You might be wondering, “What is fertility?” Fertility is your natural ability to conceive and carry your baby to full term and bring it into the world.
The chance that a healthy woman having regular intercourse will conceive in any given cycle is only 7 to 12 per cent, the older you get, the number declines.
It is not uncommon for people to experience signs of infertility. This may be stressful, as many people show no direct symptoms of infertility until they try to conceive.
Infertility affects both men and women. About a third of the issues with infertility comes from women, and another third starts with men. The final third may be due to a combination of both, other factors, or unknown causes.
Read: What You Need to Know About infertility in Men
Does your age affect your fertility?
Fertility and age go hand in hand. When your hormones kick in during puberty and you have your first period, you can get pregnant.
As you grow older into your twenties, you become more fertile. As you progress deep into your thirties, you become less fertile. After 35, your fertility drops so much that you cannot conceive by the time you reach 50.
Contraception myth.
You’ve decided the time is right to try to have a baby. But if you’ve been using birth control, you might be worried about whether it will affect your ability to get pregnant.
In some cases, it can take a little longer to conceive after you stop using a method that has the hormones estrogen or progesterone. But in the long run, there’s no negative effect on your fertility.
It’s not uncommon for women to believe that there will be a delay in fertility after being on birth control, and it’s a concern that gynaecologists constantly try to squash.
Another reason people think contraception can delay fertility is that we’ve been led to believe that getting pregnant is way easier than it actually is. So if a woman doesn’t see the telltale two lines on a pregnancy test after a few months of trying to conceive, it’s easy to point the finger at years of being on birth control. However, this delay is totally expected.
Check him out!
Your partner’s fertility also plays a role (this pregnancy thing takes two, let’s remember), and factors such as being overweight, smoking, taking certain medications, skimping on sleep and even being stressed out can hurt your chances of conceiving.
Smoking tobacco can impact fertility in men as well as women. Some research suggests that smoking tobacco can have a negative impact on semen quality and reduce the chances of reproductive success. Therefore, not using tobacco could increase fertility in men.
Do your health screening!
There are plenty of diseases that cause your hormones to run amok. And when hormones are out of whack, fertility is at risk. Thyroid and adrenal disease, for example, contribute to infertility by causing the body to release too much estrogen, testosterone, and even the stress hormone cortisol, thereby interfering with ovulation. – Health Screening in Malaysia
Also Read: Getting Heart Attack at Young Age
Polycystic ovarian disease (PCOD) is another fertility-robbing condition. “Women with PCOD have elevated levels of insulin and the male hormone testosterone, and those things together prevent regular ovulation.
Getting the right amount of exercise.
Getting adequate exercise is important for fertility, but too much can have the opposite effect. Most women do well with several hours of recreational activity a week (walking, fun sports, or swimming) and a few weight training sessions. Too much moderate/intensive exercise will keep the body from ovulation if done regularly. While weight loss can greatly help fertility, having too little body fat (below 15-18%) can make the body go into an anovulatory state (not ovulate).
Raed: Therapeutic Lifestyle Changes
Why stress?
Easier said than done, especially for anyone who is going through the emotions of fertility difficulties! You’ve probably been told that if you can relax, you will get pregnant. While this is certainly not true for everyone, reducing stress is a good idea. Often, the ideas above will help with many of the physical causes of stress, leaving you more time to (hopefully) relax.
DidYouKnow:
Pelvic Inflammatory Disease might damage your reproductive organs and cause infertility or the inability to become pregnant. The more times you’ve had PID, the greater your risk of infertility. Delaying treatment for PID also dramatically increases your risk of infertility.
Get enough sleep!
Sleep is vital to health and the production of many hormones. Studies have shown that women with low melatonin and serotonin levels have a shorter luteal phase (time between ovulation and menstruation) and consequently have a lower chance of conceiving. Lack of sleep also impairs the body’s ability to properly regulate adrenaline, cortisol, and insulin, making conception very difficult.
Also Read: What Can You Do For Yourself When You Have Period Pain
Make sleep a priority and get enough to feel rested, not just awake. This may mean taking a nap during the day or going to bed a few hours earlier. A completely dark sleep environment may also help melatonin levels and sleep.
Also Read: How Long Do You Have to Wait After Using Contraceptives to Get Pregnant?
Nutrition
This is by far the most important step. In modern times, many people are undernourished, despite being overweight. The body simply will not allow conception to occur or a pregnancy to continue if it doesn’t have the basic foundation it needs to sustain a pregnancy.
Many women turn to a low-fat, high-fiber diet in an attempt to increase health and lose weight. Weight loss has been shown to increase fertility, but losing weight in this way is rarely effective for increasing fertility because it deprives the body of the necessary proteins and fats necessary for hormone production.
Avoid Reproductive hazards.
Reproductive hazards are agents (normally chemical toxins), which affect men and women’s ability to have children. They can also affect the development of the foetus or baby, when the mother is exposed during pregnancy to a reproductive hazard or while breastfeeding.
Fetotoxins, for example, are substances with the ability to cause harm to a developing foetus thus considered reproductive toxins.
One common chemical that is used when creating polycarbonate plastic and epoxy resins is bisphenol A, more commonly known as BPA. It can affect women both when they’re trying to get pregnant and have negative effects on their baby, once they are.
The mechanism of entry to the body is not entirely clear, but it is thought that minute amounts of these chemicals can leach into fluids, for example, from bottles containing water and other fluids, and are thus ingested. ‘Exposure to BPA may affect the human reproduction system, particularly in women, by affecting the number of follicles which result in the formation of mature eggs which can then ovulate and be fertilised.
All in All
There are currently no proven natural ways to counteract this fertility decline in women, however, it is possible that maintaining a healthy lifestyle and getting good nutrition could help delay the onset of the menopause and be a vital aspect for a healthy body and reproductive system.
Read More: 7 Ways-to-Reduce Symptoms of Menopause
Most healthy couples will conceive within a year of actively trying to get pregnant. If you don’t get pregnant within a year and are under age 35, you should see your doctor for a fertility evaluation. If you are over 35, you should only wait six months before seeing a doctor.
Couples should also see a fertility specialist if they have a history of multiple miscarriages or know that they have a genetic or medical condition that might affect their fertility.
