Healthy food (as long as I'm not pregnant anyways)

[Cheesecake]

I figured that as long as I'm not pregnant, I can still A: try to lose some weight, and B: try to get myself into some healthier habits.

So for snacks at work, I just made home made granola bars. I know exactly what's in there, and did the math and a huge ass "will fill me up for the rest of the day" bar is about 200 Cal, so really not that bad. Much better than cookies and chocolate and chips which I now use to tidy me over until dinner. (Or regular or low cal granola bars, which are filled with unhealthy additives or sweeteners or whatever. Mine just have brown rice syrup and a splash of maple syrup for flavor.)

And since I was 8 or 9 I haven't really done breakfast anymore. Brunch, sure, on weekends, but never breakfast. And since it's supposed to be super important, I'm trying to get myself into that as well. Right now, in the oven, a batch of omelet. Filled with chicken sausage (or really just home ground chicken and salt free sausage seasoning), 7 egg whites, 2 whole eggs, red and yellow bell peppers and spring onions. I filled a cupcake pan with the mixture, so I can just nuke one in the morning and have a super healthy and insanely quick breakfast.
(I'd already made a batch of regular and a batch of pumpkin pancakes earlier, which are frozen and can go in the toaster for a quicky breakfast as well.)

Let's see if 3 meals a day and a healthy snack will help me stay away from crappy food and improve both my weight and overall health. who knows.

So how healthy do you eat? Do you eat 3 meals a day? And have you changed/are you changing anything in your diet since starting TTC, or since you've know that there's trouble?

[lola]

I'm super, super terrible about being healthy. Thank god for genetics, or I'd have a huge problem on my hands.

[G22]

I've always eaten 3 meals a day. My mom used to make me eat breakfast when I was younger, so now I kind of feel a bit off when I don't eat something for breakfast.

H and I try to eat relatively healthy. We a lot of fruit, and I try to eat a good amount of veggies too. I'm also addicted to milk so I get a good amount of calcium from that. Honestly the only the thing I have changed about my diet since TTC is the amount of caffeine I have daily. I make sure I limit myself to one cup of coffee daily. I occasionally like a Dr Pepper, and I try not to have both of those on the same day. Caffeine overload! I know I don't have the absolute healthiest diet, but I run and keep active enough to balance out the crappy stuff I eat, so for now I don't stress about my diet much.

[ilovecandy]

Yeh also not so great at eating healthy. We do try to not eat much processed crap like amburger helper etc. For breakfast i usually have toast with peanut butter or oatmel, if it is the weekend we try to do bigger breakfasts like omlets, scrambled eggs. etc.

[thoseareradishes]

I try to keep us eating pretty healthy. H has cereal with milk and a banana for breakfast, while currently I am having a whole wheat bagel with keifr (yogurt) cheese and fruit. I pack our lunches every day and I cook dinner most nights- usually something vegetarian with meat once or twice a week. We do eat out some on the weekends. (Today we went to Sonic, yum.)

I'm not very good with snacks- H is fine with fruit and crackers, but I get bored with that. Lately its been crackers with keifer cheese (that stuff is awesome), or cheese slices.

When we decided to TTC, I actually tried to gain a little weight- I've always been a little underweight. I have gained about 5-8 lbs since the summer. I eat more yogurt, eggs when I'm in the mood, and larger amounts of food in general, mainly.

[mae141]

My RE told me to cut the carbs when he saw my bloodwork. I always thought I ate pretty
well, until I realized I didn't. He told me not to loose any weight though, and I have lost more than I would have liked to. I'm working on eating more to gain some back.

When I started cutting carbs I did lots of research on what I could actually eat because I love sweets. I came across the website 100 Days of Real Food somehow, and was reading a lot about just eating better in general. Since then I've cut out most processed foods and eat more veggies. I read a lot about "fertility diets" and they were pretty much low-carb, real food diets, so that was even more motivation for me to eat better.

