The Microbiome’s Impact On Hormones And Fertility

Introduction to Dr. Emily Hernandez 0:00

Welcome back to The Super Fertility Summit. I'm so excited to introduce you to our speaker, Dr. Emily Hernandez. Dr. Emily, so good to have you here today. Thank you for being here with us to share your expertise in your practice and to share about an incredible, group of formulations that you work with in Biocidin Botanicals. You're a naturopathic doctor and clinical consultant for Biocidin Botanicals. You own wild craft medicine, a family medicine practice in the valley at California, and you specialize in digestive health, pre-conception and fertility, hormone balancing, and chronic illness, including Lyme disease.

This is really, really important, actually, for fertility and pregnancy outcomes. You believe that starting with gut health is often the best way to bring overall health back into balance. And you've used Biocidin products throughout your almost ten years of practice, and you speak often on topics related to their clinical uses and relevancy. Welcome to The Super Fertility Summit, Dr. Emily, I'm so happy that you're here with us today. Thank you. Yeah, it's great to be here. I'm really honored to be speaking with you today.

Thank you. And we're going to be talking about critical topics because you really focus on digestive health for overall health, but also for preconception preparation or prime mastering, as we call it, and fertility. And you also have your own fertility journey, which you can speak from, which I think people are going listening to us right now, are going to really appreciate one of the things that I love about the emphasis of this conversation is gut health and the microbiome. And we always talk about at the Fertility and Pregnancy Institute and in the Primemester Protocol, that our digestive is the mother of our fertility and pregnancy system, and that our gut microbiome is our second genome and our second epigenome.

So I can't wait to dive into this conversation with you. I always like to begin by thinking from the end and end, thinking from the end. When this conversation closes, what do you want the people listening to our voices right now to take away if they only remember one thing, what's the one thing you hope that they'll remember? I love that question, and I think it's really helpful to set the stage of what we're going to be talking about and the importance, and I would say I would love to, to help people understand the bridge between the microbiome, balancing that microbiome health in general and hormonal control and fertility so interconnected and linked.

And I think when we think about our fertility journey, we think about the hormones, we think about even the thyroid maybe, and our mental health around it. But sometimes I don't think people completely make that connection between how important our gut health, especially our microbiome health, is when it comes to fertility. So hopefully we can really, you know, hone that in and, and drive that in for people. I love that so much. And one of the things that I find to be the most miraculous about that, about gut health in the microbiome, specifically, is how it not only programs our own health and fertility and pregnancy outcomes, but also the programing of the children that we're going to have, the mental health, the physical health.

We now know that there are all these health problems that have been conditioned and programed by the microbiome, or lack of exposure to the vaginal microbiome in birth, etc., from C-section. So I just I'm saying that up front because I want people to understand just how critical this conversation is to cracking the code

Why the Microbiome Matters for Fertility 4:08

to our healthiest fertility and pregnancy and to our super babies, as we call them, our healthiest, happiest, brightest, most well adjusted, most resilient children that we can have. So, Dr. Emily , would you start us off with the basics? Why is the microbiome so important for fertility? Yeah. Great question. And I love what you were saying before about the microbiome in the genetic component. And I think you said something about secondary I don't want to even argue like primary. I mean, we're actually made up of more microbes and microbial genes, and we are human genes and human cells, which by a drastic amount.

I think there's about 20,000 human genes compared to 100 trillion, microbial genes. So just I mean, thinking about that, we are them, you know, versus more of them being us. I think, you know, we have to remember that most of our, you know, health really stems from the health and the balance of this microbiome. And I think, you know, microbiome is starting to be a word we hear a lot more, especially in functional medicine. And yes, we're going to talk a lot about the gut microbiome in particular.

That's where most of those microbes reside. But we actually have a microbiome in and on every area of our body. Right? Our skin, our vagina, our uterus, cervical mucus has its own, and or the cervix has its own microbiome. So I think we have to remember that too, that each area has its own unique composition of microbes. And they're there for very particular reasons. the microbiome is how we absorb our nutrients. It's how we, support our hydration in our body. It helps us detoxify. They help us with our immune function quite a bit.

They help with, and in relation to immune system, they help with priming our immune system as well as supporting the actual immune system itself. So priming meaning teaching our immune system what to react to and what not to react to. I mean, that's really important when we're talking about fertility. It really is. Yeah. Huge. So, you know, inflammation control and so forth. Hormones, of course. And we're going to get quite a bit into that and that connection. But the microbiome really holds the key, right.

So this is why it's so important. This is why it's really important to talk about in general health but definitely in fertility. And as you mentioned, you know, this microbiome is something that we pass on in a lot of ways to our offspring, especially as moms. and we can talk about some of the really cool research I've come across recently. You know, we there's a lot of studies now looking at you know, this the general understanding is that when we're born, we're near sterile. And we get that first exposure to the vaginal canal or through the skin when if there's a C-section delivery.

