I voted no because 85% of the time I have no idea/don’t notice. Then every once in a while, I’ll get crampy, or notice the mucus, or afix a meaning to the level of horniness. But this is rare.
Or wretched pain elsewhere because yay, endometriosis! Being a girl is so much frickety fun!
I can tell because of both the “yes” answers – I keep track of my cycle via Femilia, but I can always tell when I’m ovulating anyway because of the goo, the ramped-up libido and everyone’s favourite mittelschmerz.
And I’m an idiot because I just got my period last night…
I have PCOS, so sometimes I go months without ovulating… and them sometimes it just happens. I never know when it’s going on until about two weeks later when I start bleeding!
So… in some women you can tell by your libido? That doesn’t work for me - one of the few “hey, my period is going to start real soon” signs is heightened libido, which seems counter-productive, but is common to lots of women. Having it happen when you ovulate seems much more efficient from a reproductive standpoint!
Yes- I track my cycle daily, but the physical signs make it obvious too (high sex drive, lots of cervical fluid, ovary pain before - followed by a sudden drop-off of the first two).
For me, I get it at both times, right about when I ovulate, then it’s less for awhile, then my libido is back up right before my period.
Disgustingly funny! Thanks for the chuckle.
When not on birth control pills*, I suffer from Mittelschmirz** when I ovulate. It really really realllly sucks. Usually it’s a mild cramping right at the ovary itself (as opposed to uterine cramps during a period), but about 3-4 times a year hoooooooooly crap.
I will get the most horrid pain. It literally feels like an iron rod is being jammed up my asshole repeatedly, to be blunt. I can’t walk without this bizarre limping mincing gait and if I even shift around when sitting or laying down, there’s the iron rod! I’ve had to hurry to a couch or bed sometimes to lay down because I was at the beginning of passing out (darkening vision with pinpricks of light, the funny tunnel-hearing, lightheadedness).
I’d say the only upside is that I can actually tell each month which ovary is shooting the egg out.
- which I recently stopped, so I can expect this joy to come back.
** German for “middle pain”.
I didn’t answer the poll because, thankfully, I am finished with that crap. 
I’m retired now too, but I never ever had a clue when I ovulated. I spent years on the pill, years with an IUD (for comparison), and years using no birth control and was completely oblivious to ovulation.
I am often pretty sensitive to stuff going on in my body - I was convinced that I was pregnant within 24 hours of conceiving, for instance - but there was nothing that clued me in on my ovary functioning.
Sometimes I have the popping pain, but it is not bad, sometimes I just have a general midregion achiness, but then main way I know I’m ovulating is that I fall in love with the whole world, especially the men. I start noticing men everywhere, they don’t even have to be particularly attractive for me to get all attentive. The level of lovey doveyness directed toward my husband goes up and I feel like I’m walking on sunshine. I’ve often thought I needed a word for how my whole perception changes…o-goggles?
That would be nice!! I wish my hormones gave me that kind of natural high!
I get stabby pains too, and the sticky mucus. And it smells…yeasty. When I pee, it’ll be cloudy, too. Doesn’t make me feel very sexy, which is unfortunate, given why these things are happening.
Mittelschmerz sounds pretty awful! I didn’t know it could get that bad. I’m grateful to have never experienced it myself.
Aw. I get rectal pain during my period*. It can be REALLY intense - probably more intense than any other pain I have experienced. I have never passed out from it though.
Mittelschmirtz for me is just regular menstrualish crampiness, with the occasional month with horrific cramps which probably mean I have a cyst.
*I might have endometriosis and this isn’t uncommon in those who do.
I voted No, I’ve never felt that pain/popping sensation, or I’ve just never made the connection.
I almost always notice the mucus and the extra hornies but this seems to happen a couple of times a month so I’m still in the clueless camp…or extra fertile…that’s actually rather disturbing.
rhubarbarin, me too! I always picture a metal claw squeezing the base of my spine in a merciless grip, much worse than any cramp I’ve ever had.
Slightly off topic, and I’ve posted about this before… But when I was 15 I had two episodes of this. Mine was severe abdominal pain and the limping mincing gait. My doctor… such as he was… diagnosed it at pelvic immflamatory disease and essentially called me a whore. (He didn’t believe me when I told him I was not sexually active.) He was a lovely guy.
I had to explain what PID was to my mother as we were walking out to the car. “It’s uterine scarring that is usually caused by an STD gone on too long or a result of an abortion.”
I betcha it was mittleschmertz.
I no longer have that problem but I’m somehow comforted in reading that other women recognized that they were ovulating because of the pain. In my case, the pain was so hard that I had no sexual desire to speak of. As I often read that women had increased desire at ovulation, I used to think that I was abnormal or deficient that way.