IVF diet 'tricks' have you tried them all?

[yorkshireteaspoonie]

I'm about to start my first round in Late July after having it delayed due to COVID. I honestly thought it was never going to happen and I'm feeling massively panic stricken and anxious now rather than excited!

My question is, I follow all sorts of Instagram accounts about IVF and infertility, there are so many things that are touted as miracle helpers. Maca powder, spirulina, bee pollen, Chinese herbs, beetroot...

Has anyone tried them all or most off and have any objective thoughts? I've yet to see anyone swear by the success of any of them. It seems that we just do these things to make us feel like we are doing everything we can rather than them having any great effect!?

If it helps, I'm 38 and have miscarried early on twice. age seems to be my only issue and he has sperm morphology issues.

I wish you well with your upcoming IVF treatment.

I would stop following all social media as of today about IVF and subfertility because what you're reading amounts to quackery. Quackery harms people. Listen instead to what the clinic advise you.

That was my general feeling about the whole thing but again, I suppose it's the guilt of if I don't do it all .. am I not trying hard enough/ doing all I can?

I do find some of the Instagram stuff useful to understand the injection and hormone regimes etc as I find the clinics / science talk a bit overwhelming, but the diet talk I feel I disconnect from 🤷🏽‍♀️

I have to say that after 5 rounds of IVF in 18months that diet/lifestyle/supplements doesn't have that much effect on IVF success.

I have been doing a multi cycle package since January. This last egg collection earlier this month I did everything right in the months leading up to it largely due to lockdown. Ate healthy lost 1/2 stone no stress as working from home/furloughed - lots of supplements. My egg quality was AWFUL; the worst it's been and I didn't get any blastocysts. We had to thaw 2 from my January egg collection which was on the back off weeks/months of gluttony and booze and general bad lifestyle and those blastocysts are top quality (and I've just had a BFP)

The only thing that has made a significant difference in egg quality for me was changing from short protocol to natural modified. Last year over 2 short protocol cycles I got a total of 28 eggs - less than 30% fertilised and I got 4 average quality blastocysts. Compare this to natural modified IVF where I had a total of 9 eggs 100% fertilised and 4 top top quality blastocysts

I genuinely think the only that makes a difference is tailoring your medication to your specific mix of hormones for that month - every month is completely different and what ever might have worked in a previous month might not have the same effect next time. Hence why clinics like ARGC which have the bootcamp approach of daily blood tests and drug changes get such good results (I'm not with them as a cycle there costs £20k - I'm with Create)