Trying to get pregnant turns out to be a pretty stressful endeavour for a lot of women, even though it seems like it should be pretty straightforward. Have sex while you're ovulating and it should work out right? In theory, yes, that's the way to go, but there are myriad factors at play when it comes to getting pregnant and maintaining a healthy pregnancy. Not everyone has spent time learning about hormones and the many things that throw them out of whack, so it may not be obvious to many people why they can't make it happen.
So what's the main thing stopping me from getting pregnant?
This question of course requires investigation from a practitioner in some cases, but let's get some of the common issues on the table. As I talked about in my article on female athletes and period irregularities, stress is not just something that makes you irritable and sleep poorly. It has a profound effect on hormones because your body produces hormones in response to stress in order to protect itself. Hormones are involved in all processes in the body, not just those related to reproduction, however they will ultimately influence reproductive processes. If you're interested in the sciencey stuff then you can head over to the previous article for an explanation, but we can break things down into simple terms. If you're stressed out, your body does not consider it a safe time to grow a baby. Growing a baby requires a LOT of resources, and those resources are taken from your own body. So if anything is lacking or out of balance, your body may not create the necessary conditions for conception and ongoing pregnancy. I know it's a bit boring to talk about stress, and you've probably heard enough about it, but it's the number one obstacle seen in fertility patients.
But I don't feel that stressed...
Our bodies are incredibly adaptive to their environment because adaptation literally allows us to survive. It's important to remember though that survival is not really the mode we want to be in when we want to conceive. By now, we're probably so used to consistent stressors all around us that we hardly pay any attention to them anymore. Perhaps we wake up to an alarm for work everyday and force ourselves to get up earlier than our body wants to. We spend the morning inside our home or office without natural light, and then eat dinner, work and hang out under artificial lights into the night hours when it would otherwise be dark. Our messed up lighting means our cortisol is higher at night instead of the daytime, so we don't sleep very well. Not to mention, we might be sleeping on off-gassing mattresses in homes full of synthetic materials and chemicals abound. We clean our houses and wash our clothes and dishes in harmful chemicals and chlorinated water, we breathe exhaust when we go for a walk or do errands around town, and we sit for hours and hours a day, stagnant, in front of screens. This is all stress.
If you've been working hard to have a healthy lifestyle perhaps you've added daily exercise into the mix, maybe you're doing intermittent fasting, or you cut out carbs. In isolation, many of these habits have some major health benefits, but to our body, they're all considered stress. A little bit of stress is actually beneficial, but chances are, you've already got more than a little bit before you started implementing these "healthy" activities. Not to mention any challenges at work, in your relationship, within yourself, and simply the stress of making it through modern life day to day. So you may not feel overtly stressed, maybe everything is going pretty smoothly, but behind the scenes your body is working tirelessly to keep everything functioning.
Okay now I'm stressed about being stressed! What can I do?
This tends to happen a lot with women seeking treatment for fertility. First they don't know what's wrong. Then they start learning and getting in touch with their bodies and they realise there are quite a few things putting them under the pump, and they worry they'll never be able to make it work. Don't worry! It's overwhelming at the beginning, but there are some fairly straightforward changes that can be made without throwing off your routine too much, and you'll start to benefit pretty quickly.
To begin with, it's crucial to have discernment. Which things are in your control, and which things are not? Anything that's not in your control, put those to the side. And for now, we'll even include things that you technically can control, like where you live or the car you drive, in things we'll put aside, because they require a lot of mental and physical energy to change. Let's make it easy.
Eat Breakfast
Who would have thought telling people to eat breakfast would become controversial? I spent quite a few years doing intermittent fasting by skipping breakfast and having coffee instead, and there are endless videos and articles preaching the health benefits. There are some for sure, but there is a time and a place.
