Can’t motivate myself to eat healthily - IVF

[Pennylane22]

Hi all

Posting here for traffic.

Just wondering if anyone has any idea how to change mindset around eating ! I’m due to start another round of ivf soon but can’t seem to motivate myself to improve my diet.

I’ve given up caffeine and alcohol no problem since January and am taking supplements daily but I want to eat high protein low carb And cut out sugar but I can’t seem to do it!!!

For example today I had plain chicken breast and soup in with me for lunch. I was going to the canteen to heat it up and somehow ended up with a baked potato, baked beans, cheese and a caramel freddo.

I don’t know why I can’t motivate myself. I also wanted to lose a stone before this ivf - I’m not overweight for my height but I’m hovering a few pounds below it. I haven’t managed to even loose a pound since Jan.

It’s like I’m super motivated in the morning - get some kind of amnesia then feel bad and determined to start again the next day and then repeat all over again.

I don’t know why I’m like this when the potential success of a round of ivf / having a child is at stake!!!

Help!

I think your lunch fromhhome needs to be tastier tbh

I didn't mean the OP was lambasting herself, the second reply came across pretty sarky to me.

Eating 'healthy' doesn't mean cutting out a food group though, does it? Carbs aren't the devil. Just eat the sodding things.

If you're craving something, have it.
But make it within your daily calories.

Get My Fitness Pal and stick to a set calories amount a day. Eat whatever you want within those calories, but just don't go over them.
You'll soon see that you can eat much more of certain foods than others for your daily calories.
Some days, I'll eat/want an entire family sized bar of chocolate. But I know that means I'll only have 200 cals (for instance) left over for the rest of the day. So sometimes I'll have it and be on poverty cals for the rest of the day because I REALLY want that bar. Other days, I'll only have a small bar and then still have hundreds and hundreds of calories left for more filling foods.

Thanks all. Lots of really good advice here.

Definitely possible @Whatsername177 that there is an element of self sabotage Especially having put on a stone since we started down this road after a fairly consistent weight before so I think I’ll need to work on myself as well as my eating habits and as some posters have said I am probably going too crazy with plain lunches and aiming for no carbs. I’ll sit down with one of those apps and work out a calorie count and meal plan!

Thanks all - you’ve been a great help and I’m glad I posted.

Take lunch with you and put a big picture of a baby on your fridge and your favourite snack cupboards; keep it right in front of your mind and good luck!!!!

Why are you being so strict on yourself? Giving up caffeine and alcohol is enough.

You don’t need to do this and looking at pictures of babies is really not a good idea, just stress inducing.

I don’t go on some super diet when I did IVF , not even for the FET that resulted in my twins.

Ah op - as a veteran of 6 ivf cycles Id give yourself a break. Just drink lots of water, add a bit more protein to your diet and try and have plenty of fruit and veg.

You’ve done amazingly to cut out caffeine and booze so massive well done for that - my clinic told me not to make any drastic changes to my diet in the run to a cycle as it won’t necessarily help, just try not to eat too much junk.

Good luck! X

Jesus @ButtonandPickle19 that is some of the worst advice I’ve ever read on here. I’m sure it’s kindly meant but you can’t ‘visualise’ yourself pregnant despite what all the self help guff might tell you . Not what the op needs to hear.

If you're going low carb you need to make it more exciting. This usually involves adding cheese.

@MindatWork to mean to visualise what you are doing it for. It helped me when I was ttc (with help). Whatever works for you

When I was trying to up protein I take for ivf I used decent quality protein shakes. Not only are they filling I drank sweet ones (peanut butter and chocolate yum!) so got the sweet hot but then didn’t want to snack on rubbish. Just make sure your fruit intake is also decent and water as increased protein can back you up. You don’t need to ban all sugar just in moderation and some healthy carbs are good.

Good luck

Another one saying not to beat yourself up! Agree with not trying to lose weight but instead becoming healthy for a (hopefully 🤞🏻) healthy pregnancy

I'm all for cutting out junk, but make sure your meals are tasty to keep you going:

Big salad with peppers/sweetcorn/beetroot (lots of colours to jazz it up) - stick a handful of pasta in too so it's more filling

Big bowl of soup with a seeded roll and delicious fresh fruit for after

Chicken wraps with some coleslaw and cheese on the side

Some chopped raw veg with hummus to snack on

Yummy! Good luck 😀

Does your body need the pressure of restricting your food intake when you are doing IVF? I put on 2 stone during 2 years of fertility treatment, hormone treatment does not suit me.
I lost some during early pregnancy and was my pre-fertility journey weight at a reasonable time after giving birth.
A stone is nothing to stress about at the moment, you need to be kind to your body and yourself. If you have always maintained a certain weight you will get back there.

I would say identify what your weak points are with food, it seems that you had a second lunch; this would suggest that your lunch wasn't filling enough. I used to snack loads in the evening which I always out down to boredom, but in actual fact it's just that my meals during the day were healthy, but no way near enough food. If you like sweet stuff like freddos, have just the one a day. If you're anything like me, banning foods makes them more desirable to me, whereas having something a day still saves me a lot of calories as it stops me binging. Take it a meal at a time, make small changes and before you know it you will have made some big changes. Good luck.

