What about increasing fertility naturally?

Medical practitioners have very little training in nutrition and most have no idea of supplements or herbal products. You need to go to someone whose job it is to enhance normal – and a specialist obstetrician has NOT had the sensible veterinary training – to know babies are made from great raw ingredients.

Taking folic acid by itself mans all the other B’s in the body are unbalanced.
Folic acid is found in FOLIAGE – meaning you need to eat more veggies.
Found in eggs and whole food – eat better and no need to take any vitamins.

Research this yourself – taking a dedicated highly advertised pregnancy multivitamin is only helping the drug company who made it – as it is a very average and not inclusive superior product – any one from a health food shop will be cheaper and better. Check the ingredient list yourself.

What are you Making a Potential Baby from?

To not even ask about what you eat  – what you are making the sperm and eggs with is a very bad start.
No farmer would be that irresponsible – their livelihoods depends on quality offspring.
If this sounds too confronting of your belief systems, perhaps skip me and try someone who is happy to take your money, promising the earth . . or at least success.

You are the creators of your life.
I provide hopefully food for thought – so you go off and work out the meaning of what you do for your life.

We as helpers/facilitators/service providers do not make the life changes that will make the difference you seek.
You have to do it yourself.
To get a different result – you have to change what you are doing.

Usually it is HIM (intended father) that needs to start getting involved.
This not women’s business.
It can massively affect your relationship throughout all of the rest of your lives together.

Change is very easy – and most naturopaths and natural therapists expect conception to happen as a consequence of more attention being paid to what is eaten and lifestyle changes.

It can be easily seen using nutritional markers that most ‘infertility’ is just a matter of both potential parents becoming more healthy.

Medicine and reproductive specialists do not even ask about diet – let alone see that the common ‘preconception’ supplement from the chemist is  a very poor second to any good multi purpose multivitamin.

Mother Nature is probably saying – ‘not yet!’

Not – ‘not at all!’

Look to what you are thinking you are making a great baby from.

Whilst the medical specialists may be very adept at making embryos – they are not so good at predicting why pregnancy does, or does not happen.

Using science and studying nutrition would have you understanding such matters as sperm defragmenatation – the usual reason the ‘OK’ or ‘good enough’ sperm (at the newly identified apparently fertile range of 4 or 5 % normal) – it is not making babies.

This is a very poor pass mark.  How to get the sperm more active?

Maybe take a large hit of Vit D3 and then some every day – just get in the sun and on the whole body daily.  Vit D3 definitely improves sperm motility.

Does it actually work?

Most natural therapists are very capable of assisting the body to return to well functioning – IF the person seeking help is prepared to actually alter what they have previously been doing. By changing what has created the current pattern of troubles – through often simple life and eating adjustments, major changes on body wellness and thus fertility can occur.

 The difference between standard and natural medicine is in the focus – the more traditional culture’s medical practices HAD to work with nature, and all rely on the body healing itself. The focus thus is on wellness. Western medicine has evolved through the study of death prevention and disease organisms, outside our innate inner healing mechanisms. This has resulted in a tradition of intervention that attacks the apparent problem, rather than strengthening the body to do whatever is needed.

This means that for many things – and fertility is one of these, there are holes in the framework. Hence, if a doctor/book/website says that here is nothing, past IVF techniques possible to help you get pregnant, this is coming from the only view they see – the disease focus model, rather than help the body heal the itself one. Nature needs us all to reproduce. If this is not happening, there is a sound reason, and this requires correcting, rather than just trying to make conception happen

Even if pregnancy does not result from visiting a natural therapist, at least the QUALITY of the sperm and egg, and the ‘garden’ it is to grow within, if you BOTH adhere to the changes suggested, will be vastly enhanced, leading to a far more likely pregnancy once IVF is then attempted.

