Lily NicholsReal Food for Fertility: Prepare your body for pregnancy with preconception nutrition and fertility awareness

This is simply a fertility bible, no other book about fertility even comes close. This has absolutely everything you might possibly want to know, and not just regarding nutrition, but it also covers cycle tracking, functional testing, supplements, exercise and more.Most importantly, it is actually based on real scientific evidence. Lily Nichols is incredible at reading scientific papers and unlike many other authors, she does this properly and therefore proves herself to be one of the most trustworthy voices in the fertility space.Don’t even think about other books, buy this and you won’t be disappointed.

RFFF, along with Ultra-Processed People, changed the way I think about what I put into my body. I truly believe this book helped me eat my best to support my body during fertility treatments. The research is sound and well explained.

I am only 2/3 of the way through this book so far, but the amount of information I have learnt has been revelating! I am truly shocked by some of the research findings in this book, but it makes complete sense that we should be going back to our natural way of eating.I feel empowered now that I can prepare my body in the best way I can for pregnancy in the future! I think everybody should read this before they are considering becoming pregnant.I have also ordered the Pregnancy version of this book and I am excited to read that as well!

This book is just an essential for anyone trying to conceive, it covers all the key nutritional aspects of what to eat to improve your egg and sperm quality as well as how to know your cycle inside out to optimise ovulation and sex! it is referenced, really easy to read and very comprehensive. Highly recommend!

A must read if you're preparing for pregnancy or if you want to improve your fertility! I got this one after having read "Real Food for Pregnancy". It's a BIG book with A LOT of information. Love the recipes.

What a wonderful book from two of my favorite women's health writers. As a nutritional therapist who specialises in fertility, I found this book to be fully comprehensive and pitched at just the right level, explaining the importance of preconception preparation from a nutrition and lifestyle perspective and full details on how to get started. The content also covers topics related to menstrual health in general — which as the authors say is health itself. It's a very important read which I believe should be compulsory on all school curriculums — it would offer so much knowledge and power to women and their partners from an early age.

This is a valuable book, written in a crisp, approachable style by authors I respect and from whom I have learned a lot. The first downside, and the reason for subtracting one star, is that this book recycles material from the authors' previous books. The second donwside, and the reason for subtracting two stars, is owing to the discussion of vegetarian and vegan diets. As someone who has studied and experienced the significant, life-changing benefits of plant-based nutrition, I was surprised by the difference in this chapter's tone, which bordered on hostile, patronising, and damning. The authors take care to say, at one point, that they respect their vegan/vegetarian friends/colleagues, but this outlook is not reflected in their recommendations. They cite various scientific studies suggesting the negative impact of vegan nutrition, with little consideration for the funding bodies and food lobbies that might be behind those papers. Furthermore, they show profound, outdated misunderstanding of heme/non-heme iron, protein absorption, soy, and lectin. Finally, they neglect very recent, well-established findings reporting on the enormous benefits of vegan and vegetarian nutrition, such as the Harvard study showing improved ovulatory function, or studies pointing to links between dairy elimination and a dramatic decrease in endometriosis plaques. Such cherry-picking of data is irresponsible and took me aback enough to write this review. I can draw from my own experience here by attesting to how balanced plant-based nutrition enabled me to optimise my menstrual cycle, eliminate cramping, reverse joint pain, improve fertility hormone markers, and double my energy, as well as fall pregnant easily into my 40s and resolve some of the inflammatory issues that that had caused vitamin B12/D and iron deficiency back when I was still an omnivore. (I can also think of various examples of women who had healthful, easy TTC/pregnancies while on a plant-centred diet – anecdotal evidence, to be sure, but still consistent enough for me to shake my head at the authors' pessimistic outlook.) As with any meat-inclusive diet, a plant-based one can be both healthful and unhealthful, depending both on how it is implemented and on how this nutritional profile compared to a person's previous diet and health. I support the authors' emphasis on preparing the body's nutritional reserves ahead of pregnancy – that is the main, very valuable takeaway of this book – and agree that the body in pregnancy needs unprecedented levels of nutritional support and care. They are lifelong meat-eaters and prefer to adhere to the cultural norms they follow themselves, which is fine, but it is a bit concerning to see them make dietary recommendations that include, in the interest of protein intake, a list of WHO-identified class-1 carcinogens. The authors argue that fertility is a reflection of general health. Given the long-established benefits of balanced plant-based nutrition, they have missed a tremendous opportunity to do better by a subset of vegetarian and vegan readers who have already taken crucial dietary steps to improve their health and wellbeing.