What to Do When You’re One of the 12% Struggling to Get Pregnant

Starting a family may be one of your major life goals with your husband, but the unfortunate reality is that 12 percent of married women struggle to conceive or to sustain a pregnancy. This can be stressful and even heartbreaking for both of you, and you may be wondering what you can do to overcome this challenge. Many fertility issues are related to lifestyle, and you may be able to increase your chances of having a healthy baby by following a few steps.

Reduce Your Stress Level

When you are having trouble getting pregnant, you and your partner may both feel a level of stress and pressure in the bedroom. You may both be trying to time conception perfectly, and this can also add to your stress level. Stress can negatively affect fertility hormones. Simply relaxing about timing and having sex two to four times each week when it is most enjoyable and convenient for you and your partner may help you to reduce stress and conceive naturally. Many couples have gotten pregnant when they stopped trying so hard to get pregnant.

Improve Your Health

Health and well-being play a major role on your fertility hormones and on your ability to achieve a pregnancy. Your diet can significantly affect pregnancy, and you need to be eating a healthy diet regularly if you want the best results. The extra weight associated with a poor diet can alter fertility hormones in both men and women. Focus your attention on improving your diet and achieving or maintaining a healthy body weight, and you may find that pregnancy comes naturally. This includes eating more fruits, vegetables and lean meats. Avoid unnecessary sugars, fats and caffeine. Smoking and alcohol use should also be curbed to further improve your health and well-being. To further improve your health, exercise regularly several times per week. Also, ensure that you get an adequate amount of sleep at night. Sleep also affects fertility hormones as well as how well you manage stress.

Choose Your Lubricant Carefully

Using water-based lubrication during intercourse is common, but it can, unfortunately, have a negative effect on sperm motility. Sperm need to be able to travel easily through your uterus and fallopian tube to reach your egg with ease, but water-based lubrication can slow the sperm down and make this process more difficult. In fact, it may slow the sperm down by 60 percent or more in some cases. Simply switching to a different lubricant or using no lubricant at all may provide you with better results when you are trying to get pregnant.

Seek Professional Treatment

If you and your partner have been trying to conceive unsuccessfully for more than 12 months without interruption, it may be time to seek professional treatment from a fertility specialist. Initially, your specialist may review your health status and run a few tests to determine if there is a fertility issue. Then, they’ll probably need to do a test to check female infertility. If there is an issue, the cause will be identified so that it can be treated. Otherwise, alternative conception methods may be explored. Some of these options include artificial insemination and in vitro fertilization. If these are not ideal for you, surrogacy or adoption may also be explored.

While it can be frustrating to have trouble conceiving, you can see that there are several options available for you and your spouse to pursue. The desire to have a child can be innate and very strong, and you understandably may be filled with many emotions at this time. It is best, however, to focus on total body health initially. If you still are unable to have a baby, remember that there are many professional treatment options available that can help you to successfully overcome infertility issues.

By: Hannah Whittenly