Guide to weight loss for pink, weight gain for blue
Weight Loss for Pink, Weight Gain for Blue – How to Updated 12-18-17
One of the most common questions swayers ask is about weight loss/gain, so I thought I’d put all the info in one spot for future reference.
:DD::DD:Guide to Losing Weight for PINK:DD::DD:
Also please check out this thread, very helpful info about how long to follow a sway diet prior to trying to conceive. HELP!! How long should I stay on diet before TTC?
Why do we want to lose weight for pink?
Losing weight does a lot for us in our pink sways. First of all, we shrink muscle mass which lowers testosterone levels, because having and using muscle signals the body to make lots of testosterone, which some swaying theories claim sways blue (please note – there are some studies out there that show weight loss RAISES testosterone. This is in very obese people and NOT in the average person. Obese people, men especially, sometimes have very high estrogen levels due to their high body fat and their body “gives up” making testosterone and makes estrogen instead. For a woman of average weight, losing weight will loser testosterone.)
Being very heavy can cause T levels to drop, because excess body fat actually makes estrogen. Another benefit from weight loss, is that we also reduce body fat which lowers estrogen and also may sway blue (body fat actually makes its own estrogen) and in turn dries up CM. People have reported a lot less CM after having been on the Low Everything Diet, even only after a couple of weeks. We also lower blood sugar levels by quite a lot – just by losing 5-10% of our body mass (which if you’re thin, is not much weight at all) you drastically lower blood sugar levels. Less proven, but still a plausible benefit of weight loss for your sway, is the idea that burning fat/calories for fuel acidifies the body more effectively than any supplement.
Additionally, weight loss and being at a low weight, tend to inhibit fertility overall, as does eating a less nutrient dense diet (by definition, if you’re losing weight, you’re ingesting fewer nutrients than if you’re gaining weight or holding steady.) Diet and Ovulation | IVF Centers | IVF1 Losing weight also sends a message to your body that food resources are scarce, which according to the Trivers-Willard Hypothesis, sways pink…we do not know if it sways via the previously-mentioned mechanisms (lowering T and E levels, drying up CM, lower blood sugar, pH), or if there is an entirely different set of mechanisms that come into play. Either way, losing weight is great for your pink sway.
How much should I lose?
You should try to be at your lowest conception weight if you can, and if possible, at your lowest adult weight. If this is undoable, just losing any weight will help. I personally only lost 3 lbs before I conceived my daughter (but this was also my lowest conception weight.) If you have PCOS and/or insulin resistance, it’s imperative to lose weight because it will help get your blood sugar, and in turn, your testosterone and estrogen levels, down. Plus it will help you conceive, PCOSers!
Is it possible to lose too much?
Yes, it is possible to lose too much weight and stop ovulation all together. The Nurses’ Health Study II found that having a BMI below 20 made it 38% more likely that your ovulation would be suppressed. (please see the link below for more about the Nurses’ Health Study II)
Aim to go no lower than 18.5 BMI (this is the lowest normal BMI) – between 21 and 18.5 BMI should be your goal range. I like you guys to stop losing weight at BMI 21 and then hold steady, so if a couple pounds sneak off before you can get the right cal. intake to stop weight loss dialed in, it's not the end of the world. DO NOT drop below BMI 18.5, that is the absolute "do anything to prevent going below this" number.
