Healthy Pregnancy

The relaxation response is a key element on the fertility journey. Circle and Bloom has created a series of mind body programs with the intention of helping women to gain control of their health, by reducing cortisol levels and balancing the internal system. Their first programs help women to enhance their fertility through the effects of meditative relaxation and they plan to continue with more general topics like the energy for empowerment series.

As I write this blog, I have just completed my second session of Circle + Bloom’s Energy for Empowerment guided visualization. Calm and more centered, I am convinced that guided meditations are not only a wonderful way to start the day but a key to creating a healthy mind body connection in everyday life.

Research shows that our bodies cannot tell the difference between what we are visualizing and what we are actually experiencing. The implications of these findings are incredible, implying that we can actually retrain our bodies to the perfect state of health by working with mind body meditations that deliver positive messages and relaxation.

If you are looking to enhance fertility consider the following Circle + Bloom meditations:

Natural Cycle: 28 days of guided meditations that lead you through each day and happening of a fertile month.

IVF and IUI: helps to prepare your body for a medicated cycle

Even though I love to eat salad, I’m always feeling like I could use more greens in my diet. Greens are, in fact, way easier for us digest when we chew extremely well (which Paul Pitchford told me is at least 30 chews per bite) or in my new favorite form: the green smoothie. My doctor was kind enough to share the work of a local Ashland Oregon author Victoria Boutenko who wrote Green Smoothie Revolution. This book has really changed the way I eat. Victoria herself is mostly a raw foodist, which is something I am not. I believe that lightly cooked foods can be a lot easier to digest and it’s generally what I recommend to my fertility clients. That said, the Green Smoothie Revolution has bridged the two worlds of raw and cooked foods for me. By using a powerful vitamix or comparable blender, the green are liquefied making them highly digestible and I would argue absolutely delicious.

Beyond being a fabulous source of chlorophyll, a lot of the research in the green smoothie revolution is based on the fact that human beings are most compartable to chimapnazees. In fact we share about 99% in dna structure. While we do a lot of testing on these animals about various human conditions, not enough consideration has been given to their diet and what makes them healthy. What Victoria concluded is that it is there above average intake of greens. Also the way they break down the cellular wall structure to access the nutrients present in the cellular walls. With this level of nutrition, hydrochloric acid is increased in the gut which contributes to many healthy benefits including: improved digestion, increase in dietary fiber, increase in chlorophyll rich blood building properties, decrease in inflammation, gentle detoxification and more energy. I would highly recommend reading Victoria’s book to hear about all the incredible benefits derived from drinking one quart of green smoothie per day.

Every day I fill the blender with variations of the following ingredients:

2 cups filtered water
a bunch of kale
a bunch of spinach
½ a peach
½ a banana
a handful of blueberries

Kathryn Flynn is the author of Cooking for Fertility: Foods to Nourish Your Fertile Soul. Kathryn supports men and women worldwide in achieving a healthy pregnancy through nutrition and lifestyle changes in her individual fertility nutrition consultations. For additional information, please feel free to email Kathryn.

Below are the video instructions for making the delicious chlorophyll salad recipe from the Cooking for Fertility DVD.  For written instructions please click here.

Recently, a number of nutrition clients have been reporting that they have the MTHFR gene.  MTHFR (methylenetetrahydrofoloate reductase) is an enzyme/ protein that is used to activate folic acid, a crucial B vitamin for pregnancy.  In certain cases, the MTHFR gene does not activate the folic acid to it’s full capacity: heterozygous MTHFR carriers activate folate at 60-70%; homozygous carriers only activate folate at 10%.  When testing for MTHFR, doctors use a blood test to look for two genes: MTHFR C677T and MTHFR A1298C.  It is a fact that MTHFR is quite common (present in as much as 30% of the population) and by simply adding additional methylfolate a number of medical conditions including infertility and pregnancy can be supported.  Additional folic acid in cases of MTHFR can help:

• reduce miscarriage frequency
• avoid neural tube defects
• treat depression and anxiety
• heal ADD and autism
• reduce dementia
• support uric acid metabolism and resolve gout
• facilitate detoxification
• lower homocysteine levels
• encourage DNA repair which decreases cancer risk

Folic acid consumption is particularly important in fertility and pregnancy to maintain a healthy pregnancy and prevent birth defects.  If a blood test reveals that you have MTHFR, your doctor may suggest taking a higher dose of  folic acid in a methylated form that helps bypass the enzyme.  It’s important to include the other B vitamins (B6 and B12)  in your regimen as well as eating a diet rich in folate.

