You cannot get pregnant if you are not ovulating because pregnancy requires an egg to be released that sperm can fertilize. Ovulation is when your body releases a mature egg, and this egg survives for about 12 to 24 hours, during which fertilization can occur. Without ovulation, there is no egg present to fertilize, so pregnancy cannot happen. However, although you only ovulate once per cycle, sperm can live inside your reproductive system for up to five days. This means you can get pregnant if you have sex in the days leading up to ovulation, since sperm may still be present when the egg is released. If you have a cycle where ovulation does not occur (called anovulation), pregnancy is not possible in that cycle. Anovulation can occasionally happen for various reasons like stress or changes in routine, but it does not mean you can't conceive in other cycles when ovulation resumes. In summary, pregnancy requires ovulation to occur, so you cannot get pregnant when you are not ovulating at all. But you can conceive in a window of several days around ovulation because of sperm longevity inside the body.
