IVF and exercise

[chundercatsarego]

Has anyone got any views on this? I absolutely love the gym/hill running/swim training/weight lifting. We are due to start IVF in next few months due to severe mfi. Im not sure what to do re exercise... I'm finding it all quite hard and exercise keeps me sane

When we went through IVF the advice we were given was to keep doing what you are doing as long as you feel comfortable (same as in first 12 weeks of pg).
I kept cycling (8k to and from work once a week, not anything tough), and running (5k a couple of times a week) for the first part of the cycle but then potholes and the jarring got uncomfortable as I got more bloated, and TBH I just didn't feel like it. I carried on swimming (again, I wasn't exactly hardcore though). However I'm sure that I've read that some clinics advise some women against certain types of exercise due to a very small risk of ovarian torsion if they get very large. You will / should get advice from your IVF nurses or consultant. At any rate I wouldn't stop doing anything before any treatment starts. Good luck xx

My clinic explicitly told me to stop exercising as soon as I started stims (in case of ovary torsion). I carried on training three times per week until that point, and I'm glad I stopped when I did - the bloating and discomfort would have been too much.

My clinic advised against swimming from transfer until 12 weeks as apparently there was a study that found an elevated rusk of miscarriage. It only applied to pool swimming - the clinic was entirely relaxed about me swimming 3k in a local lake.
It seemed to be about chemicals abs elevated temperatures. Now several failed cycles later I have decided that my swimming was keeping me sane and fit and I have minimised the risk by swimming in a pool that's uv-filtered instead of chlorinated and is kept at competition temp.

Other than swimming, I've also always been told that it's fine to continue anything that your body is used to.

Like you, I do lots of exercise... running, road biking and weight training. Its very important to me and has kept me sane over the years. My clinic's official leaflet said do what you'd normally do but nothing too strenuous, so that wasn't entirely helpful. A nurse guilt tripped me when I asked what I could do, she said "well just ask yourself, is it worth it? If anything went wrong, would you blame yourself?". That clearly scared me, so I took it easy during stims, ran 10k between EC and ET and then did nothing.

In the end I got a BFP which ended in an ectopic. Clearly that was very depressing, but (like purple) I'm sure my state of mind was made worse by the fact I'd done nothing for weeks. As I did what they told me to and got the worst outcome, this time I'm just going to do exactly what I want. I'm going to listen to my body, and if I am too bloated, or in the event of BFP, too knackered, then of course I'm not going to force myself into the gym. But my aim is business as usual.

I wasn't advised anything about exercise (and I was a total gym bunny), however I found I could do my usual workout during the down reg nasal drugs but the stims left me totally exhausted for some bizarre reason so I stopped exercise at that point. I asked after ET about exercise and was also told "don't do anything that you would regret doing if this didn't work". Once I got my BFP I was too sodding scared to go to the gym so stuck to long-ish brisk walks instead.

Thanks for the replies all. Seems like a bit of a no win situation... exercise and feel like it's all my fault if it doesn't work... or don't exercise and feel like crap if it doesn't work

I'd forgotten about the swimming. I was recommended to not swim until 12 weeks due to the small risk of infection from the egg collection and egg transfer (as the cervical mucus plug will have been disturbed). I swam up to egg collection day.

I think the "could you live with yourself" argument is more important for certain personality types. If you think you're likely to obsess over everything you did/didn't do and think "what if" if the cycle fails, it might make you feel better to avoid some things just for peace of mind. I wasn't like this so just followed the guidelines our clinic gave and ignored the stuff I read about online.