But actually the oral microbiome plays a really important role. women who are pregnant. And I'm sure you've heard this, if you have been pregnant before or just, you know, a little bit about oral health, they tend to have something called leaky gums when they're pregnant. This makes them have a little bit more susceptibility to infections. Their gums can bleed more, but by design this happens because this is actually one of the first exposures that the fetus has to a microbiome. That oral microbiome can actually escape through that leaky gum into the, into the uterus where the baby is growing and actually start to support that growth of beneficial flora for them.

So huge connections with microbiomes in general throughout our body and supporting fertility in the grow, and a growing baby. so that's actually probably number one where we're exposed and then through delivery, of course, depending upon if it's vaginal or C-section. but yeah, I think the microbiome is so important to talk about because of all these other health components that ultimately influence hormones, right? so the microbiome, in particular, one of the major ways directly it influences hormones is through something called the estrobolome.

and this is a collection of bacteria and their, in their genes that, create different enzymes that can help us either, reabsorb estrogens and other hormones, progesterone to or it's when they're in a, in the right balance state. It allows for those estrogens to be excreted through the bile and eventually, you know, through our feces. But if we have too many of these microbes or they're overactive and they're producing too much of this enzyme called beta glucan quantities, then the, conjugated estrogens that were conjugated through the bile actually get reabsorbed in increase that estrogen level systemically throughout the body.

So this is one very direct way that the microbiome can influence hormones. This is really, really important. I, I loved how you said that we are them. More than that, they are us. And I always think about the research that shows that so much of our personality is dictated by our microbial composition and how somebody might think that they have a jittery or anxious personality, or tendencies, and that it may very well be their microbiome. And with shifts in that richness and diversity, etc., they could feel their almost their personal traits changing.

And this is really important when you're dealing with, even beyond the direct impacts for fertility and hormonal balance such as estrogen metabolism, this is this is indirectly also really important for fertility because there's so much stress and anxiety and worry for surrounding fertility in general. But especially for people who have had a fertility journey and for them, getting and or staying pregnant and and having a healthy baby hasn't been easy or hasn't been as simple as let's have sex and get pregnant and have it be the way that we we're told it was always going to happen.

So yeah, I think this is really, really important. Can can you talk a little bit about, about the microbiome and the extra ball, specifically and how, this affects the, the estrogen balance and the ratio of estrogen to progesterone, which is something that we really need to be thinking about when it comes to fertility. Yeah, absolutely. And and even before that, something that you mentioned that I think is really good to tie into with stress. And obviously we all have stress. It's inevitable. Right.

But but stress, our cortisol, which is our stress hormone, can, can actually affect our progesterone levels as well. Right. And there's a huge connection with the microbiome supporting the HPA axis, the hypothalamus pituitary adrenal access, which is this, you know, huge access between these endocrinol hormonal organs that helps to regulate hormones like stress. and the gut microbes can actually talk and help control and modulate that access. And when we have too much stress, too much cortisol, it actually starts to compete for progesterone binding sites and the nutrients that need that are needed to make progesterone.

And so we know progesterone, right, is the kind of main key hormone for becoming and staying pregnant. And so that's that's really key is how do we manage our stress. And a lot of that is obviously through lifestyle and working on sleep and diet and all those things. But working on the microbiome can drastically help modulate and control that access where cortisol is released. So I just wanted to mention that because you brought up such a great point. and then to your other question about the estrus balloon.

So as mentioned before, it's a combination of certain bacteria that produce enzymes. And one of those enzymes is called beta glucan. It is. And what happens is if we have too many of these bacteria, we create an increase.

Estrogen Balance and the Estrobolome 12:16

We see an increase in beta glucan. It is and beta glucan is responsible for de conjugating steroid hormones. So estrogen and progesterone, even testosterone. But mostly I would say estrogen is the main one that we know that it really affects, which can facilitate their reabsorption into systemic circulation. So the idea is that these hormones, we want to use them, then lose them. That's what I always tell my patients. We, we use of the estrogen and progesterone. And then we want to package them with the bile and excrete them from the body.

If we don't do that and they're reabsorbed because they're not being eliminated properly, then we start to see them create actions on receptor sites more so than they should. Right. And we have hormone receptors on almost every different kind of tissue. There's definitely concentrations on certain tissue more than others. Obviously the reproductive tissues have more of those receptors. But bone tissue, cardiovascular tissue, kidney, liver, all of those things, our immune cells all have estrogen, progesterone, testosterone receptors.

And so when we have them reabsorbed into systemic circulation, that can really throw us a balance between the hormones. And that's something also, you know, that's important is that estrogen progesterone ratio like you were mentioning. So when we're talking about fertility and hormones, we want to not just look at progesterone alone or estrogen alone. even FSH and LCH and some of the other ones that are important. And we want to look at them together and get a full picture about what's going on, because the relationship between them is almost more important than just one on its own.

And so it's really important to make sure that we don't have really high estrogens and kind of normal progesterone that can kind of create that ratio is out of balance. or sometimes we may have low progesterone and our estrogen high or normal, but it looks high in the body because progesterone has dropped. So it's you know, I think when I show this kind of back and forth for patients, it kind of helps them visualize that it's really not just do I have high estrogen and nothing else. It's a combination of, you know, what are they doing together?

and obviously we still want them in those normal functional ranges that will optimize fertility. But when we have a dis biotic microbiome, meaning a microbiome that's out of balance, maybe there's too much of one type of bacteria and not enough of another, and especially when we have too many that are in part of that is trouble. making too much of the beta glucan is then we start to see estrogen really creeps up. And this can affect not just fertility. But first we start to see it as hormonal symptoms. You're right.

