Fertility tips and encouragement

Here are some fertility tips and encouragement from me to all the women out there who are TTC:

hey, it takes most couples 18 months or so to get pregnant (doctors won't even do anything until you've been trying over a year). You only have a 20% chance of getting pregnant once every cycle. And that number goes down the older you get. So don't worry about infertility until you've been trying for a couple of years. Also, a woman is only fertile 8 days of the cycle - the four days of cervical mucus plus the four dry days afterwards. Also, most women ovulate at 4 pm, and then the egg is only viable for about 12 hours after that. (that's why you see on tv shows when women are watching their ovulation of having lunchtime "quickies".) The sperm however can live for several days inside the ducts within the cervical mucus, and then when you ovulate, the sperm rushes out to fertilize the egg, which is why women are considered fertile for 8 days of the cycle. Also, the percentage of getting pregnant goes way down if you are drinking caffeine and soda during those 8 days, which is a bummer. I'm pretty much off caffeine right now, thank goodness, but it took awhile. :)
There are a lot of little "fertility tricks" that people can do to help along fertility. You can check out my webpage on fertility (its a work in progress) and I also really liked the book Natural Fertility by Nikki Bradford.
Hot baths are a big time no-no. Sperm has to stay at a 89.6 degree F temperature. The whole testicle/scrotum area is a lot cooler than regular body temperature, which I found to be interesting.
Also, at the doctor's office, there is a really simple test for men to make sure they have viable sperm (its a lot easier to check the men first, and then check the woman, their test is not as involved. ;). You can also find these tests on the internet, if you don't have a doctor.
Millions of couples have fertility issues, mostly as an environmental and food issue, as well as a biological one. So there's a lot of stuff to try out there, so don't feel like there's no hope or feel like the problems are insurmountable or something. :) Anyway, I didn't know any of the stuff I mentioned above until this year so I thought I'd pass on my info. :)