Give time to allow the body to repair – hopefully at least SIX months being taken out of the baby-making schedule to get dad in order (miscarriages are often attributable to poor starts – and often the sperm should not have been anywhere near the perfect egg) . It is often that mum’s perfect body that may be ejecting a defective being (sperm less than perfect)– and common lifestyle changes including eating well may be all that is required to correct this.

What does eating well mean?

Whether you are trying to get pregnant/thinner or over cancer, this article on nutrition can point you in the general direction of health.

How much is it going to cost?

An often asked question– the answer of course – is like how long is a piece of string . . . . .

But “How much is it costing not getting pregnant?”

What price is the constant hassle and the dashed hopes?

And – if you are considering IVF – how much do you value your relationship with your body, your partner and yourself?

Is this being factored in, and do you see the point in trying to be as well as possible first? How much will possibly be spent on the assisted reproductive techniques, how much will this cost your relationship and your sexual intimacy and will you be assured a baby at the end of all of this?

How long is it going to take?

I have found in practice that the quicker a result happens, the better.

Usually by the time a person/couple consults me they have had enough and want a baby NOW.

This is sometimes not practical as nature is refusing to co operate for very good reasons.

Nature Intends Us to be Parents.

If unprotected sex is regularly happening and pregnancy is not, there is a good reason – and looking to this, rather than side stepping the wisdom of the body, is the aim of all natural therapists in the fertility area.
Most people tend to not think past the actual getting pregnant – as if the rest just naturally follows.

If however, a quick pregnancy did not naturally follow unprotected sex easily, how is this supposed to occur?

The medical model/IVF regime just aims for pregnancy, NOT the correction of bodily imbalances.

Why should this be an issue?
Because becoming pregnant, staying pregnant, being well and happy throughout the pregnancy, birthing easily, being a happy mum with a well, happy baby, within a happy bonded family unit is what we all want.

Being as well as possible BEFORE pregnancy helps ensure that staying pregnant with a very healthy baby resulting in a well happy pregnancy, birth and mum and family unit is more likely to ensure this.

Statistics

I am often asked what my statistics are like.

Recently, someone said she was thinking of trying IVF as she felt that she was running out of time . . . and wanted to know about my ‘success rate’.

A look on my face, as I wondered how to answer this prompted her to say – “I suppose it depends on what we do with what you tell us we have to do . . .”

The dangling question – is “How many people coming to see you walk away with a baby?”
The answer is many. . . . .

Many questions –

1. How many people actually come as a couple
2. How many are COMMITTED to actually following the advice they are paying for?
3. How many think it easier to do the bits that suit them, thinking that IVF is an apparent safety net . . Also –
4. How many actually REALLY want to be parents, as opposed to wanting to follow the life script – In a stable relationship, settled down, have house, been overseas, this is the next step . . . .
5. How many are willing to WAIT till they are both in very good health, so their offspring has the best potential possible?

If a couple commit to doing whatever it takes to become parents naturally – these statistics are excellent. If one of them really wants a baby, but one or neither is really prepared to put the work in, it is a patchy business.

Who gets pregnant?

The easiest are those who BOTH attend clinic and follow through with all advice – regardless of ‘reasons’ for not conceiving. If she has supposedly a bit of a problem, he needs to be 150% fertile, not just ‘average’. They are not getting pregnant. Regardless of the reasons, and how long it has taken, and how many other specialists and therapists they have trialed . . ..

Before IVF, I found that even people with blocked tubes could become pregnant, as the herbal and natural lines do work; it is just slow – and thorough.

Unexplained infertility

I have found the easiest people to become pregnant are those who have ‘unexplained infertility” – both seem physically to be fertile, but as a couple they are still not parents.

There are a variety of common issues here.

Male Factors

Sperm Tests

Too many men seem to think that it is in someway demeaning to find out if THEIR sperm are useful, so they find all excuses possible to not find the time to take the test. It is not as if it hurts . . . . Waiting for yet another month to go by to see if she is pregnant is not an active participation in the parenting plan.

