Before Your Pregnancy: A 90 Day Guide for Couples on How to Prepare for a Healthy Conception

by Amy Ogle, Lisa Mazzullo

Before Your Pregnancy is a breakthrough book for prospective parents—a completely detailed resource that prepares mothers and fathers-to-be to conceive the healthiest baby possible, to make pregnancy and delivery easier, and to foster the mental and physical well-being of their infant child. Created by two experienced health-care professionals, this unique handbook not only discusses virtually every aspect of preconception that affects a healthy baby, it tells you how to handle each one. The authors spell out what each parent needs to do, starting at least ninety days before conception (the minimum time needed for sperm to mature). The hundreds of topics covered—many for the first time in any book—include

• Men’s Health: Building healthy sperm before conception (nutrition, fitness, and medical influences)
• Women’s Health: Gynecologic well-being, preexisting medical conditions, genetic legacy, boosting fertility, becoming a mother at an older age
• Becoming an Informed Patient: Choosing a doctor, what a complete preconception exam includes, important questions and how to ask them, insurance coverage
• Nutrition: Improving the health of future generations, preconception meal makeovers, ethnic Food Guide Pyramids, avoiding food-borne illnesses, vitamin and mineral facts, pre-pregnancy body weight
• Fitness: Preconception fitness evaluation and exercise prescription, safety tips and motivational anecdotes, preconception strength and flexibility workout
• Medications/Herbs: Baby-friendly ones and ones to avoid
• Personal Readiness: Emotional, financial, and environmental issues
• Romancing the Egg: Tips for success when ready to “start trying”
Plus : Separate questionnaires for the prospective parents to fill out in preparation for their preconception medical visit.

This warm, intelligent, and completely informed reference gives aspiring parents exactly the knowledge and support they need to insure the best of everything for their child-to-be.

Genres: Parenting, Nonfiction, Health, Family

448 pages, Paperback

First published May 15, 1998

Reviews

[Carissa · Rating 3 out of 5]

I skimmed through this book because of the amount of baby books I had read before this. It had an excellent section on specific diseases and medications and a large section on nutrition. It is a verbose book, hence why I skimmed it.



Notes:
Use glass, stainless steel, porcelain or ceramic containers for hot foods.
Reduce your use of canned foods.
Microwave food in nonplastic containers designated for microwave usage.
Choose glass or BPA-free baby bottles.

For cat litter, use a mask and gloves. Wash hands frequently.
You can get a toxoplasmosis test with your regular blood test to see if you are immune.

Go off the pill two or three months before trying to get pregnant.

Keep your gastrointestinal tract healthy by regularly eating yogurt with probiotics.
Take 400mcg of folic acid daily.

Research on women who used Zoloft and Prozac did not find negative outcomes for baby. These are the preferred medications during pregnancy. Do NOT use Paxil.

Drugs that are not recommended: tricyclic antidepressants, benzodiazepines, monoamine oxidane inhibitors.

Breastfeeding while taking antidepressants appears to be safe for the baby, although taking the lowest possible effective dose is recommended. Zoloft and Prozac are considered safe options.

Take steps before delivery to strengthen your support system.
1. consider having a nightnurse
2. stagger family help over 2 months
3. plan alone time with spouse

Nutrients to help depression
1. omega 3s & 6s
2. folate
3. vitamin B

Lamictal is potentially safe, but the medical jury is still out.

When using medication:
1. weigh benefits as well as risks
2. choose the most baby-friendly medicine
3. use single-agent therapy (one med for all symptoms)
4. take lowest does possible
5. discontinue for a short period of time during first trimester

Safe OTC drugs for headaches and muscle soreness is Tylenol. Fioricet for more serious headaches.

