The Supplement Stack + Lifestyle Protocol I Actually Used for Egg Freezing and IVF
And now we have a baby!
The three to six months before your retrieval matter more than most clinics tell you. I tracked everything I did during that window on my last and most successful IVF round: every supplement, every dose, lifestyle swaps and built it into a living Google Sheet that I will keep current as research evolves. It is linked below. Here is the full context.
Before I get into it, the standard disclaimer: I am not a doctor. This is not medical advice. What I am is a founder who has spent a decade reading women’s health research, a patient who has been through this process herself, and someone who is deeply allergic to vague non-answers when women ask real questions about their bodies. So I am sharing what I did and what informed those decisions. Please work with your own doctor before adding new stuff to your routine, especially during this important moment.
A note on the research: if you have shown any of this to your doctor and gotten a shrug or an eyeroll, I understand why. Most of what is in this protocol has not been proven in large randomized clinical trials, and that is the bar conventional medicine uses to call something evidence-based. The honest reason those trials do not exist is not because the science is bad, it is because supplements cannot be patented, so there is no financial incentive for pharmaceutical companies to fund the research at the scale required to satisfy that standard. What does exist is solid mechanistic research showing how these compounds interact with oocyte mitochondrial function, oxidative stress, insulin signaling, and hormonal balance. The biology is understood. The large human trials are not there yet. I am not telling you to ignore your doctor. I am telling you why the absence of a clinical trial does not mean the absence of a reason…
Why I Made a Protocol in the First Place
Egg freezing is one of those things where the clinic tells you what to do during stimulation but nobody really talks about the three to six months before retrieval that can meaningfully affect egg quality. That window matters. A lot. Oocyte maturation takes roughly 90 days, which means what you do in the months leading up to your retrieval cycle has a direct impact on what you get out of it.
I wanted to go in having done everything within my control for my most recent cycle (that will most likely be my last).
The Stack
I built out a living Google Sheet with every supplement I took, the dose, what I used it for, and how long I took it for. It lives here. I will keep it updated as research evolves, as you guys give me insight from your own cycles, etc.
The categories I organized it around: mitochondrial support, antioxidants, methylation support, anti-inflammatory, and hormonal balance.
If You Want To Go Deeper, Listen To This
I sat down with Dr. Sheeva Talebian, reproductive endocrinologist at CCRM Fertility New York, for an episode of Tell Me I’m a Good Mom that covers everything I wish I had known before I started back during my first round in 2020. The math nobody warns you about. The lifestyle changes that actually move the needle on egg quality. What NAD+ therapy does for fertility and why more western doctors are finally paying attention. And why the number of eggs you retrieve is almost never the number that matters when it comes to viable embryos. If you are navigating IVF, egg freezing, unexplained infertility, or just trying to understand your fertility before it becomes urgent — this one is for you.
The Easy Swaps That Actually Add Up
Supplements are one lever. The other is reducing your daily endocrine disruptor load, which sounds overwhelming until you realize most of it comes down to a few simple product swaps. These are the ones I made (links + a few more suggestions in the Google sheet).
Fragranced Body Wash → a pH-balanced cleanser with no synthetic fragrance Synthetic fragrance is one of the sneakiest sources of phthalates, which are endocrine disruptors with documented effects on reproductive hormones. I use Love Wellness pH Balanced Cleanser down there and as my body wash.
Plastic water bottles → glass or stainless steel BPA gets a lot of press but BPA-free plastics often contain BPS and BPF, which behave similarly in the body. Xenoestrogens from plastic leach especially when bottles are heated or scratched. Glass or stainless is the simple fix.
Non-stick cookware → stainless steel or cast iron PFAS, the “forever chemicals” in most non-stick coatings, have been linked to hormonal disruption and are worth minimizing during a fertility prep window. Cast iron also has the bonus of adding dietary iron.
Scented candles and plug-in air fresheners → beeswax or fragrance-free Most scented candles and plug-ins release phthalates and VOCs into the air you are breathing all day. Beeswax candles burn cleaner. If you want scent, a diffuser with a single-ingredient essential oil is the cleaner route.
