The BMI and fertility are in a relationship. It is one of the most widely used metrics in fertility care today, determining IVF eligibility, shaping insurance decisions, and influencing how providers assess your health. Taking one look at a number and making a decision and your fertility before being asked a single question about your cycle, your hormones, or your history. And it was never designed to do any of that.
In this episode, Kerry breaks down the full story of the Body Mass Index: where it came from, why it was adopted into clinical medicine, and why it continues to be used as a gatekeeping tool in fertility treatment, despite the fact that it cannot measure fat versus muscle, does not account for bone density, and was built on data collected almost entirely from white European men.
This one gets personal. Kerry shares her own experience of being classified as “obese” on a BMI chart for most of her adult life, despite being fit, active, and healthy by every other measure. As someone with a pitta-kapha constitution (an Ayurvedic body type characterized by strong muscles, dense tissue, and a larger frame), she knows firsthand what it feels like to have a number on a chart tell a completely different story than the one your body is actually living.
In this episode:
- The origin of the BMI and why it was never meant to measure individual health
- How it became a clinical and insurance tool, and why that matters
- Why the BMI is considered both racist and sexist by design
- What body constitution looks like through both Western science and Ayurveda
- Ojas and what Ayurveda has always understood about fertile bodies
- What current research says about BMI cutoffs in IVF clinics
- Practical steps if a BMI number is blocking your fertility care
Resources mentioned:
- Devlin, Keith. “Top 10 Reasons Why the BMI Is Bogus.” NPR, July 4, 2009. https://www.npr.org/2009/07/04/106268439/top-10-reasons-why-the-bmi-is-bogus
- “Opinion: Women With Obesity Are Often Restricted From IVF. That’s Discriminatory.” NPR Health Shots, January 14, 2024. https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2024/01/14/1224546666/opinion-women-with-obesity-are-often-restricted-from-ivf-thats-discriminatory
- Boots, Christina, et al. “Addressing Weight Bias in Reproductive Medicine: A Call to Revisit BMI Restrictions for IVF Treatment.” Fertility and Sterility, 2024. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38750875/
Read the full blog post: https://fertilebodyyoga.com/blog/bmi-and-fertility-and-why-i-hate-the-bmi/
Explore the Fertile Body Yoga Virtual Studio: https://studio.fertilebodyyoga.com/shop
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