Hello my dear ladies, so finally the clock has struck within you and you wish to get pregnant soon? And do you think getting pregnant is easy? Well maybe! But only if you understand certain things to do or better to say to follow strictly, as we all know that the pregnancy window is very small and the healthier you ‘re and your chances of getting pregnant is still only 25% in a month, and what about others who face certain health problems? Hmm? It might take some time, better not lose hope, prepare yourself physically as well as mentally before planning for a baby to let your fetus grow in an healthy atmosphere and be born healthy when it arrives this world. Am I scaring you? Definitely not! All you need to do is follow certain diet plan, exercise and fully understand your menstrual cycle along with the fertility window (time you ovulate), and bring together all these factors.
We also know that half of pregnancy goes unplanned and those who plan can never quit their bad habits which they know might harm the fetus, for not everyone takes care and concern about following a healthy diet plan, a proper exercise and mental peace. It is important that you as well as your partner focus on the health benefits before you try to conceive, for both you and your partner’s wellness matters. Today most our food are contaminated or chemically harvested, we hardly get all the nutrients. Focusing on our lifestyle, we need to realize that majority of pre-term labor, miscarriages, abortions are mainly caused due to smoking, alcohol consumption, intake of drugs and wrong medications, and there are other factors, which still remain unknown. It is also said that women who consume more than eight cups of caffeine might undergo the risk of miscarriage. Taking care of yourself and quitting certain harmful factors might potentially increase your chances of having a healthy baby, why not you give it a try, if you are addicted to one of these.
Knowing Your Body!
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What do I mean when I say “knowing your body� As I already said, time period for the sperm to get attached itself with the egg is very limited and your fertility window is very small, you need to fully understand your menstrual cycle and the fertile days, and nowadays we have a lot of techniques by which we can predict ovulation.
- Ovulation Calendar: This is one of the traditional method to detect fertility, which has been followed by women for days, for an average woman, menstrual cycle last somewhere between 28 to 32, this is calculated from day one till the day when the next period starts, where she can expect here fertility to lay between 10th to 20th day starting from the first day of her period, then she ovulates and enters the luteal phase, which will be from her ovulation to next expected period, this period is often considered as very less fertile or not fertile phase, for many believe and researchers say that chances of getting pregnant in luteal face is nearly zero. But there is exactly no perfect time where you can never get pregnant. Drawback of this method is that not every woman is same and at times you might get delayed ovulation, which might be caused due to stress, change in diet or weight gain.
- Ovulation Prediction Kits: this is another simple method which works by measuring the presence of Luteinizing Hormone (LH) in your urine sample. Ovulation is the only time when the hormones are secreted in your body, so a positive test probably means you’re ovulating. Best time to test is during the afternoon when the hormones are in raised level. Drawback of using this method is that they don’t work if you’re on fertility drugs, they do not indicate if the cervical mucus is conductive for the sperms to swim to the egg and finally they don’t work on women who are mostly above 40 yrs.
- Tracking Cervical Mucus: Many women rely on the cervical mucus to predict ovulation, cervical mucus vary throughout the cycle and during ovulation it is like raw egg, slippery and watery, this method proves effective when combined with BBT (basal body temperature method) or ovulation prediction method, during the luteal phase the cervical mucus is rather thick and white and less expandable.
- Basal Body Temperature: this method is also known as fertility charting or natural family planning method, and is used to determine when you’re most fertile, all you need to do is check your base body temperature with a thermometer and exactly at the same time everyday first thing in the morning when u step out of bed. When there is hike in temperature it means you’re fertile, keeping track of these temperatures for more than couple of months will give you an exact idea when you’re ovulating.
Healthy Diet Plan:
A healthy diet is very important while trying to conceive, health care providers, midwives, and WHO recommend women to take good prenatal capsules right from the time they plan conception, prenatal capsules that contain folic acid and DHA are very essential for good spinal cord and neural development in the fetus, it promotes fetus development and prevent early miscarriages. Most of our food doesn’t contain enough natural source of Folic acid, DHA, Vitamin D, so taking a supplementary is recommended, some of the natural sources of DHA and folic acid are green leafy vegetable, oranges, breakfast cereals, pulses. Take a balanced diet, eating five servings of fresh fruits and vegetable salads, and make sure your don’t lack Calcium and Vitamin D. Eliminate fast food items, high fat dairy products, sodas and Coke, Pepsi etc.
Exercises are another factor which help to conceive faster, maintaining a good healthy weight adds on to the positive factor, women who are obese are at higher risk of pregnancy complications like gestational diabetics, hypertension etc. at least stick to walking if you haven’t got much time to spare for exercise.
Diet For Men:
It is important that even your partner follow certain plan while trying to conceive, for even his food habit might affect conception, eating healthy food like carrots, green leafy vegetables, pulses, beans, orange juice, pomegranate juice, apricots, oysters etc are some of the finest examples of fertility boosting foods. Pomegranates are good in increasing the sperm count and quality, so why not try to add them in his diet?
It is important that even your partner strictly avoids fast foods, junk and canned foods along with alcohol, smoking and drugs to maintain the quality of the sperm and to increase the sperm motility.
Intercourse Tips:
Missionary position will help in conceiving faster as the sperms are in closer reach to the cervix, and place a pillow below your hips and stay slightly inclined for 10- 15 minutes, for the sperms to swim faster, though this is sometimes called as myth as the leakage after intercourse is semen and not sperms, still some believe it to work. Having sex on every other day is proved to be effective and improves the quality of the sperm.
Now that you know what to do and what not, start planning for your pregnancy, and get an appointment fixed with your gynecologist for general examination before you proceed.