Herbs & Supplements CAUTION-- alfalfa, grape seed extract, valerian, wheat grass, camphor, chamomile, coffee, echinacea, gingko, ingested lemongrass, ingested lavender, melatonin, raspberry leaf, sarsaparilla, wild yam (not the same as in stores), tea (green, black, white oolong), ginger as a dietary supplement (otherwise don't load up on it during the day), garlic as a dietary supplement (otherwise fewer than 2-3 cloves daily)

Herbs & Supplements AVOID-- ingested aloe, ingested essential oil, ginseng, licorice (real, which is seldom found in candies), passion flower, medicinal rhubarb (not garden), st. john's wort, sassafras

Drink A LOT of water.. 8x8oz glasses/day

Vitamins
folic acid - 400mcg
choline - 425 mg
vitamin c - 75mg
b6 - 1.9mg
b12 - 2.4mcg

Food Safety Practices
1. Wash your hands
2. Avoid cross-contamination when using cutting board
3. Refrigerate perishable food promptly in shallow pans
4. Avoid storing foods in large, deep containers
5. Test food with thermometer
6. Plan ahead when thawing food (defrost large items in refrigerator 1 day per 5 lbs)
7. Buy appliance thermometers if you don't have built-in ones (keep refrigerator below 40 degrees and your freezer at 0 degrees)
8. Purchase perishable foods last at the grocery store
9. Carry perishables in your passenger seat during warm weather rather than the hot trunk
10. When in doubt, throw it out

Do not drink unpasteurized or raw milk
Always store milk in the regular refrigerator, not the door
Avoid eating soft cheeses unless melted and brought to boil OR if they have been pasteurized (brie, feta, blue cheese, camembert, mexican cheeses)
Yogurt, cottage cheese and cream cheese are okay
Do not consume dairy products after the use-by date
When buying meats & poultry, place wrapped item in another plastic bag and keep bagged or on a clean the fridge
If raw meat juice gets on counter or fridge shelf, wash with soap & water & paper towel
Cook meats to safe internal temperature
Wash hands before and after handling raw meat
Anything that touches raw food should be thoroughly washed
All ready-to-eat deli meat must be reheated until they are steaming hot before consuming
Eat ready-to-eat foods by use-by date
Reheat meat and poultry products only once
Eggs should be kept refrigerated
Cook eggs all the way through til firm
Avoid testing batters that have uncooked eggs
Ask if items that have eggs are pasteurized (caesar salad dressing, tiramisu, chocolate mousse, ice cream, eggnog)
Wash hands after handling eggs
Rinse or scrub all veggies & fruits under cool running water before eating/cutting/peeling
For leafy vegetables such as lettuce and cabbage, discard the outer leaves
Rewash veggies that have been precut & prewashed
Avoid both raw & minimally-cooked sprouts
Avoid drinking unpasteurized juice or cider from roadside stands
Avoid raw fish & shellfish
Avoid refrigerated smoked seafood (lox, nova style, kippered, smoked, jerky)

DO NOT participate in these sports:
downhill skiing, waterskiing, scuba diving, diving, surfing, horseback riding, rock climbing, high altitude hiking or snowshoeing above 10,000 ft, soccer, ice or field hockey, basketball, gymnastics, bikram yoga

[Lightreads · Rating 3 out of 5]

Huh. I’m glad I read this, and I’ll keep it around for the vitamins/minerals charts, but overall . . . not so much. This book pays lipservice to the notion that straight married people aren’t the only ones having babies by using the word “partner,” but then doesn’t manage to include anyone LGBT or single having a child anywhere in over 500 pages that I saw. And they want to cover a lot of ground about health and reproduction, so they can’t really dig into anything, with the unfortunate overall impression that they think diet and exercise can solve anything, which is not even really what they believe.

But mostly, anyone who gives the BMI this much credence has lost a lot of my respect. I am a living breathing example of why the BMI is bullshit as a health measurement tool. According to it, I am teetering on the very top end of normal/acceptable, just a few tenths of a point below overweight. And everyone who has met me is now laughing, because I am, in fact, a U.S. size 6, an athlete, and in glowing health.

So I wrote off the fitness chapters, and was highly suspicious of the nutrition information (the food pyramid website? seriously?). But you know. It was a decent place to start.

However, the phrase “providing womb service” is just never not going to kneejerk piss me off.

