Which is healthier - boy or girl sway diet??
Update 12-16-17
The answer may surprise you!
I have seen several instances where people refer to the Low Everything Diet as being very unhealthy and bad for you, because it's lower in fat, protein, and calories than the average modern diet. Other times, the High Everything is called unhealthy because some people don't include milk and it has a lot of fat and sodium. And of course we all are naturally concerned about the health and well-being of our future children.
We were all raised with the idea that a healthy diet is based around the 4 food groups and 2000 calories a day, but only very recently in human history have people even had access to the kinds and variety of foods that we do today. For most of human existence, we were hunter-gatherers and ate whatever was available in our environment. Great minds like Socrates, Michelangelo, Shakespeare, and Einstein were all born to women who were most certainly NOT eating anything approaching what we would consider a balanced diet and none of them were taking prenatal supplements...in fact most of our own mothers were not even taking prenatal supplements when they conceived us!!
The fact is, humans are capable of not just surviving, but thriving while eating a huge variety of different diets and a wide array of caloric intakes. Some cultures eat mostly plant foods, others mostly animal foods, and 75% of all adults across the globe cannot even digest dairy foods and never even eat them! You do NOT need to eat from the 4 food groups at every meal, take in 2000 calories a day, eat massive amounts of protein or drink milk AT ALL to be very healthy and have a healthy pregnancy.
First, the girl diet myths.
:omg: :DD: Myth #1 "The girl diet is SO LOW in calories, that can't be healthy for you."
Actually, a calorie-restricted diet has been shown to LENGTHEN life span in mice and monkeys. Low-Calorie Diet May Lead to Longer Life - The New York Times Telegraph | Error 404 | Sorry, the page you have requested is not available
Eating less calories CAN reduce fertility, but a slight reduction in fertility is what you WANT for TTC pink.
Not only that, but the 1500-1800 calorie a day guideline of the Low-Everything diet is right in line with what is advised by fertility clinics for their patients as a healthy caloric intake for weight loss without affecting fertility negatively. http://www.kyinfertility.com/patient...ertility.shtml And the protein and fat amounts come from the World Health Organization's recommendations about what the safe lower level of intake for a safe pre-pregnancy diet. The LE Diet is not, and never has been, a starvation diet. It is simply the lower range of normal.
:omg::DD:Myth #2 - "Eating 40-50 grams of protein is really bad for you. You NEED high protein foods like meat for your health."
Actually, 40-50 grams of protein is just right for a 110-120 pound woman. Page not found - TODAY Too much protein isn't good for you anyway. How Much Protein Do I Need?
A vegetarian diet has been proven to produce more girls http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/869696.stm and is also considered better for your health in the long term. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vegetarianism
Red meat in particular is not terribly healthy and it will not hurt anyone to give it up for a few months while TTC. http://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/fe...about-red-meat
Anyone with PCOS, who is very tall, breastfeeding, or exercising a lot may boost their protein intake (and fat too) to 50-60 g.
:omg::DD:MYTH #3 - "You NEED to be on prenatal supplements before you conceive, to have a healthy baby!"
Prenatal vitamins were not even invented until fairly recently, so this is obviously untrue. In fact, some vitamins may even shorten your lifespan http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/173646...u-live-longer/ and high doses of Vitamin A, in particular, cause birth defects.http://lpi.oregonstate.edu/infocente...#lpi_recommend
Also, your body stores Vit. A, D, E, B12, calcium, magnesium, and many other nutrients. The water soluble vitamins like the other B's and Vitamin C, you will get adequate doses of via your diet (IF you are on the Low-Everything Diet and NOT starving yourself or following the awful Ingender Diet) because girl staples like crackers, rice, and pasta are all highly fortified with B vitamins and Vit. C is present in strawberries and cranberries. You don't NEED the prenatals.
EVERYONE should be taking folic acid or better still, folate, prior to pregnancy of course, but it is fine to wait on the prenatals until you get a BFP.
:omg::DD:MYTH #4 - "Losing weight right before you get pregnant is really dangerous!"
This one might have a grain of truth in it, because some researchers believe that weight loss ~may~ release stored toxins in your fat. But the fact is that women get pregnant after losing weight every day, and some of them even lose weight during the first trimester, and go on to have perfectly healthy babies (I did!). Losing a few pounds prior to pregnancy will also help your overall health and may reduce the risks of things like gestational diabetes and preeclampsia which DO harm babies!
:omg::DD: MYTH #5 - "Eating aspartame or other fake sugars before you get pregnant will kill your baby!"
Aside from saccharin, all artificial sweeteners are believed safe in moderation during pregnancy, let alone beforehand. http://www.americanpregnancy.org/pre...alsweetner.htm
On Gender Dreaming we only recommend the amount of aspartame that has been approved by the FDA as safe DURING pregnancy, let alone beforehand. (2-3 servings per day of 12-16 oz. each) If you don't want to sway using aspartame that's fine, we doubt it even works anyway, but if you want to use it, please don't worry that it will harm you or your baby.
