Healthy Pregnancy

A simple analogy – FSH is the flame. The uterus is the oven. LH is the opening of the flu. The ovaries are the wood; Estradiol measures the available wood for burning, inhibin B could be seen as the damper that keeps the fire from burning out of control, and AMH could be seen as the lighter fluid. If we are trying to ignite the spark of life and keep it going, we need to ensure all of our provisions are adequate. Assisted reproductive technology gives you one tool – more fire. However, if we need a drier oven, if we need to gather more wood, soak it in more fluid, or reduce the wind that is keeping the spark from igniting, more fire is not the only answer. In fact, sometimes more fire actually keeps the materials from being able to burn on their own. A flame-thrower is not the best way to tender the gently burning fire of life. Some ways you can improve your capacity on your own:

Reduce stress   Perform reproductive and femoral massage

Take anti-oxidants  Eat organic, natural fruits and vegetables

Get adequate rest  Practice internal deep breathing techniques

Energy Balancing  Keep yourself in supportive environments

Acupuncture   Herbal therapy

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.

Within the last ten to 15 years, reproductive medicine has made quite a fuss made over high FSH levels. Chinese medicine doesn’t focus so much on the unqualified meaning of laboratory values like Western medicine does; we view lab results energetically according to what is behind them, rather than providing meaning to the absolute numerical value.

The body energetically views the ovaries as “essence”, an elemental potential, like the primordial follicles within them. Follicles are only potential until they begin to interact with their internal environment, which is responding to cues coming from our interpretation of our external environment. All of this is subject to change, when we change our internal environment, and our response to our external environment. FSH, on the other hand, is viewed as “heat”, which activates the potential of the ovaries’ essence in the form of eggs, and resulting blood levels of estradiol (or yin). When the essence is adequate, it doesn’t require much heat to ignite the ovaries. When the essence is weak (due to stress, lack of restoration, follicular malnourishment, and the demands of life), it takes more heat to induce the necessary ovarian response, indicative of present ovarian health.

To put it simply and in energetic terms, those who have high FSH and low estradiol levels generally have too much heat, in relation to the underlying essence capable of responding to FSH stimulation. Although optimal FSH values are seen as <10, The Fertile Soul Retreat process has helped women whose FSH values are well over 100 conceive naturally. First, however, we have had to energetically reduce their heat, and maximize their essence, which allows the FSH to activate healthy follicles.

Although Western medicine views the reproductive system as an ever-deteriorating disease process waiting for intervention, Chinese medicine employs a different lens. We view the body/mind/spirit as an ever adaptive system, which, when given appropriate environmental cues, has a miraculous ability to manifest its highest potential.

To hear a personal experience of someone who lowered their FSH naturally please watch the following video.

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.

As if high FSH values, and low estradiol/inhibin-b levels weren’t enough to convince you of your need for drastic intervention and donor eggs, the newest craze in ovarian reserve testing is a hormone known as Anti-Mullerian Hormone or AMH.

Again, some reproductive physiology will be helpful to make sense of this hormone.

During embryonic development, male testes produce AMH, to inhibit the expression of Mullerian ducts, which become female sexual organs. In the presence of AMH, the primordial urogenital ridge bears Wolfian expressions of prostate, testes and vas deferens, rather than the female Mullerian expressions of fallopian tubes, uterus and vagina. We could look at Anti-Mullerian Hormone as a “holding back” hormone. After birth, AMH becomes expressed by females, within the granulosa cells of the ovary, where it inhibits the responsiveness of growing follicles to FSH. Since human beings aren’t made to raise litters, the body’s internal wisdom does not allow the recruitment of all of the primordial follicles, as only one dominant follicle is chosen for ovulation during each menstrual cycle. If FSH is viewed has heat, and estradiol is viewed as yin, AMH is viewed as the “essence potential”, or the ability to hold back the ovarian essence from interacting with the pituitary gland’s igniting fire. The greater the body’s ability to hold back ovarian essence, the easier it is for the FSH igniting potential to activate a response in the form of a healthy egg and its resulting estradiol levels. Therefore, higher AMH values are indicative of a greater abundance of interactive follicles. The “normal” values of AMH are between 0-6 ug/L. The closer you are to 6, the greater the force behind the dam. Once again, The Fertile Soul Retreat Process has helped women whose AMH values were zero conceive naturally.

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.

Markers of Ovarian Reserve Viewed Through the Lens of Chinese Medicine

Estradiol   FSH – Follicle Stimulating Hormone

Inhibin B   AMH – Antimullerian Hormone

“Ovarian reserve” testing can be intimidating and daunting. The results often feel like a fertility death sentence. When viewed through the eyes of Chinese medicine, however, these laboratory markers of ovarian potential can actually make diagnostic sense, and help determine the best natural therapeutic course for you.

