5 Key Strategies To Elevate Your Fertility

Summit Introduction and Daily Crash Course 0:00

Hey, where are your co-hosts of the beyond infertility summit. Dr. Carrie and Dr. Aumatma. And we have an incredible lineup of speakers for you. In addition, Dr. Aumatma and I have created a mini crash course for, you know, every day you can expect a mini lecture from us covering foundational content, helping you gain context and insight before deep diving into the day's interviews. We hope that this will serve as a helpful context to get deeper understanding through the day's interviews. Hello and welcome back to the Beyond Infertility Summit.

I'm your host, Dr. Aumatma. And today we are talking about the top five research backed things to do to optimize your fertility. Let's get into it. I thought of this as like what are the low hanging fruit

Top Five Fertility Optimization Tips 0:58

or the things that you're going to do that are going to get the most return on your investment of time, energy, resources, all of the things and most of the things that I've selected here are relatively easy and inexpensive, and they're going to make a huge difference on your fertility journey. So if you are like well along on your journey, if you've been following me for a while, you maybe already have heard me talk about these things. But today we're going to talk about the key things that are going to get you the most biggest return on your investment.

Remove Toxins 1:33

So let's get into it and I'm going to go backwards. So number one is going to be at the end and you're going to have to wait to hear that one. So number five is get rid of toxins. You have heard this a million times, probably from a million different practitioners, but toxins are honestly the number one contributing factor of decline for declining fertility in men and women. We see it in men the most because there is lots of data that has shown that sperm counts have essentially went from what used to be an average of 120 million to an average of 20 million per ejaculate for men.

That's a huge decline in the last like 70 to 75 years. Similarly with women, we're seeing a similar decline. We also have lots and lots of research on which toxins are specifically impacting and influencing the decline of fertility from the aspect of egg quality, from the aspect of implantation failure. failed IVF cycles. Like there's so much data that's being amassed as far as what each and every toxin is doing. My mini course tomorrow is going to go over which toxins. But today I want you to just have the general concept get rid of the toxins.

Number four is going to be to eat a wholesome diet that's rich with antioxidants.

Eat Whole Foods and Antioxidant-Rich Produce 3:03

So we always talk about what all the things are to remove, what all the things are to take away. But a good starting point for most people is to eat whole food. That literally means if it came in a bag, a box or a can, maybe don't eat it, or at least don't eat it as much. These are the things that are going to get you results. And when you start eating whole food like you bought it from the bulk center, like the bulk section of the grocery store, or you bought it at a farmer's market, ideally you're going to get a higher quality of food than the stuff that's prepackaged, made easy and more convenient.

You're going to get more nutrients out of the things that are not prepackaged and pre processed. Do that. And then anti-oxidants. We think about antioxidants usually from fruits like berries are really high in antioxidants, but also things like avocados are actually really high in essential fatty acids that you need. There are lots and lots of vegetables that are really high in antioxidants and they're giving you minerals and cofactors to make the right hormones at the right times. So eating just a variety is a good starting point.

If you are already doing that or you're like, What else could I do about this? I would say a focus around more vegetables than fruit. So instead of the eight servings of fruits and vegetables, try to make it like 1 to 2 servings of fruit and 6 to 7 servings of vegetables. And when you're thinking about what vegetables, you're want to eat the rainbow. So eat all the different colors. Don't focus on just kale or just collard greens are just spinach. They all have different nutrients to offer. So just get a rainbow and that way you're covered.

All right. Number three on this list is to drink adequate amounts of pure water. Most people aren't getting enough water yet. Water is pretty essential to the transmission of hormones, the production of good cervical fluid and semen. So your partners also need to be drinking high quality, pure water. And what do you think happens to those eggs in your ovaries if they don't have enough fluid in the fluid filled sack that they live in? Well, they're probably going to shrivel up and die. That's a very poor visual. But

Hydration for Fertility 5:42

this fluid filled sac called is filled with something called follicular fluid, which is basically a fluid made of water as a primary thing. And then hormones, electrolyte, antioxidants and so many other things that are crucial to the development of this follicle or egg that's going to be ovulated. So a lot of people are focused on what supplement can I take, what supplement can I take, what supplement can I take? But you can take all the supplements in the world if they're not making their way into this follicular fluid.

