Research shows that in addition to age, the lifestyle of a prospective father turns out to have a significant impact on the health of a prospective baby. With these findings, the responsibility of maintaining health for the sake of having a healthy baby is not only carried out by expectant mothers, but also the father must pay attention to his own lifestyle. This is because the healthy behavior of both prospective parents can have an impact on the success rate of pregnancy, the risk of a mother having a miscarriage, a child experiencing birth defects, and the occurrence of cancer in children.
For a prospective father, eating patterns, smoking habits, preferences for alcoholic beverages, and age factors can contribute to birth defects in children, mental illness, autism, obesity, and other problems. Research confirms that the prospective father's sperm can bring potential health problems for the child into the egg of the expectant mother.
Here are some lifestyle factors that need to be considered prospective fathers.
Dietary habit
Apply a healthy and balanced diet and maintain ideal body weight, which means don't be too thin and don't get obese. Men who are obese tend to have children with a higher risk of obesity. These children are also more likely to have diabetes, abnormal metabolism, and some types of cancer. This can occur because obesity and malnutrition make changes in certain genes that are directly related to the condition. Prospective fathers can adopt a healthy diet like the following.
- Consumption of vegetables and fruit. Within a day, try to consume at least 3-5 serving sizes of vegetables and 2-4 serving fruits. The goal is to meet the needs of antioxidants, such as beta carotene and vitamin C. In addition, you can also eat wheat and beans as a source of vitamin E. In general, antioxidant nutrients from vitamin E and vitamin C can help ward off free radicals.
Vitamin C itself has been known as an important factor in maintaining the quality of male reproductive health. A biochemist says that vitamin C is found to be around eight times more in semen than in blood plasma, so it plays an important role in supporting pregnancy. Not only that, the expert research also found that men with vitamin C deficiency were 2.5 times more likely to have an imperfect sperm shape, compared to men whose vitamin C needs were met.
- Meeting the needs of folic acid, one way is to eat green vegetables, such as broccoli, cabbage, mustard greens, and lettuce. In addition, you can also eat legumes, beans, sunflower seeds (watermelon), oranges, and other foods that are rich in folic acid, fiber, and nutrition.
- Consuming protein such as fish and lean meat, and do not miss low-fat dairy products or in the form of yogurt.
- Need for vitamin D, zinc and selenium. Zinc and selenium can be obtained from beans and chicken meat. While vitamin D is obtained by the body with the help of sun exposure.
If your diet has not been able to meet all the necessary nutrients, you can consider taking a multivitamin, but choose a moderate dose.
Stop smoking right now!
Try to stay away from cigarettes for as long as possible before you go on a program to have children, maybe years before. A study suggests that a prospective father should stop smoking to protect their babies from the common cancers in children. Although it still requires other in-depth studies, the results of this study should not be ignored. What's more, the study found evidence that fathers who smoke, at any time in their lives, are 30 percent more likely to have children with cancer, than fathers who have never smoked.
In addition, infant mortality rates are generally 45 percent higher if the father smokes, compared to if the father does not smoke. Not only that, a number of studies found more incidence of birth defects in children of fathers who smoked, compared to nonsmokers.
Avoid or Limit Alcoholic Beverages
Father's favorite in consuming alcoholic drinks during this time can have an impact on the child's genes, even though the mother did not consume alcoholic beverages before or during pregnancy. If the father likes to consume alcohol, the result is the possibility of a child born with symptoms of a baby disorder due to alcohol (fetal alcohol syndrome). Children with this disorder can have a low weight, impaired brain development, and learning difficulties. The study found that as many as 3 out of 4 children diagnosed with this disorder apparently have a father who likes to consume alcoholic beverages.
Living a healthy lifestyle does not stop at efforts to implement healthy eating patterns and avoid smoking and alcoholic drinks, but expectant fathers also need to exercise regularly. Maintaining ideal body weight and living a healthy lifestyle is important to maintain the quality of father's sperm in good condition for the sake of producing a healthy baby. In addition, as much as possible manage stress well and avoid prolonged stress. Although more research is needed, the results of the studies available now show that high levels of stress increase the risk of having children with behavioral disorders.
Comments
Post a Comment