Can nutrition and gut health help infertility?
I don’t know of anything that is not helped by better nutrition - especially with an individualized, Functional Nutrition approach.
Last summer, a lovely woman of age 37 started working with me. She was referred by another client of mine to give Functional Nutrition a try before going to expensive IVF treatments. In late July we had our first consult and she informed me that she was planning to begin the process towards IVF in October.
“Andrea” worked in a helping profession and had a busy career. She and her husband had tried for two years to become pregnant. Recently, she had received a diagnosis of PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome). This helped guide my protocol.
Luckily, Andrea already had a very clean diet (goals are always more quickly achieved when this is the case). Because part of PCOS is an overproduction of insulin and poor regulation of blood sugar levels, we changed her diet and eating habits to address this by increasing fiber, adding cinnamon (a natural insulin-sensitizer), replacing some high carb/simple sugar items, eliminating her non-stop snacking, and increasing her protein.
Also critical was balancing gut health, testing for food intolerances and eliminating certain foods based on the results, and adding a supplement that improves insulin sensitivity AND has been shown (by the New England Journal of Medicine) to cut free testosterone by more than half. (PCOS is also characterized by higher levels of androgens and testosterone). This supplement is a form of inositol called D-chiro-inositol. (For more info see Dr. Sara Gottfried’s work and the work of Dr. Felice Gersh).
Optimizing Andrea’s nutrition was important too, and we added B12 (she is a vegetarian and B12 is mostly found in animal products) and a prenatal vitamin/protein powder from Seeking Health.
In late September at our follow-up appointment Andrea had some happy news to share. (I told you a clean diet makes everything faster :)). She was pregnant!
Don’t underestimate the results possible with Functional Nutrition. Whatever your goals are, they can be aided by individualized nutrition.
This protocol took into account client’s history and health status - consult a health professional before writing your own protocol.