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TTC Diet
In aid of doing everything I can to help us conceive naturally, before pushing for fertility referral, I think I'm going to take a look at my diet. Generally we haven't changed my eating habits what so ever since starting our TTC journey. Basic changes will be including a lot more fruit, vegetables, and much less processed food. Oh and I've purchased caffine free teabags and I'm going to ditch the diet coke, heard caffeine is bad when TTC? Is there anything obvious I'm missing? Has anyone else changed their diet in aid of TTC, what did you change? Did it help do you think?
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Good move, it makes sense to do all you can naturally. We switched to decaf tea and coffee last July when we started TTC. Didn't help us, but we have stuck at it anyway, as we feel better without the caffeine and can't taste the difference. I find typhoo do the best decaf tea bags (pouring one as I type) and supermarket own brand decaf filter coffee to be the best...if you're after instant I rate kenco milicano caff free.
Lots of fruit and veg will make sure you get plenty of nutrients, and calcium is important too, I use fat free yogurts to get mine as I follow slimming world which doesn't allow for much milk. Iron is essential, so green veg like broccoli and spinach are great, and also red meat if you're not a veggie...if you are don't worry, the leafy greens with give you plenty. Anecdotally, peas can be detrimental, not sure how much truth there is in that. We cut them out for a while but nothing happened, and we love them so went back to them after a while.
I think the main thing is cut down on caffeine and processed foods. Try to eat fresh and healthy where possible, and regular exercise - even just a walk to the shops - will help too.
Good luck!
Thanks Saffron! All very helpful.
Have you heard much about sweetener? I have to admit to using quite a lot of it. Generally I know I need to ditch it because its not that healthy, but wondered if it was known to have any impact on TTC. I've looked around and had mixed feedback so far!
Wish I'd posted this yesterday as would have got the typhoo bags, I went with Tetley Decaf in the end, if they are no good will definitely try Typhoo ones! Thanks.
Haven't tried tetley, but I'm sure they'll be fine. What do you use sweetener in?
Tea ... and I drink a lot :-O and I have 3 sweeteners... *hangs head in shame*
I had sugar in my tea up until last year when we started TTC, two sugars. I cut down and then eventually out altogether, took about 3months. From what I gather sweeteners aren't great, you would be better off switching to sugar, sorry
I have heard sweetener isn't great because of the aspartame - I have cut it out and now down to half a sugar. I am missing diet coke though! Other than that exactly what saffron said. Good luck.
I don't consume a lot of caffeine anyway but I try to limit Diet Coke to only one or two only at the weekends. Other than that I do try and eat healthy although I've been eating too much rubbish the last couple of months. Think I'm starting to comfort eat so I really need to get myself out of that asap.
Other than that I'm just trying to but back on rubbish, eat more fruit and veg and cut back on alcohol a bit. I'm not one that drinks loads anyway so the alcohol thing isn't a huge issue for me.
I've upped my intake of vegetables, particularly spinach and broccoli. I exercise regularly - gym at least twice a week and I practice Pilates at home too.
I haven't done anything, but we eat healthily anyway, and neither of us are over weight. H has started taking some multi vitamins
We try to eat healthy where possible anyway but are trying to be more strict. We both love our wine so knocking that down is proving rather difficult!
I'm not TTC but did make some changes to my diet when we were. A lot of what I did has already been mentioned, eating more dark green veg and upping my calcium a bit. I also made sure I drank a lot more water as I read that this can help increase the amount of EWCM you produce and I never seemed to have much. I never drink caffeine anyway.
The other thing I did was drink pomegranate juice and decaf green tea as they are quite cleansing and I heard that they would be good for a bit of a detox. Not sure if any of it really worked but it's never a bad thing to eat more healthily!
Hope you have some success with it!
There are some tips for good foods to eat on this website
natural-fertility-info.com/fertility-diet
My ttc diet is slightly different as I accidentally stumbled across a website all about ttcing for a particular sex whilst looking for healthy diets so am back onto eating 'boy' friendly foods which is basically trying to make my body as alkaline as possible to make it friendly to boy sperm. So I try to eat as much red meat as possible with salt, green veg, chips, potatoes. I try to eat at least 1 banana a day (along with with other fruit like plums, strawberries & apples). I drink warm water with freshly squeezed lemon & a carton of V8 a day with manuaka honey vinegar in it. I also take a variety of supplements but I can't remember which are for general fertility & which are for swaying boy, I also take a multi vit with folic acid. Fingers crossed it all helps!