ovulation frustration kits

I think this is a good moment to express just how I feel about the ovulation predictor kits out there in the pharmacy.  I am doing a natural cycle, ie. I get to track the LH surge with ovulation kits, and then have one ultrasound to check the lining (tomorrow morning) followed by transfer six days after the LH surge.

Sounds simple, on paper.

I went to buy an OPK at the pharmacy, and got a digital Clear Blue.  I am not a big fan of digital anything, but they did not have the analog ones, so digital it was.  I used the first one on cycle day 10, and I will spare you the details of how exactly I have urinated on it for five seconds, but for some reason, instead of a smiley face or a blank circle, I got an error message.  Having wasted my preciously held urine (did you know you have to hold your bladder for four hours prior to peeing on one, and no fluids for the last 2 hours allowed either, in the middle of freakin' summer), I was back to square one.

I held it again for three more hours (the waterworks, that is) and, feeling smarter by the minute, decided to collect the urine in a cup and use the second method of "dip it in for 15 seconds" as outlined in the pamphlet.  Ditto.  Got another error message.  Dumped the urine and did it again, four hours later.  By now it was night, I got a negative (finally) and practically collapsed in exhaustion after not drinking and holding my urine for so long.

The next day, I got a smiley face (positive) on the first morning urine.  Deciding that, although the test pamphlet does not forbid using the first morning urine, it was probably a bad idea to use, I thought I should double check it by using another test kit from some other place.  Hopefully not a digital one.

I went to the first pharmacy available in Salt Spring Island, where I was at the moment.  It is a hippy type of island, and the first pharmacy was an integrative healing pharmacy.  They had all sorts of herbal and "natural" remedies, but alas no OPK's.  The second pharmacy did, and they were the old style First Response where you get to look at two lines and decide whether yours was darker than the control line.  Love those.  Peed on one at first sight, in the pharmacy's washroom, and got a big fat negative.  Huh?  Am I or am I not ovulating?  that is the question.  Not to mention that now I was comparing two different brands, introducing another element of instability in the madness.

Two out of three tests seems always best, so I did another test three hours later, from the First Response batch as well.  (Have I mentioned that they cost 16$ each?).  The last one DID NOT WORK!  I got no control line, no test line, nothing.  It was blank like a piece of cardboard.  So I had to do a fourth one ($$$$) and got another negative.

My conclusions at the end of cycle day 11 are as follows:
1.  Out of six opk sticks, three gave me an error. Two of the ClearBlue, one of the First Response.
2.  Out of the three that did give me a result, one said yes, two said no.  On the same day, within four hours of each other.  Which one is wrong? Who knows...

Tomorrow I am going for my ultrasound for lining thickness, and I am going to ask for a blood test to detect the LH surge.  Blood is thicker than urine.  And that concludes cycle day 11.