An army of ‘pregnancy prep’ influencers is offering would-be parents everything from sensible advice to quackery and questionable supplements. What’s really needed?
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nything to do with pregnancy can sometimes feel like a crash course in withstanding uncertainty. From getting pregnant in the first place to avoiding complications later on, any parent-to-be is forced to reckon with the limits of their own control.
The stats around this are worth emphasising: about one in seven couples in the UK will have difficulty conceiving. About one in eight known pregnancies will end in a loss. And as many as 29% of low-risk pregnancies will experience some kind of unforeseen complication. Often there’s no rhyme or reason to any of this. “You can do everything ‘right’ and still face delays. That’s biology, not failure,” says Dr Linda Farahani, a consultant gynaecologist and specialist in reproductive medicine at the Lister Fertility Clinic in Chelsea, London.
All this said, leaving your fertility to the whims of chance may feel unnecessarily fatalistic. If you’ve spent any time in the wilds of the “trying to conceive” (TTC) community, you’ve probably heard of something called “trimester zero”. Simply put, this is the period before you get pregnant, when you try to prepare your body for a healthy outcome. There are no guarantees. But according to an army of “pregnancy prep” influencers, there’s plenty you can do to maximise your odds of success.
