Sorry this is quite a long rant about me me me so feel free to ignore.
I'm 36 and have been TTC for 18 months with 2 miscarriages @ 12 weeks and 1 ectopic discovered at 6 weeks. I'm not overweight but I'm only 5ft tall and I was size 8 when we started TTC, now I'm a size 10-12. I used to look slim now I look chubby and my clothes don't fit. My BMI was in the middle of the safe range now it's at the very upper limit, if I keep going like this I'll be overweight soon. With both my miscarriages at 12w I had constant sickness for 2 months that had me eating carbs every 2 hours.
My losses have been difficult. I definitely use food as a treat because I'm sad. But being chubby also makes me sad, much as I wish it didn't and feel like a bad feminist! Apologies to any ladies who are overweight and think I'm in no position to moan. But isn't this slow creep exactly how people gain weight in the first place that they then can't shift?
In the past if I eat healthily and exercise without getting obsessive and extreme, nothing happens to my weight, it stays rock solid the same. A few biscuits here and there and it goes up. I'm able to lose weight if I go HARD, 1000 calories or less a day and quite extreme exercise. Then I can keep most of it off easily by being moderate.
The problem is that I think being in an energy deficit negatively affects fertility so my two projects are in opposition to each other. I have read all the guidance but I'm not clear about this. The only time I ovulated late last year was when I was under 1200 calories a day. But I am confused because ladies who start TTC overweight and lose weight to conceive must be in an energy deficit, and it helps in that case?
I desperately want to both lose weight and conceive and I don't understand if I can do them both at the same time. I can't be laid back about either of them. If I'm laid back about losing weight, nothing happens. I can't be laid back about conceiving because I want to be a mother so bad. Part of me wants to take a couple of months off TTC to lose the weight I've gained, but I don't think I can let go of TTC plus I'm worried it would adversely affect my fertility when I go back to TTC. I'm 36 with multiple losses and hypothyroidism, I know all is not lost for me but I certainly feel like I don't have time to waste. Right now if I get pregnant I expect to have another loss so I feel like I need to get it over with asap so I'm one step closer to having a baby.
Have any women reading been in the same situation, or know about the science? Has anyone been in a calorie/energy defecit and conceived? Has anyone experimented with losing weight and noticed how it affected your ovulation/womb lining etc? I'd really love to connect with women who feel similarly as this problem eats me up but I don't have anyone that understands.
Lots of love to all the want-to-be mamas out there x