And now for the boy myths.
:omg: :DS: MYTH #1 "You HAVE to drink milk/get a lot of calcium to conceive a healthy baby!"
No, you don't. Humans did not even have the capacity to digest milk until 15,000 years ago. Most people worldwide STILL cannot digest it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lactose_intolerance Most non-European cultures do not eat much dairy at all. Oddly, people in the countries that eat the most dairy products have the MOST osteoporosis, so just ingesting massive amounts of calcium does not mean you will have good bone health.
It is ok to take/eat less calcium in the short term if you want to, because your body simply robs it from your bones and teeth for whatever it's not getting via diet. Over time, it will begin to affect your health and fertility negatively, but for a 6 week period if you should choose to limit your calcium intake, that is fine. (Now whether that actually will sway blue or not remains to be seen - http://genderdreaming.com/forum/arch...php/t-610.html)
Of course, you do have the option of following the High-Everything Diet which allows full-fat dairy. :agree: I personally think that full fat dairy is great for a boy sway and strongly recommend it, but it's simply a myth that you HAVE TO drink milk to get and stay pregnant.
Also do be aware we have seen a LOT of opposites in people drinking large amounts of milk replacers, particularly rice and almond milk. If you can't bring yourself to drink/eat dairy, that's up to you, but don't start drinking a lot of milk replacers, either.
:omg::DS:MYTH #2 - "Eating that much sodium is really really bad for you!"
This is actually true in part, particularly for people with high blood pressure or a genetic predisposition to develop it, but the fact is that MOST Americans and Europeans are ALREADY eating the 4000-5000 mg of salt recommended by the French and IG diets, if not more so. (and despite this, we aren't inundated by boy babies...but I digress)
One recent study even found that a low sodium diet may actually be BAD for you http://www.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/05/03...ack/index.html (Beware pink swayers!!)
:omg::DS:MYTH #3 - "Eating that much fat is really really bad for you!"
Fat has gotten a bad rap, but the facts are undeniable. Fat is GOOD for you and is especially good for unborn babies.
http://www.babycenter.com/0_dietary-...y-diet_1694.bc
Transfats should be avoided of course! But healthy fats like those in nuts and avocado are GREAT for health and fertility, and even saturated fats in meats are not bad for you in moderation. UPDATE - do be sure that for the sake of your sway, you are taking in higher amounts of saturated and animal fats and lesser amounts of Omega 6 and vegetable based fats. Getting more Omega 6 fats (the kind largely present in vegetable sources) than Omega 3 and saturated animal fats may sway strongly pink!
:omg::DS:MYTH #4 - "Gaining weight is the worst thing you can do for your health."
All weight is not created equal!!
Gaining 3-5 pounds (even 7-10!!) of muscle will only HELP your health. http://www.webmd.com/fitness-exercis...-better-health Yes, some people end up gaining too much but that's why I ended up making the High-Everything Diet, so no one ends up gaining too much when they're swaying blue.
In fact, if you are very thin to begin with (as some girl moms tend to be) even gaining some pounds of fat is not the worst thing for you. It will certainly help boost your fertility because low BMI is believed to be a cause of infertility. http://journals.lww.com/epidem/Abstr...latory.13.aspx
Also, gaining pounds of muscle will help protect your bones even should you choose to follow a low-calcium diet. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...1006082858.htm
:twocents:
The best evidence I have at my disposal, after studying this issue for 10 years, indicates that the Low-Everything/High-Everything diets are safe to follow indefinitely, and that the FGD and IG-style diets are safe to follow for 6 months or so. BOTH the boy and girl diets have things about them that are quite healthy (probably more so than your regular diet) and things about them that are less than ideal (but you may have been doing for a sway anyway, like the high sodium).
It is only natural that when we begin a new or different diet, that we don't trust it and then chalk up everything weird that happens with our bodies to the diet itself. Starting a new diet may be tough to do, it may make you feel off your game, or even upset your stomach at first because your body is not used to eating that way. And if you find that is the case, by all means it's ok to back off and ease into the new eating pattern over the course of a couple of weeks.
Yes, the Low-Everything diet will reduce your fertility and may suppress your ovulation somewhat, but that is what it is supposed to do. That is how it works, by reducing your fertility and making your body think that times are hard. It's hard to make your body think that times are hard without reducing calories and protein at least a little bit.
Yes, the High-Everything diet may make people gain weight. Again, that is what it's supposed to do. If you don't go overboard with it it will help you build muscle mass and boost your fertility. It's hard to make your body think times are great without gaining a bit of weight and eating more fat and protein.
Humans evolved for a million years on an African savannah eating a handful of raw grass seeds, some rotten fruit from the ground and then whatever meat they came across or were lucky enough to hunt. We do not need to be eating a perfectly balanced meal at breakfast, lunch, and dinner. We think it's best to eliminate the sway tactics that aren't working and really cut odds of conception (timing, pH, frequency for pink, unhealthy high sodium diets for blue, etc) and focusing on what has - LE and HE Diets!