Through no fault of their own, men today are less fertile than their fathers. We are living in an increasingly toxic environment. This is affecting all forms of life on the planet, and can be researched easily by Goggling any site – “Environmental Causes of Fertility” is a good start.

Enhancing Male Fertility

Modern medicine in its current form is unable to enhance male fertility directly, unless there is something that can be surgically adjusted.

The only direct help they can be is to take a sample wash and centrifuge, and either artificially insert, or by taking this to another stage, help by actually puncturing your partner’s egg.

All of this is outside the body, requiring skill and money to accomplish.

Looking to why nature is unwilling to allow pregnancy first is the sensible route to ensure a stunning baby. SHE may be either not getting pregnant, or keeps miscarrying, because the sperm are just not good enough.

Blocks to Fertility

Besides the obvious physical blocks [past vasectomy and subsequent reversal/ varicosele – (up to 20% of men have this):

• blocked tubes and
• wearing close pants
• sitting for long periods especially in a vehicle
• riding a bike
• using a mobile phone a lot
• being close to wireless and computer monitors to overheat the testes,

there are diverse and insidious ways of cooking/deactivating /damaging your sperm, hence chances of well pregnancy.

Sperm respond well to you living better.

Supposedly it takes three or four months for sperm to go through their life cycle before being found in what is actually ejaculated.

In clinical practice, I have found that the more interventions that happen, (dietary and lifestyle changes, supplements taken, Chinese herbs ingested, acupuncture treatments given, often close together to increase body wellness allowing perfect digestion and circulation), the faster this change occurs – either in pregnancy or in test results changing for the better.

Common Changes to Lifestyle

Many authors have done a great job in setting this out – Francesca Naish and Janelle Roberts have done so in “Better Babies”. Searching Google on the subjects of “environmental effects on fertility/breast milk/fetal growth” etc, “toxic sperm”, “male infertility”, “effects of smoking/alcohol /caffeine/marijuana on sperm” will all provide interesting reading, further leads and strengthen the idea that there is some work to be done before embarking on any baby that slips in.

“Hormonal disruption”/ “environmental contamination and fertility” and the resultant generalized feminization of all beings on the planet can be explored just as easily.

This all adds up to everyone having significant alterations to their fertility, just by being here, before we start looking at what YOU have actually chosen to do with yourself.

Why bother changing your lifestyle?

Getting pregnant should not actually be your real focus.

Having a low maintenance, happy healthy kid is what you expect will happen once she is pregnant – but like growing a garden, or breeding animals – what you start with is what you can only work with later.

The rates of autism spectrum disorder/ADHD/behavioral difficulties/chronic ill health are rising and generally difficult children are made BEFORE pregnancy through the results of our hoping for the best and possible lack of mindfulness.

By cleaning up your habits, you will feel more vibrant.

By doing all this for yourself first – to feel more alive – for your as yet unmade children second and for your future together as happy parents of healthy children, you are creating the life you wish for. This is in no way doing it because she nags you.

Think about it – if a less than perfect baby results from her putting in all the work, and she carries your lack of commitment, an effort, who will carry the results?

The kid – for the rest of its life. Becoming conscious and responsible is not the message of IVF – you may choose it as it offers possible results for no effort past the financial.

It is assumed in using natural medicine that we, the providers, can not make these life choices for you – it requires effort, diligence, and perseverance on your part.

The rewards are immense.

What to work with

1 – Previous infections.

Whether using Chinese, Ayurvedic or Western herbs, there are whole systems of medicine that work to return the body to its potential. These medical traditions usually are slow to turn the body around, met with patience and persistence, can do an overall cleanup, spruce up and repair job that is not possible by attending a more orthodox doctor.

Often the loose behaviour of our teens comes back when we are more settled, to haunt us.

Someone part of the statistics reflected in the rates of sexually transmitted diseases. There may have been few symptoms for a woman to leads her to suspect that she has been infected with something like Chlamydia, but it leaves often the tubes blocked and scarred. She may well be harboring something that long ago blocked her up.