Folate rich foods include:  beans and lentils, peas (black-eyed peas, chickpeas, green peas), juices (orange, tomato, grapefruit, pineapple), fruits (oranges, cantaloupe, honeydew melon, avocado, papaya, raspberries), soymilk, vegetables (green leafy vegetables such as spinach, lettuce, turnip greens, mustard greens, collard greens, and Chinese cabbage; broccoli; Brussels sprouts; asparagus; artichokes; okra; corn; cauliflower; potato; beets; green onions; sweet red peppers), nuts and sunflower seeds.  If you are folic acid deficient, avoid green tea which can limit the absorption of folate.

Source:

Delgado Family Care

Stone Medical Center

Kathryn Flynn is the author of Cooking for Fertility: Foods to Nourish Your Fertile Soul. Kathryn supports men and women worldwide in achieving a healthy pregnancy through nutrition and lifestyle changes in her individual fertility nutrition consultations. For additional information, please feel free to email Kathryn.

Inflammation is believed to be one of the root causes of many imbalances in the body. The stress of inflammation is indicated as a contributing factor in several infertility diagnosis including PCOS, endometriosis, recurrent miscarriage, poor sperm and egg quality. So it makes perfect sense that when you are ready to get pregnant, this diet can help to resolve any inflammatory responses in the body that could be preventing conception or impacting your health during pregnancy.

Even before tackling the dietary principles, it is important to take a close look at how stress may be impacting your life. It has been long known that cortisol, a stress hormone, is a leading cause of inflammation in the body. Choose activities that provide peace and relaxation each day can help to heal conditions of inflammation. This can be anything from a foot soak, a massage or even a funny movie at the end of the day. Something that helps you to unwind. Also, choose exercises you enjoy that replenish you, while detoxifying and reducing stress. Swimming, walking, dancing, yoga and gardening are all low impact exercises that get your blood flowing. One recent study on the benefits of stress reducing yoga has shown that a regular practice may have the capacity to reduce inflammation in the body, measured by C-reactive protein (CRP).

Along with stress reduction and gentle exercises consider adopting these anti-inflammatory dietary tips:

Avoid sugars and artificial sweeteners- especially in soda and processed candy

Limit caffeine, coffee (prefer green tea and herbal teas), alcohol, red meat, burnt food

Eat an abundance of colorful fresh fruits and vegetables for the bioflavanoids- especially dark leafy greens.

Cook with anti-inflammatory herbs or sprinkle on food: ginger and turmeric.

Consume a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar in water each day

Limit nightshades

Enjoy herbal Teas like Yogi detox, licorice, chamomile

Eat Omegas at every opportunity. Favor Omega 3’s and reduce omega 6 oils (corn, soy, canola, safflower and sunflower oil)

Foods containing a high ratio of omega 3 oil: Menhaden, salmon, cod liver, cod, shrimp, tuna, pink salmon, king crab, Mackerel, flax, flaxseed (sprinkled on salads or oatmeal in the morning) hemp, hemp nuts, canola, walnut, & pumpkin, pumpkin seeds.

Kathryn Flynn is the author of Cooking for Fertility: Foods to Nourish Your Fertile Soul. Kathryn supports men and women worldwide in achieving a healthy pregnancy through nutrition and lifestyle changes in her individual fertility nutrition consultations. For additional information, please feel free to email Kathryn.

A mother asks, “I am returning back to work soon and my 3 month old baby girl will not take a bottle. What can I do?”

It’s really terrific that you have been exclusively breastfeeding your daughter! It can be challenging to transition back to the workplace, so it’s great that you are being thoughtful about helping your baby learn about another way to receive your milk. It is normal for a 3 month old baby to initially refuse a bottle. It is a foreign object to her. Remember, she doesn’t know what a bottle is! Even if she had been given a bottle every day since she was born, she may still refuse at about 3 months. This is the age when babies can start taking more control of their world!

My best advice to you is to take it slowly, make it fun, be creative, and give her control. Babies are naturally curious and use their mouths to explore. If she sees the bottle as just another play-thing, she will be more accepting. Try other liquids. Make it surprising, novel and interesting. Try water or very diluted apple juice when introducing a bottle. Or use breast milk—but very cold. Some babies will only take a bottle if they are distracted with TV, toys or going for a walk. Try making the bottle very UNlike the breast, and you may be more successful. Some babies never drink from a bottle but do very well with a cup, so be sure to give that a try.

Whichever method you and baby choose, patience will win over force. Good luck!

Written by Renee Beebe, M.Ed., IBCLC. Renee is a lactation consultant in private practice in Seattle, Washington. She is available for home/hospital visits and phone consultations. Renee can be reached at www.second9months.com

Pregnancy is a joyous time in a woman’s life, but it can also be confusing because there’s a lot of advice out there.  Many women want recommendations that support not only their own health and their baby’s, but also the environment.  Most people are prompted to start making healthy changes in their lives when they find out a baby is on the way.  However, it is best to begin before conception.