That is the sac that surrounds the egg that's going to grow. Guess what? It's probably not going to make it to impact the egg quality. So really optimizing this fluid is crucial to supporting a quality. A lot of people, it's going to ask me, what's the best water? So usually tap water is not advisable. I did a whole interview with Warren and the nontoxic dad and he talks about the different types of water and what's the best source and all of that. But essentially one water filtration system that not only takes out the chlorine, but also things like fluoride medications that are in our water.

Just a good quality purification system and you want to drink actual water. So tea, coffee, kombucha, all of those things are not actually contributing to your water intake because guess what? None of your body functions on tea or coffee. It functions on water. So you need absolutely essential pure water. The only thing if you don't like the taste of water, I would suggest adding like berries to your water or cucumber. I love cucumber and water. A couple of springs of mint thyme. Those are all really great. And guess what?

You're adding antioxidants into your water when you do stuff like that. So that's another way to like supercharge your water. You could also, if you need more minerals, you could add a little pinch of high quality Celtic sea salt to your water to make sure that you're getting high quality minerals into that water. And that's supporting that electrolyte balance, which is really like how things in our body move and connect and communicate.

Support Mitochondrial Function 8:12

Those are all the things that I would suggest doing. Number two is going to be optimize the mitochondrial function. Mitochondria are essentially the energy powerhouses in our body and the ovaries are literally energy houses on steroids because they have a thousand mitochondria per ovary. That's a lot of mitochondria. And if that wasn't enough, one spermatozoa actually has 50 to 75 mitochondria. So mitochondria are essentially the backbone of our DNA of our energy, of how well what's the quality of this thing that our body is producing?

And if it doesn't have healthy, high functioning mitochondria, it's probably not going to do a great job with producing what you need in order to create another human. And then last but not least, number one, and you guys are going to be a little bit surprised about what I chose for, number one. But I feel like it is one of the most vital things that we need as part of our system that is going to be to optimize oxytocin. What the heck is oxytocin? It's one of our crucial hormones. And oxytocin is essentially what I call our safety hormone.

It gives us gives our body the signal of it's okay to relax because I'm safe. Right. So if I feel safe as a female, especially, then I feel like it's okay for me to bring a child into this world if I don't feel safe. It's not something that my body is really going to sign up to do.

Optimize Oxytocin and Reduce Stress 10:18

So it is really, really important to optimize oxytocin. And what I love about it is there's no herbs or supplements or things that you're going to take. It's essentially a practice that you can do. And the research has shown that the best way to improve oxytocin is actually 10 minutes of eye contact with another human, followed by a 22nd hug. Yes, 10 minutes followed by 20 seconds. So how you do this is essentially you and your partner. Can I give or you can have a deep conversation face to face.

That part is the key. You have to be looking into each other's eyes. It's like readying your body to release oxytocin and then the actual physical contact helps to release oxytocin into your system yourself, like soak it up and your body says and you really are waiting to get to the point where you actually like, can melt and relax. And I know you guys have felt this. It doesn't happen with every hug. So you really are focusing your energy on like, when do I feel like I've gotten that release, that stress response, lowering action, and you'll start to feel it, you'll notice it.

It's really hard to describe, but you will I promise you will feel it. And you're really going for at least 20 seconds. You can do longer hugs if you like, but that is going to be my top tip to support your fertility. The reason this works is because cortisol and stress, all kinds of stress, it's not always like, Oh, my work is stressing me out. It's all types of stress is going to put your body into fight or flight mode. If you're in fight or flight, you're not having the safety response that tells your body it's okay to relax, that it's okay to reproduce.

So the more that we can signal that to our bodies regularly, the more our body is going to kind of neutralize that cortisol with the oxytocin. So it's my little hack. I love it. I do it even if we're not trying to get pregnant, because I have a lot of stress, as you can imagine. And it's so, so, so helpful to have that stress response just being mitigated or neutralized too, with something so simple that doesn't have to do with taking more pills. It's easy to do. And honestly, like the side benefits, are you going to have a better relationship?

You're going to feel closer to your partner. A lot of times there is going to be a rise of sexual desire. Like those are all really good side benefits to add on to our fertility journey. So I hope this is really helpful. I know this was a little bit longer than our usual, but I think that information today is really, really important and you guys have been asking for it. So here you go. I will talk to you soon. I hope you enjoy this day. There's a lot of amazing lectures coming up, so make sure to tune in for all of our interviews today and write to us.

Tell us how it's going. We want to connect with you and we want to hear what's happening.