Free Online Pregnancy Tools
Back in the old days, women had to rely on visits to the doctor or a medical book to find out information about their pregnancy. Now there are thousands of online pregnancy tools, most of which are free. Here are a few ideas to get started.
Trying to get pregnant? There are online ovulation calculators that give you the best window of opportunity of conception to be most likely. Enter the date of your last period and the computer will not only calculate the week your fertility is at its peak, but also the weeks for the coming year.
There are also fertility worksheets available for free download. You can track your periods, calculate ovulation dates, keep track of possible dates of conception and track your way all the way to the due date.
Think you might be pregnant? There are all kinds of symptom guides online that let you know the tell-tale signs… nausea, dizziness, cramps, fatigue, bloating, breast changes and, of course, a missed period.
There are all kinds of due date calculators out there. Enter the date of your last period and the computer will tell you the probable date of conception, the dates of the first, second and third trimester and a due date.
Once you find out you’re pregnant, there are lists of foods to avoid while pregnant, charts regarding types of fish that have higher levels of dangerous mercury, types of soft cheeses that are likely to cause illness or miscarriage due to lack of pasteurization and other guidelines as to whether or not you should have caffeine or alcohol or raw foods of any kind.
Other tools available online include a pregnancy weight gain tracker, online journals, as well as message boards to get advice and exchange ideas with other moms. A lot of these message boards are wonderful resources full of articles, tools and information about how your baby is developing from week to week.
Once you start to near the end of your pregnancy, there are websites that help you create your own birth plan in which you specify everything from who you want present to what you will do for pain relief.
Birth announcements are an excellent item to work on as you near those final months of pregnancy. There are lots of websites that offer all kinds of options – everything from free announcements sent via email to photo announcements once the baby is born.
Another popular tool is the ubiquitous baby name web site. There are tons of them out there and they list everything from traditional names, celebrity names, meanings of names, names that come from various regions of the world, popular names, unpopular names, suggestions for middle names… it’s all there.
Want something fun? There are Chinese gender predictors. Enter the date of conception and your birth date month and year, and the predictor calculates whether you’re having a boy or a girl based on your lunar age and the Chinese lunar month the baby was conceived. Keep in mind this tool only has a 50% chance of being accurate – for more accurate results, check with your doctor when he does an ultrasound.
Finally, one sure way to amaze your friends – a free online pregnancy test. You enter your name, stand in front of your computer and it scans you for everything from hormone levels to ovulation status to… bovine encephalitis distemper? Then it announces whether or not you are pregnant, lets you know whether the baby is a boy or a girl and even specifies who the celebrity father is… Yeah, the website is a joke. But it’s a fun gag to share with a friend.