Conventional Dirty Dozen produce → organic for the high-pesticide list You do not need to go fully organic. The Environmental Working Group publishes an annual Dirty Dozen list of the highest-pesticide conventional produce. Swapping just those items meaningfully reduces your pesticide load without overhauling your grocery budget.
Scented laundry detergent → fragrance-free Your skin absorbs what your clothes are washed in for the entire day. Fragrance in detergent is another phthalate delivery system most people never think about. The swap costs nothing extra and fragrance-free options exist at every price point.
Retinol → bakuchiol, and everything else your skin touches This one surprised people when I talked about it. Most REs recommend stopping retinol once you start your stimulation cycle at minimum, and many suggest coming off it during the full prep window. Vitamin A derivatives carry a known teratogenic risk profile, and even topical retinol is not worth the variable when you are doing everything else right.
The swap is bakuchiol, a plant-derived ingredient with actual clinical data behind it for cell turnover and collagen support, zero teratogenic concern, and something you can use morning and night without issue.
For SPF, I switched to Summer Fridays Mineral SPF. Clean, elegant, wears well under makeup, and no endocrine-disrupting chemical filters.
Body lotion is also worth auditing. Most conventional lotions are loaded with fragrance. I switched to La Roche Posay fragrance-free.
The intimate hygiene piece nobody talks about Conventional soaps and wipes down there are some of the worst offenders for fragrance and pH disruption and pH disruption is directly linked to microbiome imbalance, which matters more than most people realize during an IVF cycle. Again, I use the pH Balanced Cleanser from my own brand.
What Traditional Chinese Medicine Gets Right
Ice baths are having a cultural moment but TCM has been saying the opposite for centuries for a reason. In traditional Chinese medicine, the uterus is considered a “warm palace.” Cold exposure, cold drinks, and cold foods are believed to impair blood flow to the reproductive organs and disrupt the environment eggs develop in. During a fertility prep window especially, I erred on the side of warmth and stopped ice baths.
A few other TCM principles I took seriously:
Acupuncture, specifically with a TCM fertility specialist This is probably the most evidence-adjacent TCM practice for IVF. The research is mixed but directionally positive for improving blood flow to the ovaries and uterus. Worth finding someone who works specifically with fertility patients and understands your clinic’s timeline.
Eat cooked over raw, especially in the second half of your cycle Raw salads and cold smoothies are considered dampening and hard to digest in TCM. Cooked, warm foods like soups, stews, and roasted vegetables are easier on the digestive system and support what TCM calls kidney energy, which maps roughly onto reproductive vitality.
Bone broth and warming foods Jing, the TCM concept closest to reproductive reserve, is supported through deeply nourishing foods. Bone broth, black beans, walnuts, sesame seeds, and lamb are all classic kidney-tonifying foods in this framework.
Keep your feet warm Sounds minor. The kidney meridian in TCM runs through the sole of the foot. Cold feet are considered a pathway for cold to enter the body. Warm socks, slippers inside, no bare feet on cold floors. Easy swap.
Be in bed by 11pm TCM’s body clock has the liver doing its main restoration work between 11pm and 3am. The liver governs blood and hormones. Staying up past midnight regularly is considered a drain on liver and kidney energy. This one is annoying to hear and also probably true.
The Lifestyle Side
Sleep, stress, alcohol, additional endocrine disruptors, blood sugar regulation: all of it is in the sheet with sourcing. Some of it I was already doing because of Love Wellness. Some of it genuinely surprised me when I looked at the research.
The most underrated one? Sleep. Not in a vague “get enough rest” way. Specific, mechanistic reasons why sleep quality in the months before retrieval is a variable that most people are not paying attention to.
The Thing Nobody Says Out Loud
Egg freezing and then IVF is marketed as empowering, which it is, but it is also expensive, physically demanding, and emotionally more complicated than anyone prepared me for. The prep work gave me something to focus on that was actually within my control during a process that often does not feel that way.
If you are in the middle of this, or thinking about it, or just want to understand your own biology better, I hope this is useful.
Link to the full supplement stack and protocol
Be well,
LBN