It may sound obvious but if you are a smoker and trying to conceive you aren’t doing yourself any favors! Smoking affects your follicle growth which will then impact your egg being released when you ovulate. As a regular smoker for over 15 years it wasn’t easy to stop but as with anything involving a behavior change you have to ask yourself – what is my goal..to get pregnant. Am I willing to do everything I can to make it happen? If the answer isn’t yes, you need to spend some time asking yourself why not.
I’m not suggesting for one second it will be easy – but you have to start somewhere. Personally, it was the biggest kick up the arse I needed, as with all the doctor visits you start to have – you want to be able to answer ‘no’ when asked: “Do you smoke”.
Impact on your fertility
There is evidence to suggest that smoking can impact fertility treatment. Chemicals (such as nicotine, cyanide, and carbon monoxide) in cigarette smoke speed up the loss rate of eggs. Unfortunately, once eggs die off, they cannot regenerate or be replaced. This means that menopause occurs 1 to 4 years earlier in women who smoke (compared with non-smokers).
Male smokers can suffer decreased sperm quality with lower counts (numbers of sperm) and motility (sperm’s ability to move) and increased numbers of abnormally-shaped sperm. Smoking might also decrease the sperm’s ability to fertilize eggs. (ASRM) You can learn more about the decline in sperm counts in this conversation with Dr. Muhammed Akhtar
There is help available on the NHS to quit smoking so if you can’t do it yourself ask for help.
Regarding drinking – it’s your choice but once I knew that I was going to have fertility treatment I wanted to get my insides as clean as possible and made sure I had stopped drinking a good month beforehand. That said, it can be so stressful trying to conceive and an occasional glass of wine can help. I had a great chat with fertility nutritionist Melanie Brown, about drinking good quality wine if you’re going to have a drink which you can read here.
Just think about it – make your body the best it can be and it will hopefully work to its full ability.
If you have any questions about lifestyle changes, please do come over to our closed Facebook group and use the #question and we’ll put it to our expert Dr James Nicopollous next time we chat to him
