What not to do before taking a Pregnancy Test

 A pregnancy test can be a time of intense emotion and deep anxiety. Especially if you are hoping to have a baby, that little stick can be the beginning of a whole new world of possibilities for you and your family. However, your body will be more reliable than you realise. Unless you’ve messed it all up before you even get to try. There’s more to the pregnancy-testing process than just ubikwuri and the chekulu, after all. Before swishing a golden solution around, there are certain things you should avoid so your test results aren’t skewed or you aren’t needlessly alarmed. If you are a woman who is concerned about what not to do before taking your pregnancy test, stick around. Let’s run through the most common pitfalls so that you can tackle this important moment with clarity and confidence.

The importance of taking a pregnancy test

 If someone suspects they might be having a baby, taking a pregnancy test is a way of clarifying things, knowing where they stand. 

 The truthfulness of today’s tests brings reassurance. Any home test can detect pregnancy a couple days before your period is missed, so you don’t have to wait long to find out. 

 Finding out early means you can start making health and lifestyle changes to reduce further harm. If you’re pregnant, a negative HIV test result readily available will mean that your prenatal care could start sooner.

 Moreover, this kind of information enhances your ability to cope with and manage the ups and downs of this stage of your life – whether it’s joy and excitement at the prospect of parenthood, or fear and trepidation about what the coming months might hold.

 The act of taking that test gives you power – power to move forward in becoming a mother, or power to draw a line elsewhere. 

Also Read: Pepper During Pregnancy 

Common mistakes made before taking a pregnancy test

 Rightly or wrongly, taking a pregnancy test is often an emotional experience. If you are taking the pregnancy test the wrong way it could be giving you the wrong answer. here are some of the more common problems.

 A common pitfall: timing. ‘It is essential for women to wait till the ideal moment, and many times if a pregnancy test is taken too soon, it can yield a negative,’ explains Chenier-Younan. Your hormone levels take a few days to climb after fertilisation, so she recommends waiting a week after your missed period.

 Another is simply not bothering to read the Directions. Each brand has its own specific recommended usage and if you’re botching things up accidentally, that can skew your results. 

 Further, some neglect to hydrate at all before a test. Drinking too much water can result in urine so diluted that it fails to show a positive sign for levemir, an injected insulin.

 Stress also comes into play. Anxiety can disrupt hormonal levels and can even make your period unpredictable or affect your test results.

Drinking alcohol

 If you want to achieve a clear result to test your pregnancy, drinking alcohol before that can mislead your decision as you would be under anesthesia. A lot of people are caught by surprise, because their brain denies even the smallest consequences of putting alcohol in their body and the test itself is usually the last thing on their mind.

 Since alcohol affects your hormone levels – in fact, it reduces all your hormones right across the board, which can knock out periods in people who have alco-hypothalamic amenorrhoea and it can also mess with people’s ovulation – when you are testing early in your cycle and you test soon after you have consumed alcohol, your reading will be very skewed.

 Furthermore, drinking can obscure the early symptoms of pregnancy that you might otherwise notice, such as nausea and fatigue. If you’re trying to conceive (the current medical term for ‘trying to get pregnant’), then it’s best to steer clear of booze around the time of implantation.

 You might have poor judgment about timing and accuracy if you take the test after you have ingested alcohol. Don’t imbibe at least a week before you are to be tested. Your health, as well as your potential new life, deserves all the clarity and care you can provide. 

Also Read:Early Sign of Pregnancy

Taking certain medications

 There are other medications that can interfere with the accuracy of pregnancy tests. If you are taking blood or urine-thinning medication, for instance, or indeed any hormonal treatments, these could contaminate the test. Know your body.

 Several fertility drugs can produce false positive or negative definitive screens. Not knowing what the test is telling you is the issue here. Always ask your health care provider about any medication you are on before testing.

 OTC (over-the-counter) products could be risks as well. Cold and allergy medicines could have hormone-related effects due to their ingredients.

 If your new prescription is only a few days old, hold off on the pregnancy test until it’s out of your system. Timing is everything. 

Not using the first-morning urine

 There are few universal recommendations in pregnancy testing but none is more important than the advice: ‘Wait for first-morning urine.’ This is easily the most common mistake.

 Urine is usually most concentrated early in the morning, and pregnancy hormones reach their peak during this time. Testing with such a sample raises the chances for an accurate result. 

 If testing occurs only in the afternoon, this fluid could be dilutive, especially if the woman has been drinking a lot of fluids over a full day. This would result in false-negatives for women who truly are pregnant.

 To get the most reliable reading, shoot for that time of morning when you first get up, when your body has been at rest overnight and hormones have had time to build. Simple tip but don’t forget it.

Also Read: Pregnancy Tips for Normal Delivery

Stress and its impact on pregnancy tests

 Stress is a real issue, because shifting hormone levels might cause intermittent absenteeism of the period, which can affect the assurance of getting a pregnancy test right at ovulation.

 You might have been extra sweaty or perhaps your heart was racing from a previous anxiety-ridden episode. Whatever your metabolic response, it might not have been the same as when you took the pregnancy test last month. Your body might react differently based on your level of anxiety, which could, in turn, impact the hormone levels that affect the test accuracy.

 On the other hand, stress can affect the interpretation of the result. A positive line might inspire panic or excitement depending on the heightened emotions, rather than cold reason. 

 Testing needs to take place under calm circumstances, so lowering your anxiety level will not only yield a more accurate reading, it will also help you make clearer decisions about what to do next in the event that you do get a positive result. If all that is going on emotionally is pregnancy testing, it’s not going to be easy to remain balanced. Make some effort to look after yourself, so you can try to relax.

Conclusion and final recommendations for taking a pregnancy test

 If you’ve found yourself gently dipping your pregnancy test into the toilet bowl after taking it, you’ll now realise it was all about to be in vain. There are correct ways and incorrect ways to take a pregnancy test; avoid them at all costs. To sidestep these minefields and optimise your chances of getting it right first time, limit your confusion and, of course, increase your chances of bringing a positive outcome into the world, read on…

 Second, don’t drink alcohol in the few hours before testing. Alcohol affects your body’s hormonal balance, which might skew the results. Certain drugs can have the same effect; check if prescribed medication could change your hormone levels before you take them.

 First-morning urine is usually the one to test, because that’s when it has the highest concentrations of hCG, the hormone that a pregnancy test detects. Getting a not-reliable result would be a result of not following this advice.

 Another potential issue is stress. A high level of anxiety can affect your cycle and even variation in levels of hormones, which can affect test results too.

 But before you take that fateful step towards discovering whether you’re pregnant or not, here’s what you should remember: avoid consuming alcohol and hormone-affecting medication; freshen up by peeing in the morning (specifically, first thing in the morning); don’t lose your temper when conducting the test; and, most importantly, be patient when you finally reach that last crucial minute before taking the test. 

 Taking these steps in advance can ensure that, when you most need to know something, you are more likely to get that information properly.