Equally, there may be consequences in your body from the effects of living fast and loose some time ago.

Men would tend to notice a discharge at the time, and whatever was infecting him is usually treated as it is more obvious. Most have heard about getting mumps; and in adolescence, adulthood, any localized lymphatic infection may compromise the future fertility, UNLESS corrected.

A good cleanout years later is often called for – from a Chinese medical viewpoint, the “damp’ and “heat” need resolving. These can show as a tendency to discharges, smells, herpes or other recurrent infections to emerge, rashes, itches, obstruction in flow and often feeling alterations.

Here is where the natural forms of intervention become very useful. There is no active ‘problem’ just a reduction of perfect, which often reflects in sperm quality and quantity declines.

2 – Current habits.

Not eating nutritriously and regularly – either because of time/work commitments or for whatever perfect reason, is not going to fuel our body sufficiently to make stunning sperm. Regular (preferably every three hours) injections of protein and good fat are needed to quickly build up healthy sperm.

Nutrition – see this page

Stopping all these activities may seem too hard. So is not getting pregnant, helping her through yet another miscarriage/IVF failure, parenting an ill or damaged child for the rest of your life.

Smoking – any substance or inhaling anything (firemen/industrial chemical etc) will greatly reduce you chances of getting her pregnant. Taking frequent small doses of Vitamin C is crucial if you have to keep doing whatever you are, as sperm tend to clump together and not bother with the swimming thing when you smoke – Google “sperm agglutination”. Marijuana is particularly damaging and over very long time frames – so even if you have stopped now – please look to the supplements section. Also Google “effects of marijuana on male fertility”.

Alcohol – again, this is not difficult to Google. Often drinking takes the place of nourishing food (see Heather’s eating plan). Examining why the alcohol is even necessary is very beneficial, as when baby arrives there is a lot that will come up both for you personally and as a couple if quality time and self examination and inner growth have been absent so far.

Starting to get in touch with groups of men who are exploring their inner tapes – especially if you had issues with your own father – would be a great way to assist the dad you are to become. It will also bring up what lies underneath the need to drink/take substances to ‘calm down’/help you sleep/be an apparently better person.

Caffeine – there are reports that even THREE cups of coffee daily can significantly increase HER risk of miscarrying. All these commonly ingested chemicals do have effects upon the very delicate sperm cells. It is really easier to practice safe baby making than hope for the best?

Other toxic substances – especially industrial/work related chemicals.

Our bodies soak up all environmental contaminants, and store them usually in the fat cells. The sperm cells are very vulnerable.

If you are working with toxic substances, or have done so in the past, visiting with a good naturopath (who can help shift the resultant debris in your body) and an acupuncturist (to allow quick body wellness and repair) is a very good investment.

Please look to the Glutathione pages

Sperm defragmentation (due to oxidative stress – something not mentioned in IVF circles – and a major reason the embryos aren’t made/don’t survive)  and easily altered with a Glutathione accelerator MAX GLUTATHIONE.

As little as $20 a week can see you in a hugely different health space.

Allowing the body within each cell to throw out all toxins is the best health insurance you can ever take out.

The best preparation for the best baby you can hope to make.

Exercise/breathing/mobility/flexibility

Our bodies were designed to be active, not to sit around and be the carriers for an overactive brain. To have the whole body work at peak efficiency, being active physically is as important as cleaning up the intake of foods to fuel the system. Walking 10,000 steps daily is the baseline – not something to aim for on a good day.

Turning off ‘the box’ – whichever takes up your leisure – will allow you both more quality time – and stop the radiation that is not enhancing your sperm quality (see “modern lifestyle effects of fertility”, “mobile phone and fertility” and variants thereof).

Getting up out of the chair and starting to RELATE – go off for a brisk walk after the evening meal – a much better digestive option than slouching in front of a box watching others live their lives – get up and be active in your own.

Contact Heather to learn more how you can achieve an easy pregnancy and well and happy mother and baby afterwards.