Fertility awareness methods (FAM)

There’s loads of them – Natural Cycles, Sensiplan, Fertility UK, Standard Days, Marquette, Billings, Justisse. The umbrella name for all the different methods is 'fertility awareness' of ‘fertility awareness based methods’. They all involve using knowledge of your menstrual cycle and a pick 'n' mix of fertility indicators – cycle day, waking temperature, cervical fluid, ovulation tests and cervix checks, to avoid pregnancy. You choose the level of detail that suits you. Some approaches are more complicated than others.

Safe days are the days in your menstrual cycle when you are at very low risk of getting pregnant. The exact days vary from woman to woman. There are usually a few at the beginning of your cycle and more at the end, once you have confirmed that ovulation has been and gone and your egg (or eggs) have dissolved.

This is not the method for you if you can't use condoms or other precautions for at least 11 days a cycle – more while you're learning. It’s also not for you if your periods have stopped for any reason. The record keeping can also be a disadvantage – you need to track day one of your period and a fair amount of other data, including waking temperature, though maybe not as much as you think. It’s also worth knowing that illness, stress or travel might delay or stop ovulation which means more days when you need to use condoms. If you have sex without protection when you are fertile you might need to use emergency contraception, which can change your cycle and mean more condom days.

There are no medical risks when using fertility awareness methods. The only thing that can go wrong is that it leads to an unexpected pregnancy. Lots of factors (illness, lifestyle, stress or travel) may make fertility indicators harder to interpret meaning you may not accurately predict your fertile window. You may also have sex accidentally without protection when you are fertile and that could lead to pregnancy. When not using condoms you are also not protected from STIs.