[Carmen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Chock full of lots of helpful information, tips, things to ask the midwife, ways to change the workout! Perhaps a bit dated in its focus on BMI and food portion recommendations, but the fundamentals are solid and helpful!

[Jessica · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ableist, stigmatising (eg how it talks about addiction), dietary and other lifestyle references that seem very out of touch with the average person (who is eating this much foie gras and clams?), poorly structured and edited, not referenced.
Highly focused on BMI and weight loss. And while this comes through constantly in reference to women, it is barely mentioned in the chapter for men, despite weight being a factor in male fertility too.
Highly traditional in terms of gender roles, e.g. the chapter for men, where it discusses food: "Conquer the produce aisle as you discriminate between the cantaloupes that are ripe and the ones that are not. This mutual familiarity will make it less intimidating to share shopping duties or, if need be, take it over completely, if your wife, when pregnant, experiences debilitating fatigue or morning sickness."

Just stop drinking and smoking, avoid toxic chemicals, take a prenatal multivitamin, and talk to your doctor if you're worried.

[Derek · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked up Before Your Pregnancy: A 90 Day Guide for Couples on How to Prepare for a Healthy Conception by Amy Ogle for reasons that should be readily apparent from the book's title. I went with the Kindle e-book version of this book, and, although there was a lot of helpful information in here, I wasn't impressed.

I hate to ding a book for things that are beyond the author's control, but the formatting on this version was TERRIBLE. Text boxes and charts that, in the print edition would likely have been on the margin or a separate page, would frequently break up the regular material, sometimes interrupting mid-sentence or in the middle of a list. Links to other sections of the text weren't always precise, and there was often no way to return to your original place.

Content-wise, I would like to say this book was very informative. I think it was, but I lack the scientific background to say so with any degree of certainty. However, the author uncritically accepts the USDA's "MyPyramid" health recommendations, which I know are controversial within the nutritionist community (USDA being a politically influenced organization, it's believed by many that they grossly overstate the healthy amount of meat and dairy one should consume). This wholesale endorsement, in my opinion, undermined her trustworthiness on other points. Maybe it's good advice, but I can't be confident in that anymore.

The anecdotes scattered throughout the book were stupid and unhelpful, but ultimately harmless.

As good as any other book on this topic, I guess. The advice is helpful, but I would suggest corroborating some of the recommendations with a second opinion. Get the print version of this book, though.

[Jennifer · Rating 2 out of 5]

Picked this up in my library free-kindle-book binge, and because I figured it couldn't hurt to read it.

Skimmed much of the content- much of it is so general that frankly it isn't that helpful. Yes, diet and exercise are important... but not just for pre-pregnancy women... and there are some details on vitamins, etcetc. But in the attempt to cover every topic, it doesn't really give you much more information that isn't patently obvious.

If you are trying to get pregnant, don't smoke or do drugs. Stop drinking so much, and ideally cut out all alcohol two weeks BEFORE trying to conceive. Follow the food pyramid (wonder if they'll update to the new plate). If your BMI is in the overweight or obese category, it might be easier to get pregnant (and you might have a lower risk pregnancy) if you lose some weight before you conceive. Is this all really rocket science?

We're not trying to conceive, but if we were, I think I'd check out something a lot more concrete and give this one a miss. The only positive, really, is that the charts on what things to avoid (herbs, meds, whatever) are a little less scare-tactic-y than what you'd find in Google searching!

[Darcey · Rating 4 out of 5]

So. Useful. If there’s one book to read while you’re considering trying to conceive, make it this one. Ogle takes time to look at a large number of aspects which can influence pregnancy, and risks. There are no scare tactics here -- not all of it may be pleasant reading, but neither is it full of horrible things that will happen if you don’t do the suggested things. Understanding the impact a prepregnancy body can have on a pregnancy is important, and knowing the changes to make in order to have the best possible pregnancy is important.

[Jessica Lange · Rating 3 out of 5]

While this book offers mostly common sense, I did take about a page worth of notes about things I didn't already know. A lot of the book can be skimmed and kept as a reference. Overall I'm glad I read it.