It will be helpful to understand a little reproductive physiology first.

Brain Hormones:

The pituitary gland, which sits behind your eyebrows, emits FSH (follicle stimulating hormone) in response to messages translated by the hypothalamus, which secretes Gonadotropic releasing hormone (GnRH) in response to the hormone levels in your blood, and your emotional response to your environment. This hormonal command post, like all of the hormones in your body, responds to internal chemical messages conveyed through the blood, and emotional interpretations of your external environment.

These external and internal messages determine how the pituitary hormones interact with and are able to communicate with your ovaries, and how the ovarian output communicates back to the hypothalamus and pituitary gland.

Ovarian Hormones:

Activin and Inhibin B are protein complexes within the ovarian follicule. Activin enhances FSH secretion, cellular proliferation and plays a role in menstrual regulation. Inhibin B, on the other hand, down regulates and inhibits GnRH from the hypothalamus, and FSH secretion from the pituitary gland.

When the system is in sync, the hypothalamus secretes GnRH to trigger the pituitary gland to release small amounts of FSH during the last few days of the previous menstrual cycle, which rise until the beginning of the next follicular phase. FSH recruits Graafian (or antral) follicles, which have been growing within the ovary for the better part of a year.  Around three months before these follicles are ovulated, they enter the tonic growth phase, where protein synthesis occurs.  Follicles that have interacted optimally with the internal environment have the potential to become dominant follicles, primed by FSH. They then secrete estrogen, and express LH receptors, which allow the chosen dominant follicle to mature and become capable of ovulation.

Higher levels of Inhibin B indicate that the ovarian follicle is doing its job of putting out adequate estradiol. Inhibin B provides negative feedback to the hypothalamus and pituitary gland to let them know to turn down the GnRH and FSH, as output is sufficient.

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.

While having dinner with my friend Tiffany the other night, discussing our Cooking for Fertility DVD, I mentioned I was working on an article about the connection between heartfelt happiness and health. She shared with me that in ancient cultures, before shaman would perform healings they would ask their patient to list ten things that they were grateful for. They believed that this simple act of expressing gratitude was oftenenough intervention to cure what ailed their patients.

Research is confirming this may just be true. A Canadian study revealed that looking for the silver lining throughout life and adopting a positive attitude may lower the risk of heart attacks and Angina. Furthermore, perhaps we can shift our experience of sorrow to joy simply by including pleasurable activities in our lives.

Pleasurable thoughts and experiences change our physiology by flooding the body with feel good chemicals like serotonin and beta-endorphins. Alongside hormones, a chemical called nitric oxide is also released, most commonly in the experience of orgasm. Nitric oxide relaxes the blood vessels inducing the relaxation response, which supports the parasympathetic nervous system and combats stress.

Dr. Deborah Kern, a health scientist who specializes in the impacts of pleasure conducted a study where women were enrolled in a Pleasure Diet and encouraged to seek pleasure on a daily basis through all five senses. Kern looked at 22 areas of life satisfaction and noted significant increases in life happiness in all areas.

Lifestyle and nutrition tips to support heart health and happiness:

Meditate on gratitude: Focus on an image that brings you joy and you will begin to resonate with a higher vibration. The Institude of Heartmath uses technology to measure this shift from dissonance (stress) to resonance (pleasure) using technology.

Keep a gratitude list: as shaman healers have long recognizing what you are grateful for can immediately shift your state of mind. Consider keeping a list beside your bed.

Explore your five senses: pay attention to the sensations of pleasure you experience when you taste, touch, smell, see and hear. Notice how different images and feelings impact your state of happiness.

Heart Healthy Foods: in Chinese medicine red colored foods positively impact the heart: beets, tomatoes, red peppers, raspberries and adzuki beans. The following foods also help to build the blood: apricot, beef, beetroot, blackberries, bone marrow, eggs, cuttlefish, dark leafy greens, date, dandelion, fig, grape, kidney bean, liver, hormone-free meat and liver, microalgae, nettle, octopus, oyster, parsley, sardine, spinach, spirulina, sweet rice, and watercress.

Supplements for Heart (Cardiovascular) Health: OPC, Proflavonol 90, CoQuinone 30, Biomega (fish oil)

Exercise: Daily exercise floods the body with fresh oxygen and blood supply. Find activities you love and incorporate them into your routine. Whether you are exercising for pregnancy or for fertility, pleasure is a key component to keep you on track.