Here are the top healthy changes to make that will benefit themselves, their baby, and the environment:

• Eating fresh organic, seasonal foods can make a difference to women wanting to get pregnant, to the health of their babies and the environment.
• Investing in a Kangen water filter and cutting out buying plastic water bottles will make a difference too. (www.carolinakangenwater.com)
• Cutting out things like alcohol, caffeine, sugar and recreational drug use can make it easier to get pregnant.
• Taking a high quality prenatal multivitamin
• Supplementing with DHA.  Fish oils are great options but there are vegetarian options as well.
• DHA has been shown to help with the baby’s brain development.
• Doing a cleanse before pregnancy is a great way start this journey.
• Yoga and rest can help you have a healthy pregnancy and post-partum.

By Tiffany Jackson, ND (www.ecohealthwellness.com

The wisdom that what you eat is a direct reflection of your health is now widely accepted as science continues to prove that certain foods do in fact improve reproductive function. For years, clients have requested more delicious tasting fertility friendly recipes. From this desire emerged the idea for my cookbook: Cooking for Fertility: Foods to Nourish Your Fertile Soul and an instructional Cooking for Fertility DVD for those wanting to learn how to cook to conceive. Cooking for Fertility is a simple approach to nourishing reproductive function that combines modern science with the ancient wisdom of Traditional Chinese Medicine.

While enhancing your chances of conceiving, the bigger picture of living a fertile life is important including learning lifestyle, exercise and food choices that are fertility promoting. For those experiencing infertility, specific meal plans address common Western and Chinese Medicine imbalances with healing foods. By optimizing your digestion, you naturally absorb more nutrients and prepare yourself for a healthy pregnancy. Above all else, the key to eating for fertility is pleasure: over 100 delicious recipes included for your enjoyment including a healthy chocolate mousse, smoothies, salads and more!

We are endowed with a primordial pool of follicles during fetal development. At birth they measure near one million; by the time we enter menarche, they number about 500,000, and by the time we approach the perimenopausal years we have around ten thousand. These primordial follicles do not undergo any change or deterioration until they begin to circulate within the ovaries’ response to its internal environment, which is an inner result of how we relate to our external environment.

The hypothalamus interprets our emotional response to our environment (via neurochemicals), and translates it into hormonal messages in the form of GnRH or Gonadotropin Inhibitory Hormone. These chemicals then trigger the appropriate response from the pituitary gland, whose hormones signal the gonads to release their germ cells and hormones. The resulting blood laboratory values are a manifestation, not a cause. These circulating hormone levels feed back to the hypothalamus, along with our emotional response, to regulate its ongoing release of brain hormones. Because of this adaptive feedback system, supplying external hormones will not improve the function of the ovaries; only suppress their release. In order to improve the functioning of any part of this system, the entire system must be addressed.

Tiny follicles leave their primordial pool (again, not changed since before birth), and enter into the growing pool of follicles, where the dominant follicles are activated by FSH fire from the pituitary gland. The number of circulating follicles depends upon many factors – blood flow to the ovaries (which can be enhanced), nutritional and hormonal fuel to the ovaries (which can be enhanced), our emotional response to our environment (which can be enhanced), our ability to restore and access the follicles to allow them to enter into a healthy internal environment (which can be enhanced.) The number of follicles in the growing pool determines the levels of AMH. Only the chosen dominant follicle will mature in response to the pituitary gland’s release of luteinizing hormone during ovulation. LH can be viewed as the energetic trigger, causing the entire cascade to produce the potential for release, fertilization, implantation and continued growth.

An early antral follicle releases estradiol in the form of yin. If the endocrine system provides messages that this system is conducive to new life, the ovaries perceive a great internal potential to produce more follicles. They will respond with more yin, access more essence, and the entire cascade will dance into full expression. AMH values will rise. FSH values will tend to lower, as very little flame is necessary to keep the fire going. More follicles will produce greater levels of inhibin B. The body will select a dominant follicle; LH will mature its residing egg, and allow the release of a healthy potential.

The Fertile Soul Method ® is proven to maximize your reproductive potential. Most of our patients are 40 or over; most have high FSH, low AMH, other hormonal abnormalities, or have been diagnosed with poor ovarian reserve, poor egg quality, endometriosis, or recurrent miscarriages. Most have not found their answers solely within Western reproductive medicine. Most have been able to rectify their internal energetic imbalances through our program, and produce new life.

Dr. Randine Lewis is the founder of The Fertile Soul, the president of the Continuing Excellence in Fertility Professionals, the author of The Infertility Cure, and The Way of the Fertile Soul. Find out more about Dr. Lewis’ retreats at www.thefertilesoul.com.