How Can Weight Affect Your Fertility?

Can a person's weight affect their chances of getting pregnant? Living a healthy lifestyle is often encouraged for those trying to get pregnant. It isn't easy for everyone to work out and choose to eat healthy. However, there are studies that have shown that being underweight or overweight can impact someone's ability to conceive. Men who are very overweight or obese had lower sperm counts than men who are of a normal weight. One explanation for this is that men with greater fat storage end up turning testosterone into estrogen causing lower sperm production. On the other side, men who are underweight also had lower sperm counts compared to men who are of a normal weight. Hormonal issues can be a cause of this for men who are underweight.

Women who are considerably overweight or underweight can also have hormonal disorders that can effect ovulation. They may ovulate very infrequently or maybe not at all. Fat cells create estrogen and in overweight women there can be an overproduction of estrogen that stops adequate ovulation from occurring. Also, women who are experiencing inadequate ovulation are more likely to have a luteal phase defect. The luteal phase is the time between ovulation and menstruation. Usually, a woman's luteal phase is between 12-14 days. Women who suffer from luteal phase defect have a luteal phase that is too short to carry on a pregnancy (less than 10 days).

Polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS)is another common cause of infertility. It is usually found in women who are overweight and/or have a tough time losing weight. PCOS is a hormonal disorder that makes women create more androgens (male hormones) than usual. This can cause irregular ovulation or no ovulation at all.

For more information about the effect of weight on fertility, call us at (248) 619-3100 to set up an appointment with one of our fertility doctors in Michigan.