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.

Healthy fats are the cornerstones of a balanced diet.  In fact, your hormones are stored in your fat and there is evidence that shows having either too much or too little may just impact your fertility.  Women who do not eat enough healthy fat sources often lack the necessary body fat to sustain a regular cycle and sometimes lose their periods completely.

It’s also important to recognize that all fats are not created equally.  Avoiding unhealthy fats was shown to protect fertility in the Harvard Medical Nurses Study that concluded the equivalent amount of trans fats “in two tablespoons of stick margarine, one medium order of fast-food French fries, or one doughnut” could negatively impacts one’s reproductive function.  Once you become pregnant, healthy fats are essential to your baby’s development in utero.   To get healthy fats in your diet each day include the following:

Cooking oils:

Organic, unrefined oils for cooking: extra virgin olive oil, sesame oil and high oleic sunflower oil.

Oils for drizzling:

Omega and GLA (Gamma Linolenic Acid) oils have countless health benefits. Drizzle the following oils on breakfast cereals and steamed vegetables: Usana-brand Optomega, flax oil, evening primrose oil, borage oil, black currant oil, pumpkin seed oil and chia seed oil.

Food sources:

Omega 3 fatty acids: salmon, sardines, mackerel, flax seeds, chia seed, walnuts, pumpkin seeds, and dark leafy greens.10

Monounsaturated fats: almonds, coconut, olives, walnuts, sunflower seeds and avocadoes.

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.

I recently re-read Walter Makichen’s book Spirit Babies which is offers an insightful metaphysical viewpoint of conception. I first met Walter while working at a Fertile Soul Retreat. At the time, I didn’t know much about him except that he was a clairvoyant and I had not yet read his book. There were twenty or so woman attending from all over the world and I have to admit that I wondered how they would receive the concept of spirit babies, since many of them had never seen a psychic. After seeing Walter speak, each of these woman was so moved by his description of working with spirit babies that almost all of them signed up for an individual consultation with him.

Walter’s belief is that many parents have been with their babies in past lives and that often there are lessons left to work through together. When working with infertility patients, he has noticed that there is often a blockage in physical circumstances or energetic vibration preventing the soul from entering the body. In his individual sessions, Makichen is able to speak to the spirit baby and offer insight to the parents about the needs or fears that are preventing conception. He often sees the spirit baby surrounded by an oval of light that corresponds with the chakra system, revealing which emotions need to be addressed to invite the baby in to what he calls the conception chalice:

“When couples with a conscious or unconscious desire to have a child make love, their kundalini energies flow up their spine and out the top of their heads. Their individual energies intertwine, forming a column. At the top the two energies merge into the shape of a bowl. The whole form resembles a large gold and orange goblet or chalice. This gold and orange bowl, which I call the “conception cradle,” floats above the top of the prospective mother’s head. The conception cradle calls and welcomes the spirit baby, drawing the spirit into the conception contract.” (page 186-187)

Spirit Babies offers practical solutions to teach prospective parents to speak with the spirit of their unborn child through meditation and breathwork. Walter also helps women and men to work through issues of past miscarriage, abortions and trauma through grief and self-forgiveness exercises. The key that he re-iterates throughout the book is to continuously return to nature to re-attune your system with the earth. Walter believes that spirit babies may be with their parents for many years before entering the body, often presenting themselves in the form of butterflies and hummingbirds.

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.

An estimated 1 in 5 pregnancies end in miscarriage, defined as the loss of pregnancy prior to 20 weeks. Whether expected or unexpected the loss of pregnancy can be an absolutely devastating experience for a woman. Though everyone reacts differently, there is often a deep wondering of what could have caused such a thing to happen. Was it something I did? Will I be able to get pregnant again and carry a baby until full term? Fear, anxiety and deep sadness coupled with hormonal mood swings can leave you feeling low. It is most important to surround yourself with a good support group who can help you to get through this difficult time.

In a culture that doesn’t have the reverence for the experience of loss that other cultures do, it is important to allow yourself to process the many emotions you may be experiencing. In Tears of Blood: Understanding and Creatively Intervening in the Grief of Miscarriage, the authors explain the experience of miscarriage as “a meaningful loss worth of acknowledgment and support, yet many woman do not perceive their miscarriage loss experience as validated and acknowledged.”* For many of these women the process of sharing their story of loss with a loved one or a healthcare practitioner can open the path to healing.

Mayan Abdominal Massage can be helpful for accessing the emotions and trauma stored in belly after a miscarriage. This form of massage also helps to restore hormonal balance and gently prepare the reproductive organs for a healthy pregnancy.

