Vegetarianism & IVF

I belong to a couple of forums that are dedicated to IVF. Many times I see women ask questions whether them being a vegetarian or not eating enough meat negatively effects their cycle.

Again, I am not a doctor, but if your do the research, you will see, that it does not. To my opinion being a vegetarian can actually help.

I am a vegetarian for ethical reasons. I guess not a complete vegetarian because I do eat fish and eggs that are organic and were harvested from free-run (cage free) chickens. I constantly hear that vegans and vegetarians also do not usually get adequate amounts of vitamin B12, zinc, iron and folic acid. But, hello!, who does not take vitamins or supplements these days?! If you take multivitamin, this problem disappears.

Contrary to popular opinion, protein intake in vegetarian and vegan diets is sometimes only slightly lower than in meat diets. For example, an average portion of roast chicken breast contains 24g protein. On average one vegetarian sausage/burger contains 27g of protein. Since becoming vegetarian I get more protein than ever. My suggestion - read labels.

If anything you are probably doing your eggs good by following vegetarian diet. There are over 20,000 different drugs, including steroids, antibiotics, growth hormones and other veterinary drugs that are given to livestock animals. These drugs are consumed when animal foods are consumed. The dangers herein, in secondary consumption of antibiotics, are well documented.

Vegetarians eat a lot of soy and that actually may help with IVF success!

High doses of soy estrogens can improve pregnancy rates in women undergoing in vitro fertilization and embryo transfer, Italian researchers have found.

Women who took 1,500 milligrams of soy isoflavones per day, along with progesterone injections, had significantly greater rates of implantation, ongoing pregnancy and delivery than women given progesterone injections with placebo, Dr. Vittorio Unfer of the Obstetrics and Gynecology Center in Rome and colleagues report.

Also, many RE’s would agree that there is no conclusive proof that your specific diet would affect the number of recruitable follicles in your ovaries (which is really what ovarian reserve means) if you are cycling, and of normal weight.

You should meet with a nutritionist to make sure that you are eating a balanced diet and getting adequate calories, fats, proteins and other nutrients as are important for any pregnancy to proceed well.

You know, many countries where overpopulation is an issue (India for example) have populations that eat a mainly if not exclusively vegetarian diet!

Hope this information will help you to start out on your own quest to better nutrition.

Wishing you good luck, as always!