For women trying to conceive, its pretty critical that your body does not think it's going to run out of food and starve. Your body doesn't know that this morning coffee hit is only in place until you have a lunch break in a few hours, it thinks it's not going to eat today. And that light, energised feeling you get from skipping breakfast is adrenaline, a stress hormone. Stress hormones keep us going in a way that might feel good if we're used to it, because we perceive it as having "energy", but it's kind of like using a credit card without any savings. It looks like its functioning as money, making purchases, but its leaving you increasingly deficient in funds, and you'll have to make up the debt sooner or later.
Eat breakfast within the hour you wake up. Just try it for a few weeks. If you're used to skipping it, you probably won't even be hungry. But have some hot bone broth, some eggs, and a piece of fruit. Even have a warm cup of milk with some honey (dairy, sugar?? I know, I'll cover that in another article). Just get something in you. Then make sure you feed yourself a good balance of protein and carbs, and some good fats throughout the day.
Eat Before Bed
What?? I know, it's all sounding a bit crazy. We've all heard by now how important it is so stop eating three hours before bed for better digestion etc. etc. I'm not saying to have a giant meal before you crawl in, but just have something that will keep your glycogen stores topped up so your body doesn't have to wake up or sleep too lightly because it's worried it won't have fuel tomorrow. If you're extremely metabolically healthy and you have no irregularities with your cycle, you may be fine without it. But if you're here reading this, it's likely this could be of help to you.
This isn't the time for keto, and it's not the time for Vegan...
If you're tempted to go into any named diet plan, you're at risk of falling into dogma that will bring you out of touch with your body, and into your mind in order to follow the "rules". I've done these diets before as well. There are certainly some benefits, for some people, when these are done right, but there is really no reason to try to force yourself into the best way you can survive a diet when you could just not follow one instead.
If you're having trouble getting pregnant, if you're stressed, if your period is not regular, there is likely something missing when it comes to nutrients, and something missing when it comes to fuel. It's important to work with a practitioner (which we can do in Chinese Medicine here in Melbourne) to determine what's going on specifically for you, but we can lay some basic concepts.
We need high quality protein, and some fats for our nutrients. Think grass-fed ruminants, organ meats, animal fat, butter, eggs etc. These will give us building blocks for making cells, hormones, a nourished womb, and eventually, a healthy baby. For fuel we're looking to carbs. Yes, the dreaded carbs. No, I don't really mean load up on bread and pasta, but get some carbs in with your meals that will give your body easy glucose to use as fuel, so it never has to work too hard to find energy for all its processes. Milk (if you can handle it, more on that later), and honey or maple syrup are really easy fuel sources. White rice, potatoes, and fruit with your meals is great too. If we don't give our body glucose, we have to make it. This is called gluconeogenesis and is a bit controversial when you talk to the keto and carnivore community, but according to just good old physiology, it's a stressful process for the body. If you haven't been eating carbs, start very slowly and build up.
Get Treatments
Yes, this is a plug! A plug for all services that help you chill the heck out, whether it's acupuncture and Chinese medicine, massage, or something else you love. When I work with woman on their fertility, I'm definitely addressing their individual constitution, medical history and personal concerns, but a major aspect of treatment is taking some of the pressure off of them. When you make an exchange to receive treatment, you're giving up some of the responsibility and stress you put on yourself to just get pregnant. That pressure is not helping the situation.
There have been a few times that women seeking treatment are asked to actually stop trying to get pregnant, just for a couple of months while we get the treatment plan in place. What do you know? A lot of them get pregnant during this period... because they relaxed. Otherwise, booking yourself in for acupuncture once or twice a week will guarantee that you chill out and do nothing, at least for a couple hours a week, plus the benefit from the actual treatment.
There are so many reasons why any one woman's body is behaving a certain way, and it's important to diagnose things properly in order to offer the correct treatment protocol. That said, if you can start making some changes like what is mentioned above, and start reducing any stressors that are feasible to you, things may start improving sooner than you anticipated.
If you're in Melbourne, Carlton, Collingwood, Northcote, Fitzroy areas and you'd like to book in for acupuncture or Chinese Medicine, or a phone consultation, just get in touch.
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