I always have 3 meals, but they aren't huge. I snack a lot. In a typical day I will have whole grain pretzels with peanut butter, cheese, and some garbanzo beans or veggies as snacks before lunch. I always have an apple and either nuts or veggies for an afternoon snack. Breakfast is always a smoothie with berries, plain greek yogurt and a little spinach. I found a recipe for healthy breakfast cookies so sometimes I have those, and I also make low carb high protein pancakes with oats, walnuts, cottage cheese and eggs that I freeze and pop in the toaster for a quick breakfast.

Since changing my diet, my ovaries have evened out in size- one was tiny before. I also haven't had a migraine or gotten sick. (knock on wood!) So I like to think it's helping.

[Cheesecake]

That's graet Mae! I am in the unlucky situation where I'm supposed to eat much more carbs and less protein than most. Ideally I should stay well under 3oz of animal related protein (so including milk, cheese, egg, yoghurt etc) a day for my kidneys. That's super difficult WITH eating lots of carbs, let alone if I'd cut those out.
So by all means no ideal fertility diet!

With adding breakfast and more healthy /fibrous forms of carbs I'm hoping to even things out a bit. I'm also allergic to most fruits, so easy, healthy snacking is difficult!

I have always cooked us healthy dinners though, our dinners are 99% from scratch (which means I rarely even use cans of anything, sauce, veggies, soups, all from scratch, definitely no hamburger helper type stuff). But dinner is really just 1 meal, and when the rest is meh, or sugary, fatty snacks, it's still not great.

I guess i'll find out next month if the RE wants me to change more. I have already lowered my caffeine intake, so it shouldn't be too bad, right???

Sent from my phone, please disregard typos!

[mae141]

Jan 13, 2013 4:45:14 GMT -5 Cheesecake said:

That's graet Mae! I am in the unlucky situation where I'm supposed to eat much more carbs and less protein than most. Ideally I should stay well under 3oz of animal related protein (so including milk, cheese, egg, yoghurt etc) a day for my kidneys. That's super difficult WITH eating lots of carbs, let alone if I'd cut those out.
So by all means no ideal fertility diet!

With adding breakfast and more healthy /fibrous forms of carbs I'm hoping to even things out a bit. I'm also allergic to most fruits, so easy, healthy snacking is difficult!

I have always cooked us healthy dinners though, our dinners are 99% from scratch (which means I rarely even use cans of anything, sauce, veggies, soups, all from scratch, definitely no hamburger helper type stuff). But dinner is really just 1 meal, and when the rest is meh, or sugary, fatty snacks, it's still not great.

I guess i'll find out next month if the RE wants me to change more. I have already lowered my caffeine intake, so it shouldn't be too bad, right???

Sent from my phone, please disregard typos!

Wow, I have trouble eating well without all those restrictions. That must be tough! It sounds like you do eat well though since you cook from scratch every night. That's a big accomplishment. I think cutting out processed stuff makes a huge difference.

[changedname]

Starting yesterday I am trying to eliminate dairy and wheat plus as much sugar (except fruits etc) as I can. I'm doing the diet recommended for my type in "the Infertility cure" book.

I have definitely gained weight since ttc (prob 10 pounds), mainly because of not exercising as much as I used to during the 2ww. My acupuncturist also told me not to exercise at all, ever except walking. . I'm taking the next 2 months before IVF to try and lose those 10 pounds and get in tip top shape.

[G22]

Jan 13, 2013 10:44:15 GMT -5 changedname said:

mainly because of not exercising as much as I used to during the 2ww. My acupuncturist also told me not to exercise at all, ever except walking.

What was the reasoning for that? I don't raise my eyebrow at stuff very often, but that got it up. As badly as I want to be pregnant, I have been active and in shape my entire. Unless there was a health issue to where I need to stop, I don't see the issue. It would be very hard for me to just not exercise, without a valid reason.