BMI varies by height so this will be a different number of pounds for each person depending on how tall you are and you can find a calculator to help you figure out your BMI here: Calculate your BMI, correctly rated according to age and sex If you get to that BMI range, and can’t keep weight on, increase calories and emphasize simple carbs (unless you have PCOS or insulin resistance, in which case you should limit carbs overall by increasing protein and fat to 50-60 g each, and eat complex carbs rather than simple ones to keep weight on). This will not hurt your sway; mice who were fed a carb-based diet still had more daughters than mice fed a high-fat diet even though their BMI and caloric intake was identical. The Nurses’ Study II also found that women who ate more simple carbs had lowered fertility. Striking variation in the sex ratio of pups born to mice according to whether maternal diet is high in fat or carbohydrate. - PubMed - NCBI
Remember, the caloric goals of the LE Diet are 1500-1800 cals a day. People who are very petite or have a lot of weight to lose can drop down to 1200-1500 (but please note, only about 3-5% of people should go this low). People with PCOS/IR, or who have plateaued on 1500-1800 cals a day, also may wish to drop down to the 1200-1500 cal level, temporarily (people with PCOS/IR may find that as they lose weight, their insulin sensitivity improves so much that they are able to eat more calories than they could before and yet still lose weight.) If you are very tall, have lost every pound you can spare, and/or are doing the 60-6/7 exercise recommendations for swaying or even more exercise, you may need to increase calories to 1800-2000. Do not go below 1200 cals for the sake of your health, or above 2000 for the sake of your sway (unless you need to to keep weight on, that is).
How soon before I sway, should I lose weight?
That depends on a few different things. The conventional wisdom espoused on other sites is, you can start the diet 90 days before you start to sway because the egg has a lifespan of 90 days (grows from a tiny seed to a mature egg in that time) and the “egg priming” theory suggests there is some benefit to be gained by dieting for 90 days OR you can start diet 6 weeks out because the French Gender Diet/InGender Diet claim that your mineral levels take 6 weeks to change. I don’t personally believe in either egg priming or mineral levels swaying but just so you guys are aware of these options.
If you have a lot of weight to lose, you may want to start diet sooner. If you don’t have much to spare, you may want to hold off starting the diet until 2-3 weeks before your first month’s sway. pH and blood sugar drop very soon after beginning diet (for a thin person), and while testosterone and estrogen do take some time to diminish, the odds are that you won’t get pregnant the first month anyway. You don’t want to waste away to nothing or feel like you need to rush your sway and drop sway tactics that you want to use, in order to conceive more quickly and prevent excess weight loss. Above all else, I do not want ANYONE who is already thin, thinking that they need to do, or should do, a strict sway diet for 90 days or longer before swaying and then spending 6-9 months TTC with a very strict sway. That is a recipe for disaster. You can easily stop ovulating if you try and it can sometimes take many months or even years to get your body moving in the right direction again.
If you’re going to start off doing a very strict sway, unless you have a lot of weight to lose (over 30 lbs), you may not want to start the diet strictly until even as soon as 2-3 weeks before your sway. Remember, you will probably not get pregnant the first month swaying especially if you're using a lot of sway tactics; it may take you some time to figure everything out and you don’t want to feel undue pressure to drop sway tactics that you really WANT to include, just because you’ve lost too much weight.
If you already are eating a pretty girl-friendly diet (example, you’re vegetarian/vegan or you’ve been on the FGD/IGD for a few months and have just decided to switch to LE) you may wish to start LE Diet 2-3 weeks before your first month’s attempt. In fact, this is also a valid strategy for anyone who has very little weight to lose…you have the option of going vegetarian/vegan, or following FGD/IGD if you are a believer in minerals, without cutting calories, for a few months before you start to sway in earnest. That way, you potentially can reap some benefit, be it lower T and E levels and reduction in some nutrients found mostly in meat, from a veg/vegan diet, or mineral levels from FGD/IGD.
Or do you know you’re higher than normal in testosterone and/or estrogen than the average person? If you have a lot of muscle mass, have PCOS, or have ever had a higher-than-average testosterone or estrogen reading via blood tests, you may want to start diet sooner rather than later, because testosterone and estrogen do take some time to lower.
I’m already really thin. Should I gain weight to lose? AND Should I try to time my weight loss to coincide with my month of conception?
Many people have asked if they should try to time their weight loss to peak at conception, or gain enough weight so they will be guaranteed they are actively losing weight when they get pregnant.