[Taylor · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall an informative and educational book. I skipped a lot of the pages because they weren't relevant to me but it just shows how relevant this book can be for people with all types of conditions and life situations. I'm also glad infertility was only covered in a couple of chapters and not half of the book like a lot of the other pre-pregnancy books. All in all I learned a great deal from this book, on things I didn't know or didn't even occur to me to google online.

[Jackie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Helpful. Would recommend.

[Kaitlinn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dry but informative

[Jenna · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the only book that I've found that doesn't assume I'm reading because I can't get pregnant. It definitely focuses on nutrition and exercise which makes perfect sense. In fact, 7 of 17 chapters are about the getting the mommy-to-be's body in tip top shape. It has a great list of vitamins/minerals/supplements and what they do and how many of each to consume. It has exercises that help to train your body not only for labor, but for pregnancy as well. It has different options for care providers and questions to ask potential candidates. I decided long ago that I would be using a midwife, but I didn't find that the book was trying to sway my opinion one way or another. My husband enjoyed the fact that it actually has a chapter meant for the dad instead of spreading tiny highlighted tidbits throughout the book the way What to Expect Before You're Expecting did.

I've read a lot of pregnancy books and I feel like I know most of the common sense stuff in this book, but having it in black and white really helps me focus on what's important in the period before conception. The lay-out is straight forward and easy to read. It has informative to-the-point chapters that make it a great reference. It even takes into account that adding a tiny member to the family is going to be hard on the finances and has budget worksheets. When you're ready to conceive, it does have a chapter on charting fertility and getting pregnant.

There is so much information in this book, that it's worth checking out the table of contents at least to see if it is something that works for your situation.

[Heidi · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this to be a solid and interesting resource on preparing the body for pregnancy. This was the ONLY book I was able to find at either my library or local bookstore that focused on TTC in a way that didn't assume that you were having fertility issues, but that you were just looking to plan for a healthy pregnancy (3+ months down the road, though there are health tips that could be implemented sooner or later). It includes chapters on vitamins, minerals, food health, physical health and training, body weight and image, lifestyle habits, environmental hazards, the preconception doctor visit, etc. It even includes an entire chapter for men about what they can do to boost their preconception health and chance of conceiving.

Much of the information included could be found in any basic pregnancy book I'm sure, but I like that this focused on preconception and distinguished between the two. I now feel much better prepared to make a preconception consultation visit to my doctor and ask the right questions, as well as to alter my personal eating and exercise habits to best prepare my body for a healthy pregnancy.

[Kim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Useful info about vitamins, meds and chemicals to avoid, and practical advice on basics of getting a bit more healthy before conceiving. I found the tone to be a bit annoying at times and some of the scenarios a bit obnoxious...but less so than other books I browsed on a similar topic.

Wouldn't recommend it or dissuade people from it...it just was so-so. But it did follow its claim...I felt ready to start trying and successfully tracking ovulation within 90 days and I was able to conceive quickly. My doctors were happy with the steps I had taken and I knew a lot of the things they wanted me to be know on my first pregnancy visit, so that's good too.

I guess my only issue with the book is that it wasn't very pro-woman...it seemed to focus a bit too much on the 101 things that can go wrong rather than focusing on building confidence and awareness. Something about the tone wasn't quite right to me.

[Kelly Holmes · Rating 1 out of 5]

I didn't read this book cover to cover, but I flipped through all of it and read bits here and there. It's a little too mainstream for me, so I decided to look for another preconception book that is more inline with my values and ideals. For example, this book says that nurse midwives must be under the "supervision" of an ob/gyn to perform deliveries. I know that is not the fact at least in my state. In addition, the nutrition recommendations are basically to use the food pyramid and the exercise information didn't seem to say anything about making sure your heart rate doesn't get too high. The copyright date is 2002, so I don't know if these issues are due to the age of the book, but I want a book I can trust, not second-guess.

