The Fertility Factors You Can Actually Control

Before you spend a dollar on treatment, here’s what the evidence says about the lifestyle changes that matter, the ones that don’t, and the ones the internet gets wrong.

Lisa and her husband James had been trying to conceive for 10 months when they went down the internet rabbit hole. Within a week, James had thrown out his boxer briefs, quit coffee entirely, stopped going to the gym, and was eating handfuls of zinc supplements. Lisa had cut out gluten, dairy, sugar, alcohol, caffeine, and anything that came in plastic packaging. She was also sleeping with her legs elevated after sex because a TikTok told her to.

Neither of them was sleeping well. Both were miserable. And none of what they were doing was based on solid evidence.

This is what happens when anxious people meet an unregulated wellness industry. You get fear dressed up as empowerment. You get expensive supplements marketed with cherry-picked data. You get extreme restrictions that add stress to an already stressful situation, sometimes making things worse rather than better.

Here’s what the actual science says.

What This Guide Is and Isn’t

This is a summary of lifestyle factors with credible evidence for affecting fertility in men, women, or both. I’ve included what the research shows, how strong the evidence is, and what a reasonable response looks like.

This is not a promise that lifestyle changes alone will get you pregnant. For many couples, the cause of infertility is structural, genetic, or hormonal, and no amount of clean eating or boxers-over-briefs will fix it. Lifestyle optimization is one piece of the puzzle. Sometimes it’s the most important piece. Sometimes it’s irrelevant to your specific situation.

The point is to know the difference.

First Things First: Have Sex. The Right Amount. Forget Everything Else You’ve Heard.

The evidence: Strong. ASRM committee opinion level. Applies to timing, frequency, position, orgasm, and post-sex routines.

Before we talk about what you eat, drink, or breathe, let’s talk about the thing that actually makes babies. You would be surprised how many couples trying to conceive are confused about the basics, not because they’re uninformed, but because the internet has buried straightforward biology under layers of myths, gadgets, and monetized anxiety.