Neither of these ideas is the best, for pretty much the same reasons. Firstly, remember, you may not even get pregnant the first month of swaying, so timing weight loss to peak just at the right moment, is extremely difficult. Secondly, T and E levels rise slowly and drop slowly, so all you accomplish with gaining weight to relose, is basically padding your T and E levels so diet is less effective. It’s silly to take a big step backwards when you’re trying to move forward. Thirdly, some people have had more difficulty than they thought they’d have in losing weight – you don’t want to give yourself 6 weeks to lose 20 lbs and then find it’s taking much longer than you thought. Fourthly, never underestimate the potential for an accidental pregnancy. Many people have taken time to gain weight to lose/relose only to end up with an oops baby right at the worst possible second, when they’re heavier than they’d like to be or even actively gaining (this actually happened to me and the result was DS 4). Best to ALWAYS be moving in the right direction, just in case a surprise occurs!! Finally, by trying to time weight loss, you add a huge amount of stress to the mix. Putting a deadline on yourself, planning and thinking about your sway constantly, is the type of mindset that is proven to raise testosterone levels.
It’s much better to lose weight whenever and however you can and then maintain (even if you only lose a single pound!) than to be trying to gain weight to lose and/or timing weight loss to coincide with some self-imposed deadline. There is nothing gained by trying to time weight loss (esp. if your plan is to gain weight first) and many risks along the way.
Should my husband lose weight before we sway?
No. For men, higher estrogen (more body fat) lowers testosterone and sperm count and so his being a little on the cuddly side, can help with a pink sway. Somewhat annoyingly, when men lose weight, they often lose mostly fat while preserving or even increasing their muscle mass. Testosterone levels increase accordingly.
Should I have him gain weight, then?
No. Thin guys tend to add muscle long before they add fat, and so for a thinner man to gain weight, oftentimes only will add muscle and increase his testosterone levels. For a pink sway, it’s best to have DH hold steady at whatever weight he’s presently at.
Is losing weight before pregnancy healthy?
The LE Diet is designed to be in line with the recommendations of reproductive endocrinologists as a safe caloric intake pre-pregnancy for women who want to lose weight before doing HT. The protein (40-50 g a day up to 50-60 g for PCOS, breastfeeding moms, and those who are very tall) and fat requirements (30-60 grams) are low-normal protein and fat intake (low nutrients does NOT mean no nutrients) and are recommended by WebMD and WHO as safe protein and fat intakes for female health. If you are in the minority of people who need to lower to 1200-1500 cals a day, PLEASE still continue eating the 40-50/50/60 g protein and 30-60 g fat. For people with PCOS or IR, you MUST bump up to 50-60 g of protein (this will help keep your blood sugar levels under control) but stick to the 1500-1800 calorie range.
If anything, the LE Diet is actually healthier than the diets that many of us consume pre-pregnancy. High protein intake, particularly meat, is not super-healthy as some would have you believe and of course high-fat is not super healthy either. Reducing calories slightly is also proven to be better for overall health. That having been said, lower protein, lower fat, and lower calorie diets do suppress fertility, but remember that’s what we want for pink.
Some people take the diet too far and do not follow these recommendations against my advice. If you or someone online claims to be following the LE Diet and does NOT stick to the minimum guidelines, that is NOT LE Diet. I strongly urge everyone to follow the LE Diet guidelines, for your health, your baby’s health, but also for the sake of your pink sway. If your body perceives a crisis situation where it thinks you’re literally starving, it may interpret that sudden lack of food as an indicator that you are in a circumstance where you may need to fight for survival.
Your body then may rob Peter to pay Paul – shut down/reduce estrogen and progesterone production (because your body “knows” that when you’re starving is not the greatest time for a pregnancy) and switch to producing higher levels of testosterone to assist you in the fight for food. Even if your T level are lower than they once were, it very well may still be higher in proportion to estrogen and progesterone, and that may sway blue - we do not know that it's numbers on a blood test that matter, it is likely the proportions of hormones to each other that sway. It can be difficult, if not impossible, to totally rob your body of the raw materials it uses to make testosterone without completely starving yourself, and if you were even able to do that, you’d have rendered yourself infertile by that point anyway because your body would have nothing to make estrogen and progesterone from (all three sex hormones are made of the same raw materials.)