[Kat · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some great information here, but honestly I ended up skimming through quite a bit. I think the book might be more helpful and reassuring for couples potentially facing an "at-risk" pregnancy. There is a lot of information about pre-existing conditions and how they factor in to pregnancy. I found the chapters about nutrition, exercise, and fertility particularly useful. Most pregnancy books seem to have a brief intro chapter for us studious ladies that like to read up before the big assignment, so it was nice to get some more details and insight beyond just the usual "quit smoking & drinking, eat healthy, exercise regularly, and have sex during ovulation."

[Amanda · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the best prepregnancy book I found, although there aren't that many. It does cover a lot, and I think that it did provide useful information on diet, exercise, and overall health. The tone can be a bit annoying. Also, I found that the nutrition section was highly biased towards using the mypyramid.gov website, which I think is now choosemyplate.gov. There are lots of calorie/nutrition trackers out there, and I think that section would have been more useful if it hadn't been so focused on that one site.

If you are looking for a book to get ready to conceive, I'd pick this one. But I wouldn't necessarily recommend it to everyone.

[Bird · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a very, very basic book intended for people with no knowledge of what a healthy lifestyle looks like. (Hmmm, lots of exercise and a well-balanced diet. Haven't I heard that somewhere before...? face-->palm)

There are a few good tidbits that women may not know (like that you should begin taking a folic acid supplement three months before you intend to start trying to conceive), but overall anyone health conscious enough to be thinking about picking this book up won't find anything new or helpful in here.

[Nikki · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a good book, but I just didn't enjoy it as much as What to Expect Before You're Expecting. It's good really good info, but I realized its focus on health provided me with a lot of info I'm already familiar with. Matt and I have already jointly developed healthy diets and good exercise programs. All in all, I would say it's a useful book, but just not one I really needed. I would recommend it to anyone looking to learn more about nutrition and exercise before conception.

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great book to just give you a general heads-up of what to expect when starting a family. It has nutritional information, a general over-view of conception and infertility, it also gives great insight to lifestyle choices when starting a family. Some of the info didn't apply to me and it had these little anecdotes that were cheesy. But I think this book is a good starting place for researching family planning.

[Erica · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hands down the best pregnancy book I've read to date: and it actually focuses on the "pre pregnancy" period. The tone and pacing were perfect, the content deep, scientific and engaging. I wish Mazzullo would write a pregnancy book, and then maybe a post-pregnancy book: although the market is glutted with these type of books, Mazzullo's would rise to the top because she doesn't talk down to her readers, and includes all relevant data in a balanced fashion. Fantastic.

[Perrie · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent reference for couples who are planning to get pregnant. It's very heavy on detail, all based on sound scientific studies (unlike many similar books in the field). This is more of a textbook and may not appeal to all readers but would serve as a very sound reference guide.

[Evie · Rating 3 out of 5]

After reading about ectopic pregnancies and the genetic possibilities of inheriting Huntington's disease, I checked out. Returned this book to the library after 3 renews and I'd still only managed to skim half.

No rush, anyway.

[Sonia R · Rating 5 out of 5]

Would recommend it to a friend! In depth analysis of a broad range of topics; even things that I would have never thought of to pay attention to. On the other hand, such detail scared me a little regarding all the things that can go wrong, but that's just me!

[Marisa · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book was way too detailed for me, and made me totally paranoid about everything before I even got pregnant. I worry enough, thank you very much.

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very informative if you are preparing to get preganant. I only skimmed some chapters but read others more closely.

[Pam Reeder · Rating 5 out of 5]

Got pregnant five days after reading. Purely coincidental.

[Gail · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very dense. Beware, it could take you 90 days just to read this book. It seems to have some good information though - for overall health as well as getting ready for pregnancy.

[Kristen · Rating 3 out of 5]

good read. was able to skim most of it though, since it appeared to be geared towards sedentary, overweight women with poor diets. for me, about 1/3 of the book was useful.

[Michelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

Didnt tell me anything I havent been able to find just by doing research from the internet.. But its a good starters book.