[changedname]

Jan 13, 2013 13:24:32 GMT -5 G22 said:

Jan 13, 2013 10:44:15 GMT -5 changedname said:

mainly because of not exercising as much as I used to during the 2ww. My acupuncturist also told me not to exercise at all, ever except walking.

What was the reasoning for that? I don't raise my eyebrow at stuff very often, but that got it up. As badly as I want to be pregnant, I have been active and in shape my entire. Unless there was a health issue to where I need to stop, I don't see the issue. It would be very hard for me to just not exercise, without a valid reason.

To be honest I didn't ask because I had already read it before in that book. Eastern medicine doesn't recommend "extensive" exercise like westerners do. Especially when ttc. It has to do with overheating the body. Moderate exercise like yoga/walking is ok but not running etc.

If you are happy doing exercise, I would continue. I did for 8 months but when doing treatments I completely followed the acu's recommendation to the letter just because I would have hated to get a bfn and then blame myself. I didn't get pg so I obviously my exercising hasn't been causing my IF.

[G22]

Jan 13, 2013 15:06:57 GMT -5 changedname said:

Jan 13, 2013 13:24:32 GMT -5 G22 said:

What was the reasoning for that? I don't raise my eyebrow at stuff very often, but that got it up. As badly as I want to be pregnant, I have been active and in shape my entire life. Unless there was a health issue to where I need to stop, I don't see the issue. It would be very hard for me to just not exercise, without a valid reason.

To be honest I didn't ask because I had already read it before in that book. Eastern medicine doesn't recommend "extensive" exercise like westerners do. Especially when ttc. It has to do with overheating the body. Moderate exercise like yoga/walking is ok but not running etc.

If you are happy doing exercise, I would continue. I did for 8 months but when doing treatments I completely followed the acu's recommendation to the letter just because I would have hated to get a bfn and then blame myself. I didn't get pg so I obviously my exercising hasn't been causing my IF.

I was just curious. I had never heard don't exercise when TTC. Just to clarify, I think exercise means something different to everyone. There are so many options and levels of intensity, not just running. I can understand the moderate exercise thing. With your first comment, I got that you couldn't do anything else, but walk.

I also agree with the moderate exercise at certain points in your cycle, just so you know :-)

[jewel]

Jan 12, 2013 13:38:06 GMT -5 lola said:

I'm super, super terrible about being healthy. Thank god for genetics, or I'd have a huge problem on my hands.

Same here....rarely did a fruit or vegetable touch my lips, until I met my husband. It was not uncommon for me to eat a candy bar on my way to work, fast food for lunch, and something out of a box for dinner

My husband is now the main cook in our house, and he does a reasonably healthy balance. We typically eat chicken/fish, 1 or 2 veggies, and a carb for dinner. I'll usually have leftovers for lunch, and a banana and instant breakfast in the morning. I'm not much of a snacker, but I definitely have a little treat every night. I always blame my husband and his heathy cooking for gaining 10-ish pounds since we met, but it's probably just aging from 24 to 30 that's been rude to me.

I also gained a good 10 pounds after my m/c. I was already down a few pounds because of being pregnant and sick, so I gained that back and at least 5 pounds more in pizza a ho-hos as part of my m/c recovery.

Since TTC and especially TTTC, I've only changed my diet a little. I've really cut back on caffeine. I've added sunflower seeds, POM juice and green tea. That's all I can think of, although I'm starting acupuncture this month and may look into the fertility diet.

[changedname]

Jan 13, 2013 15:44:01 GMT -5 G22 said:

Jan 13, 2013 15:06:57 GMT -5 changedname said:

To be honest I didn't ask because I had already read it before in that book. Eastern medicine doesn't recommend "extensive" exercise like westerners do. Especially when ttc. It has to do with overheating the body. Moderate exercise like yoga/walking is ok but not running etc.

If you are happy doing exercise, I would continue. I did for 8 months but when doing treatments I completely followed the acu's recommendation to the letter just because I would have hated to get a bfn and then blame myself. I didn't get pg so I obviously my exercising hasn't been causing my IF.