Should I fast to lose a lot of weight quickly?
No, for the reasons I mention above and also because it’s not healthy for you or your baby, to have a super low protein intake, either. That having been said, some people HAVE gotten baby girls while on juice fasts or during periods where they were fasting for many hours out of the day for religious reasons. If you have a lot of weight to lose (in excess of 50 lbs), you may wish to consider a temporary juice fast (you actually get a fair amount of nutrients on many juice fasts) but be sure to include many different juices to maximize your nutrition (remember, low nutrient does not equal NO nutrient). Also, you will need to come off the fast for at least a month or two before you conceive. Rapid weight loss can also cause stored toxins to be released from your body fat, so you need to give your body time for them to be processed and eliminated in order to have a safe and healthy pregnancy. Let me just stress that I am NOT a fan of this approach, I am not advocating it, but a few people with large amounts of weight to lose have done it.
Fasting for 12-16 hours out of the day (so skipping breakfast and eating 2-3 meals in a period of 8-12 hours), a similar pattern to the daytime fasts performed by some religious groups, is not only ok, but is recommended and studies have shown it sways pink in both humans and mice alike. As long as you stick to the LE Diet guidelines overall and get an adequate amount of calories, you’ll be getting adequate nutrition during the hours you are eating, and this will only help your sway.
Severe fasting around ovulation, juice fasting for months on end particularly if you are already thin or even average, or in an unhealthy way, especially doing things like drinking only Crystal Light or peppermint tea, is NOT ALLOWED. Fasting at ovulation may delay O, rapid weight loss can cause a release in toxins (not what you want immediately before conception) and it’s never a good idea to fast unless you have some nutrients coming in (ie juice fast).
To be honest, I really don’t want anyone to fast, even a juice fast, but if you MUST, please keep it in the short term, only if your body mass can easily sustain you, and stick to juices so you are getting some calories and nutrition coming in.
If being very heavy also lowers testosterone and lowers fertility (which it does), can I gain weight instead, or stay overweight if I already am?
Gaining weight to sway pink is not wise because it really takes a LOT of excess weight to sway pink for most people. It could take years to add enough body mass to suppress your fertility. Plus, there are no guarantees – some people can carry a lot of extra weight and still stay fully fertile, and for many people, you only make yourself more blue friendly by adding muscle mass and body fat, plus increasing nutrients overall. Beyond that, gaining weight is not good for your health and especially not good coming into a pregnancy where you’ll be gaining even more. Losing weight is the best option because it’s easy to do, sways for everyone at least to some extent, can be done in the short term, and is good for your health.
Staying overweight if you already are, is a more complicated matter and I must admit I do not have a satisfactory answer to that. If you’re overweight and you’ve conceived boys easily at your higher weight, then it would seem that you’re one of the ones who can stay very fertile at a higher weight. However, it may also be that it has just taken some time for the weight to take its toll. The problem becomes, you have to lose SO much weight to get to a low weight, and it ~could~ be that just by losing some weight, you put yourself in a better position fertility-wise and end up even more likely to conceive a boy than you were to begin with. That having been said, I know of at least a couple people who were overweight and had conceived boys, then lost some weight (not ALL the weight) and then did get a girl, so it is possible. I wish we had more info to go off of. Until we do, follow your gut.
Studies and articles that support weight loss as a method of swaying.
Small weight loss effectively reduces sex hormones linked with breast cancer | Fox News
Maternal Eating Disorders Influence Sex Ratio at Birth
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17522073
http://www.nature.com/news/hungry-mo...ghters-1.10331
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/...,1060110.story
http://diabetes.webmd.com/safe-diet-tips-for-diabetes
