). Since it was so early, the tech was able to determine pretty easily that I was right. Actually kind of helped my confidence in myself in directing my birth, overall…
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Darsy Reply:
January 1st, 2012 at 7:43 am (Quote)
I’m glad your ultrasound tech wasn’t like mine–she wouldn’t listen to my dates and basically told me that the baby was going to die because there wasn’t development consistent with the LMP date. I am frightened to think how many women have to go through that 
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I get easily confused by dates and numbers and stuff, so it really scared me when they wanted to induce me at 38 weeks but every ultrasound had me measuring a week less than LMP. (At 38 weeks, he was measuring 37 in every way.) i’m now fairly furious they almost hurt my baby with that crap. I know when my daughter was conceived, could point you to the date of the session if you wanted, lol. But her measurements were always spot on to what I thought it was.
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wow im so thankful my midwives arent this obnoxious, my first pregnancy my LMP was at the end of may beginning of June, i fell pregnant in august (but didnt know until November because of the before mentioned missing period) my current pregnancy, my LMP was infact a miscarriage and my cycle very irregular before hand so both times we have had to date from scans as even an ovulation date was unknown. luckily it seems my sonographer knows what hes doing as my fundal heights match the exact week and day gestation
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I got pg with my #2 while charting. After 10 calendar months, and 4 cycles we finally conceived on day 76 of a cycle. At my first OB visit, which would have been 6 weeks according to ovulation date, my OB was hysterical because she was convinced that my uterus size was way too small for a nearly 2nd trimester pregnancy.
I laughed throughout the whole dating u/s. My dates were PERFECT and she was freaked out for nothing.
My baby was born exactly on the 40w due date according to me. However, my OB was sure I was overdue starting week 32.
I pretty much laughed at all my visits and told them to trust me.
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This very well could have me writing. At my 13 week prenatal appointment (with a new OB) the nurse practioner asked me how far along I was. I told her 13 weeks. She pulled out her little wheel and asked me when my last period was. When I told her she said “no sweetie, you’re 17 weeks.”
No, thank you. I’ve had 2 early ultrasounds, I have 45 day cycles, AND I know the date of conception.
She was so insistant that I was 17 weeks, she wrote notations all over my chart about my date being 4 weeks ahead.
Thank God the actual OB read my medical records, rolled his eyes, and changed my date back.
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Nothing says trust like questioning a woman’s answer and trying to force her body into a mold.
Anyone refuse to give the LMP? I’m thinking of doing this if we have another child. I chart so I’ll have an accurate ovulation date.
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Jane Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 5:12 am Jane(Quote)
Yes, I refused to give the LMP with one of my pregnancies but did give the ovulation date. The midwife laughed and said, “Oh, so you want an early ultrasound!” and I said, “No, I just want an accurate due-date. Ovulation date was x/xx but I don’t remember my LMP.”
The second midwife I saw, who knew me through two previous pregnancies, said, “You know what you’re doing,” and wrote down my ovulation date and the due-date I gave her, and then guess when the baby was born? Right on the date I said.
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rachel Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 6:42 am rachel(Quote)
I just lied. I know my ovulation date and didnt want to end up getting into it with anyone so i just told them the lmp that matched that date.
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Lexi Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 8:18 am Lexi(Quote)
This is what I did too. With my second I conceived on day 56 of my cycle. The wheel would have had me “due” two full months early!
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Jennifer Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 8:53 am Jennifer(Quote)
That’s pretty much exactly what I did, too with my first, Just figured out what the “ideal” LMP would be based on ovulation date and told them that… with my second, I just told my midwife my ovulation date and she pretty much did the same thing I had done with my first, LOL! My cycles range from the “ideal” 4 weeks to 8 weeks and everything in-between… but I almost always know when I ovulate!
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Kathryn Reply:
December 30th, 2011 at 8:43 pm Kathryn(Quote)
OH I have a whole long story about lying about LMP! But I did it too
Even told them a week later than the date that would have matched my ovulation, because all the doctors in my area insist on eviction of the child by 41 weeks. Then they bullied me into a dating ultrasound (I told them I was 12 weeks and he thought my uterus felt like it was 14-15 weeks — this was my first appt). It was awful and I left that appt (and the ultrasound) shaking and crying.
But then I learned about a brand-new birth center and switched (I’d have gone with a homebirth from the beginning but my state doesn’t have licensing and I didn’t feel comfortable with the questionable legality of hiring a homebirth midwife, and I don’t currently feel comfortable with a UC — maybe in the future). I personally spoke with the doc I’d seen who had made me cry and told him that I was firing him and gave him my reasons why. My midwives at the birth center (there are two) are awesome and I am SO EXCITED to have my baby there sometime in February.
And for the record, I told them my ovulation date and due date based on that, which they then used to match up to a fake LMP date on the wheel
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Serene Reply:
January 2nd, 2012 at 12:26 am Serene(Quote)
yeah I just told them I didnt remember cos it was over 6 months ago (gotta love the mini-pill sometimes!) and you shoulda seen them panic!
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