I was just curious. I had never heard don't exercise when TTC. Just to clarify, I think exercise means something different to everyone. There are so many options and levels of intensity, not just running. I can understand the moderate exercise thing. With your first comment, I got that you couldn't do anything else, but walk.

I also agree with the moderate exercise at certain points in your cycle, just so you know :-)

My first comment was what you thought it was - my acupuncturist said nothing except walking. . I asked if I could go swimming during the 2ww of my injectible cycle and he laughed at me like it was the most ridiculous thing ever. It sucked. I am glad to be back doing exercise and torn on what i will do during my upcoming IVF.
Exercise makes me happy but I don't want to go overboard. Yoga and walking are the only things he okayed.

I just saw this thread on TB - it looks like walking only is pretty normally for IF/IVF patients:
community.thebump.com/cs/ks/forums/thread/71246097.aspx

[genet313]

Jan 13, 2013 15:44:01 GMT -5 G22 said:

Jan 13, 2013 15:06:57 GMT -5 changedname said:

To be honest I didn't ask because I had already read it before in that book. Eastern medicine doesn't recommend "extensive" exercise like westerners do. Especially when ttc. It has to do with overheating the body. Moderate exercise like yoga/walking is ok but not running etc.

If you are happy doing exercise, I would continue. I did for 8 months but when doing treatments I completely followed the acu's recommendation to the letter just because I would have hated to get a bfn and then blame myself. I didn't get pg so I obviously my exercising hasn't been causing my IF.

I was just curious. I had never heard don't exercise when TTC. Just to clarify, I think exercise means something different to everyone. There are so many options and levels of intensity, not just running. I can understand the moderate exercise thing. With your first comment, I got that you couldn't do anything else, but walk.

I also agree with the moderate exercise at certain points in your cycle, just so you know :-)

I've heard the same thing, particularly around ovulation. I've also heard from an actual MD that running is bad, as it shortens your LP.

I tried not running at all during the 2WW one cycle. My LP is 13 days like clockwork. The month I didn't run? Yeah, it was 12.

I no longer care, and I still run. Not a lot, mind you, but I do. I also do Jillian Michels videos, which are a lot of jumping and such. If I can't be pregnant, I might as well be healthy and get stronger.

[G22]

Jan 14, 2013 14:52:09 GMT -5 genet313 said:

Jan 13, 2013 15:44:01 GMT -5 G22 said:

I was just curious. I had never heard don't exercise when TTC. Just to clarify, I think exercise means something different to everyone. There are so many options and levels of intensity, not just running. I can understand the moderate exercise thing. With your first comment, I got that you couldn't do anything else, but walk.

I also agree with the moderate exercise at certain points in your cycle, just so you know :-)

I've heard the same thing, particularly around ovulation. I've also heard from an actual MD that running is bad, as it shortens your LP.

I tried not running at all during the 2WW one cycle. My LP is 13 days like clockwork. The month I didn't run? Yeah, it was 12.

I no longer care, and I still run. Not a lot, mind you, but I do. I also do Jillian Michels videos, which are a lot of jumping and such. If I can't be pregnant, I might as well be healthy and get stronger.

This is where I am now. I tried backing off and moderating my exercise at first, but it made no difference. After 3 years of trying , I would have missed out on so many opportunities, that I only care around the end of my cycle now. I run, zumba and play volleyball still.

[pamela]

My peak weight was around 190 and my MFM during our initial consult told me I should try to get down to 155. Thankfully that wasn't his only advice, but I definitely took it as a judgement and didn't do anything about it then. 6 months ago I got fed up and wanted to start losing weight for me, nothing to do with TTC. I'm now actually at that recommended goal of his. Hasn't done a thing as far as succesfully carrying another pregnancy, but it does feel great.

I eat 3 meals, plus some snacks. My biggest key is just tracking calories and portion control (with a scale and learning to do a good job eyeballing and rounding up at restaurants). I do exercise some now, but I don't think that's what made the big difference.