Minerals from seaweeds flood the body with healthy minerals and nourish the deepest reserves of the body impacted by miscarriage. Adding cut up seaweeds like kombu and wakame to foods slowly simmered in water (soups, stews and grains) is a great way to get the benefits without impacting your taste buds.

Foot soaks and relaxing baths help to ground and gently detoxify the body. Taking time to interiorize and relax deeply is important for replenishing your vital energy. Simply add a cup of sea salts of epsom salts to warm water, light a candle and drop into your home spa experience.

Working with a counsellor can allow you to express feelings that may feel uncomfortable to release in your daily life. A good therapist can be objective and guide you through the experience of grief. If you find yourself struggling to release painful memories consider an EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) session that works with memory patterns to release the trauma stored in your body.

Creative outlets couple with downtime are helpful ways to let the mind wander and release tension. Spend time sourcing pleasurable moments to doodle, draw or simply be inspired by the nature that surrounds you. It is a fallacy that we need to immediately dive back into the rat race. Be sure to take the time you need.

The good news is that most women will go on to have a healthy pregnancy. Even in the case of recurrent miscarriage, technology has made advances that allow women previously deemed infertile the ability to conceive. With the guidance of your doctors, allow yourself the time to grieve your loss and heal your body in preparation for a healthy pregnancy.

*Douglas, K.I., & Fox, J.R. (2009). Tears of Blood: Understanding and Creatively Intervening in the Grief of Miscarriage. In G.R. WAlz, J.C.Bleuer, & R. K. Yeps (Eds.), Compelling counselling interventions: VISTAS 2009 (p.91) Alexandria, VA: American Counseling Association.

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.

It is well known that increased stress levels over time can contribute to a host of illnesses by lowering immune function, increasing blood pressure, disturbing healthy digestive patterns. Since stress creates imbalances of hormones in your body, it also has a strong impact on your fertility and can lead to menstrual cycle irregularity, ovulation malfunction, implantation issues and lowered tubal function.

From a physiological perspective, increased levels of stress hormones are released by the nervous system and hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis sending the body into “survival mode”. As seen in nature, animals do not reproduce when they are in danger. Our body’s react in much the same way to less primal perceived threats in our environment. Some of the warning signs of stress are: memory problems, inability to concentrate, depression, feelings of isolation, chest pain, digestive disturbances, low libido, over or under-eating, changes in sleep patterns and substance abuse.

With busy schedules and constant deadlines, the opportunities to feel stressed may seem endless. Learning to manage stress in a different way by introducing specialized relaxation techniques may be the key to restoring hormonal balance and vitality. In the early 1970’s Dr. Herbert Benson, a Harvard cardiologist, introduced a technique called the relaxation responseto counteract the harmful effects of stress. He suggested that everyone practice a mindful meditation by sitting quietly, completely relaxing the body from the toes to the top of the head and breathing rhythmically for 20 minutes twice a day at least 2 hours from mealtime. The goal: when practiced over time the relaxation response can help to overrule the stress response.

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.

The holiday season reminds us to be grateful for the many blessings in our lives. But what many of us may not realize is that practicing gratitude as a ritual impacts our health, leading us to feel healthier and happier. Current research at the University of California Davis, has revealed that practicing gratitude elevates our inner happiness and contentment with life. I first heard about the gratitude concept from Oprah who wrote that she kept a journal and made a list of all she was grateful for each day. If you are looking to make major shifts in your wellbeing and joie de vivre this New Year, consider keeping a gratitude journal. Studies have revealed that:

1. Those who keep gratitude journal on a weekly basis exercise more often, experience less illness and feel more optimistic about the week to come and their lives as a whole (Emmons & McCullough, 2003).

2. Tracking gratitude is equated to meeting personal goals (personal, health and academic).

3. Guided gratitude meditations elicit positive thinking, while increasing alertness, attentiveness and energy.

4. People who practice gratitude are able to support others.

5. Those with neuromuscular disease improved their quality of life with increased feelings of connectedness, positive moods and improved sleep.

6. Children who grow up on gratitude feel more positive towards education and family. (Froh, Sefick, & Emmons, 2008)

Looking for additional ways to bring gratitude into your everyday life?

Practice giving back: the simple act of giving spreads gratitude. Consider ways you can give to experience how much you receive from the profound act of giving.

Say thank you: the two words are so simple and yet when spoken with sincerity they acknowledge the feeling of gratitude for a gift received by another.

Smile: a simple smile amongst strangers and friends can change the entire dynamic.

Say grace before meals: blessing your food is one of the most profound acts to imbue your food with gratitude to nourish your cells.

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.