You only get one shot at being fertile enough to have children. Once you pass a certain age, it becomes increasingly difficult, followed by impossible to have the family that you want.

Fortunately, there are a few things that you can do to increase your fertility.

Start Early

Img: Increase Fertility

Fertility tends to go down for both men and women pretty quickly after the mid 20s. If you hit 30’s, then it’s time to seriously think about whether you want children or not, whether you’re a man or a woman. It’s true that men have been known to have the ability to have children as old as 70, but it’s not exactly common. The younger you are when you start to think about kids, the better off you’ll be in just about every way. For example, many of the possible birth defects such as Down’s Syndrome, can have a higher chance of happening if you and your partner wait until 35 or later to conceive.

Safe Sex

Although it might seem counter-intuitive, STDs can actually be a problem when it comes to fertility. The key is to get pregnant when you want it to happen, and to prevent the onset of an STD when you don’t, so using safe sex options like condoms and birth control before you’re ready to start having children is pretty essentially important. For example, one STD related problem is called “pelvic inflammatory disease” or PID. It can be caused by Chlamydia or Gonorrhea . This can cause a host of problems when it comes to fertility including the following.

• Fallopian tube scarring
• Chronic Pelvic pain
• Fatal pregnancies

According to recent studies, 1 in 4 US women between 14 and 19 have at least one STD. Many of these will develop PID, and seriously hurt their fertility chances.

Stay Poison-Free

It might seem odd, but there are a lot of environmental toxins that you can take in that could make you infertile. For example, studies have been done that show that any sort of lead poisoning, even at a level low enough that it won’t immediately hurt women, can still have seriously bad impacts on their fertility and children. Lead can be present in unfiltered drinking water, so filtering your water is a good idea. Additionally, the chemical Benzene can also hurt fertility. This can be found in detergents, lubricants, paint, nail polish and so on. This type of poisoning can turn off periods in women, and severely lower sperm count in men. So, it makes sense to watch your environment for potential problems like these.

Keep Fit

It often sounds like a broken record, but staying healthy in terms of weight is what directly affects fertility. If you weigh too ch or too little, your body could decide to close up shop since it doesn’t have the resources or health required to safely support another life.

Overall, taking care how you treat your body and what you allow into it is critical to make sure you have the best chances to have children.

About the author: Lindsey Mcmahon. She likes to travel, play and read in her free time. Her interests are entertainment, television, parenting and health but she is constantly extending her field of view to incorporate interesting news suggested to her by her readers. She currently works for California Cryobank.