You've given up caffeine and alcohol you are doing great ! Ivf causes me to put on weight both times huge amounts and makes me crave carbs ,1 worked 1 didn't, sugar not such a issue but my God I dreamed of carbs and ate them the whole way through. If sugar and carbs are giving you some comfort while you go through the most stressful thing in the world then take it ! In the reverse once I was pregnant my cravings were ice and raw veg so it balanced back out . Good luck my darling be kind to yourself xxx

If you’re a healthy weight then dieting won’t improve your chance of getting pregnant. Drinking plenty of water & eating fibre/fruit may help counteract the side effects of the drugs.

Nobody is going to say that eating more healthily is bad, but think about your mental health too. Is dieting making you feel more positive because it’s something you can control. Or is it making you more stressed because you feel (wrongly) that you are sabotaging your treatment?

Best of luck, it’s a hard road.

It's hard isn't it!!! I think doing lots of different things helps. Since Christmas I've been cooking lots of new things in my slow cooker. I think you need to do a variety of pasta, wraps, salads, bagels etc at work.

Also if you have a nice healthy lunch and plenty of water then a freddo won't hurt. Then at teatime have a nice tasty meal.

Some of the things I make at home are ...

Fishfinger wraps with salad.

Turkey meatballs with spaghetti and to make a sauce, tinned tomatoes, courgette, pepper and onion.

Chicken in white wine sauce with lots of green vegetables.

Pasta with tuna and salad.

Gammon in the slow cooker. It just falls apart. This can be served with veg, salad, pasta etc

Veggie burgers with salad

Home made fish cakes with salad

I personally think if you don't allow yourself the freddo occasionally you will struggle anyway.

Drink more water. Even if you add squash. It will help fill you up too.

Yoghurt with berries is yummy

Porridge oats soaked in natural yoghurt is yummy too.

Banana on brown toast?

My friends a PT. She says you should never be on a diet. You should be enjoying a healthy balance of everything. She is against SW extra. She's really good at cooking. She makes brownies but they are out of a type of bean. I can't remember what it is now. They are much healthier and taste amazing. Good luck x

Hi OP

I have wanted to lose weight for a year and feel like something just clicked with me in january. I've only lost the christmas extra weight so far and am just starting to try and lose the stuff I wanted to lose originally. I stuffed my face over christmas and realised I wasnt even doing it for enjoyment any more, it was just habit. I'm losing it slowly as well, no massive changes. Here's what I did -

Eat mega healthily and no snacks for 3 days. Was hell. But it's only 3 days. I had got into a really bad chocolate habit and would just sit and eat chocolate while I watched tv. I had none. But after 3 days I felt like I'd broken the habit a bit, I had a little bit and it was really sweet. So try that to kick start you, the cravings were so much better after the 4th day. And I think 3 days is achievable.

I am actually eating normally but with 4 main changes -

Less snacking unless I'm really really hungry. No habit eating

Smaller portion sizes. Because we eat as a family I end up cooking even when I'm not hungry and wnd up eating a lot as well. Sometimes it means now i throw food away. But I put less on my plate to start with. If I want some more I sometimes wait 10 min and see if I really do want it - sometimes I'll have seconds but sometimes the full feeling only comes after a break.

I eat more mindfully. I still have treats but I'll really try and savour it instead of stuffing my face like I was doing. So I basically eat slower and really try and enjoy it. I get hotel chocolat boozy truffles which feel like a luxury to me.

I'm not doing carb free or anything, I'm basically eating what I was doing before but just with a bit more veg and a fair bit less carbs. So I'll still have creamy pasta but I'll put a lot more stuff in the sauce. I'll throw a few more veg and some nuts in a stir fry and have less rice (sometimes none). I have more yogurt and fruit for breakfast and less granola. I think I eat less processed food overall as snacks I had were mainly processed.

Also I'm trying to eat my breakfast later, I know it's meant to kick start your metabolism to have it early but I find if i leave it as late as possible, I snack less.

Oh also I downloaded an app called weight fit or something. Mega simple it just gives you stats on your weight, you put it in every day and it shows you your progress against target on a graph. I find it strangely motivating, probably because I'm a geek and like graphs, but it weirdly makes me stop having an extra drink / chocolate or something because then I think I wont be going downwards when I put my weight into the app the next day.

Lastly fruit teas are helpful if you have a craving for something sweet

Give yourself a break. IVF is hard. Jacket spud with beans and cheese isn't so bad. Good luck!

P.s a jacket potato with beans and cheese is fine as the above person has said. It's not like you had a KFC or a chippy dinner. Also do you manage to walk much? Any extra walking will boost your energy too and make you feel healthier. This may push you further too x

Just to add to the excellent posts above about not being too hard on yourself - my clinic specifically told me not to try and lose weight before/during my cycle as I had a healthy BMI. Just be kind to yourself. IVF is miserable and almost everyone ends up putting on weight (often because of, eg, a course of steroids). I know exactly what it's like to feel like you don't have any control over the process but it can be dangerous to try and use your food consumption to give you the illusion of control. I get it totally though.

Something that has helped me is I drink gallons of sparkling water. I find it fills me up, must be the bubbles!