While it can sometimes feel like the entire burden of growing a family rests on your shoulders as the future birthing partner, bringing a new little one into your family requires both partners to be ready and to show up.
Here are five things you can share with your non-birthing partner that are easily doable *in the next 24 hours* to help bring you both closer to meeting your someday baby:
1. Practice Self-Care:
Each sperm contains about 3 billion bases of genetic information, representing 750 megabytes of information. That is a lot of information — and it includes things like "How safe or dangerous is the outside world?" and "How should I synthesize certain proteins?". If your partner is well nourished, rested, and is moving their body, they can positively impact the “information” that’s encoded in their sperm and that supports healthy conception and development of an embryo. Traditional practices have recognized this for many centuries and have specific recommendations for non-birthing partners in order to prepare physically to conceive like: reducing stress, increasing micronutrient consumption, and limiting alcohol. Taking steps to care for themselves will have a direct impact on your someday baby!
2. Cook a nourishing meal for the future birthing partner (aka you):
A 2019 study published in the Clinical Medicine Insights: Women’s Health journal reviewed available evidence and concluded that “Micronutrients have essential roles in fertility, and inadequate levels can have an adverse impact on the ability to conceive.” While there are few randomized controlled trials (RCTs) that have been completed, this conclusion is consistent with what we know about human physiology: when there is an absence of micronutrients, the body is unable to carry out all normal functions.
Additionally, when your partner cooks a healthy meal for you, it helps to reduce your stress which can directly support the amount of micronutrients your body can absorb from the meal! Plus, what better way to set the mood than a romantic dinner for two ;)
3. Do a household chore that normally falls on the future birthing partner (also you):
A 2018 study in the American Journal of Epidemiology found that women who experienced higher levels of stress had lower rates of conception. Anything that they can do to relieve even small daily stressors can help create a pattern of lower stress hormones and therefore a physiological environment more conducive to conception.
4. Remind them of something they've done recently to support the fertility journey:
5. Give your non-birthing partner a massage :)
