Negative blood and urine test but have all early pregnancy symptoms!

Please help as much as you can!

I'm on the Depo Provera injection, but it is close to the end of the 3 month cycle.
My partner and I use the withdrawal method as I've never had a problem with the injection.
Anyway, about 2 - 3 weeks ago I started a dose of antibiotics and we didn't think twice about using any more protection.
But over the last week I have slowly started experiencing early pregnancy symptoms.
Infact, I did a quiz and had 20 out of 20 symptoms. Yet low and behold, an home test and a blood test have both come back negative.
I already have a 3 year old daughter and when I was pregnant with her my blood test came back positive at 5 weeks.
Now, I know that usually most symptoms can be explained by PMS but I have never had any symptoms of PMS, so I am very confused.
I know my body and I know something isn't right but I'm just wondering if I am over reacting or if someone else has possibly been in the same type of situation?

Hello Chloeanne,

Welcome to the forums!

From what I gather from your post, you are on the Depo Provera injection, and it should still be working fully as you are still within the 3 month cycle. You also mentioned that your partner and you use the withdrawal method. So it sounds like you're using two forms of birth control.

You mention that over the last week you started experiencing early pregnancy symptoms but both a home pregnancy test and a blood test came back negative. You mentioned that you took a quiz and learned that you had 20 symptoms.

There are a few things that come to mind.

1. The blood test could have been done too early to detect hCG, because it can take up to 12 days for an embryo to implant (6 days being the earliest). Once implantation occurs hCG levels will double every 2 to 3 days. So if it takes 2 days for hCG levels to become greater than 5 mIU/ml you would be looking at a positive test around 14 days post conception (if implantation did not happen earlier than 12 days after conception).

If implantation happened at 12 days and it was just too early to detect hCG, you could still experience pregnancy symptoms from rising levels of progesterone. But 20 symptoms seems like a lot for that early in pregnancy.

What makes much more sense to me is that you are experiencing hormonal imbalance. Hormonal imbalance can mimic pregnancy symptoms and this makes it really hard to tell whether you're pregnant or not, just from symptoms.

The fact that you got a negative urine and blood test, along with the fact that you were using two forms of birth control lead me to believe that it is more probable that you are experiencing hormonal imbalance than early pregnancy.

I would encourage you to take another home pregnancy test 7 days after the last to confirm that you are not pregnant. And in the mean time, I would encourage you to reduce stress, eat a really healthy diet (avoiding sugar, simple carbohydrates, white flour products, pasta and white rice). Be sure to eat at least two green salads a day, and drink plenty of pure water. Squeezing 1/2 of a fresh lemon into a glass of water and drinking that each morning is cleansing to the body and can help balance hormones. If you have a juicer, try juicing some apples with kale. Kale is really high in calcium and protein and is wonderful for taking stress off the liver and helping hormones to become more balanced. Another thing you can do is to take a tablespoon of olive oil 30 minutes before lunch and dinner. Daily exercise will help as well. All of these things can be done even if you are pregnant but will also help to balance hormones if you are not.

Please be aware that I have heard of many women who used the Depo Provera injection and then had a really hard time getting pregnant when they wanted to... in fact some experienced infertility and were not able to conceive. Depo Provera definitely has it's risks. I would encourage you to learn how to read your body's fertility signs and then use the withdrawal method along with natural family planning (this is not the Rhythm Method).

I hope this helps some and feel free to post back with any questions.

Warm Regards,

Kate