Estrogen dominance. You know, PMS, symptoms, breast tenderness, acne, headaches, whatever it may be. But definitely that can influence fertility. yeah. This is really, really important information. How do we test test the microbiome and the astrobee on them as they're contributing to our hormonal health? So what tasks do you like to do for your your patients. Yeah. Great question. It's always helpful to have some testing in front of us. You know what tests don't guess. there's certain situations where, you know, you can assume certain things based off of symptoms, but we know that so many conditions have similar symptoms.

So testing can really be helpful to really identify what's the root cause. And so comprehensive stool testing can be a great way to do this. there's many different companies out there that will offer, you know, a comprehensive stool test. And what I mean by comprehensive is, I think a lot of times when we go to our primaries and they want to run a stool test, it's typically just looking to see if there's parasites, right? That's not very comprehensive. It's sometimes can be necessary, but comprehensive stool tests typically look not just at parasites and other harmful bacteria or harmful yeast.

They look at the commensal levels. Right. So meaning the beneficial flora, the beneficial yeast, the beneficial bacteria, are they in the right balances or are they in the right ratios. Well we they look at opportunistic type or organisms. So you know maybe for example like H pylori isn't necessarily a bad bacteria, but if it's too high, if it becomes opportunistic, then it can create problems. So those skill tests will look at that. They'll look at inflammatory markers. They will look at enzyme markers.

That will give us an insight whether you're having enough enzymes and breaking down your veggies and fibers, and that they look at something called short chain fatty acids, which I definitely want to talk about after this. It's really yes. and then they also look oftentimes at beta glucose levels. And this is a great way to get some insight on what your problem is doing. You know, if that beta glucan is is too high, then we need to start thinking about how can we balance the microbiome and lower that enzyme.

And there's a few other nutrients too, that we can use to help with that, but that's a one of the best ways I have found in my practice to evaluate not just the beta glucan rounds, but kind of the whole microbiome, and then take a really good approach at how to balance it. I love that so much. So I would love to get into short chain fatty acids with you before. Before we do, tell us about what when you when, a patient comes back with a high beta glucan level. What what are what are your top 2 or 3 action steps that you want them to be taking?

Yeah. Great question. So typically it's a sign that they're needing a little bit of support with detoxification. Right. Because not only is the basically guarantees allowing our bodies to reabsorb steroid hormones like progesterone and estrogen, it also tends to absorb more toxins that should be excreted. So detox support is really helpful. There's one nutrient in particular called dim. Dim. sure. You give this to your patients too. It comes from broccoli seed extract. And it helps that that, those microbes in the gut to metabolize the estrogen more efficiently so it can actually help lower the circulating estrogen if, if there is an issue there, helps the liver specifically, lower or support the, the clearance of estrogen.

And then often you'll see with dim is calcium w great. So calcium w great works a little bit more on the gut microbiome and helping that, get rid of and lower estrogens where the dim has a little bit of a higher affinity for the liver. So I like to use those in combination. Typically there's sometimes I'll just use one versus the other. some people may have a high beta blocker, but their estrogen is actually low. That can happen. So sometimes you don't necessarily want a lower circulating estrogens, but you do want to help the body detoxify better.

So those are probably two of my go tos. And then I do like to use our liquid biocide in to help balance the microbiome. So so it's it's root cause, right. We want to address kind of symptoms. Sometimes we have to do that. We want to lower those estrogens. We want to help kind of bring down those toxins. But then we want to get why were those toxins elevated in the estrogen elevated? Because the microbiome was out of balance. So I still want to make sure I'm working on that while I'm helping to lower those estrogens or help kind of fix Astro below. So, bioscience is a combination of 18 different herbs and essential oils.

And what's beautiful about that is plants naturally have their own immune systems, their own support for helping to bring balance to the microbes without, you know, wiping them all out a lot of times we see that with antibiotics, they can be very targeted in what they do, but they do tend to wipe out the beneficial flora as well. So biocide in is great because we have lots of different mechanisms of action. We put 18 different herbs and essential oils. Some are supporting inflammation, some are reporting supporting immune modulation, or how the immune systems responding.

And then the other ones are supporting that balance between the commensal, the opportunistic and the harmful microbes. they also have the ability to go after biofilm, which is this sticky mucus that bacteria will create to hide behind. And it's very hard for our immune systems to penetrate through it. So, you know, these herbs can be sometimes even more powerful than some of our traditional medicines that we get, maybe from our primary without also creating an imbalance. so I love using that product because it's able to go after multiple different types of microbes at the same time, support immune regulation and go after that biofilm or a lot of those, you know, deep rooted infections or imbalances, maybe.

I love that so much. And I'm a huge fan of Biocide. And as well, I've been using it myself and giving it to my super baby for a long time. Yeah. And, I think we don't talk enough about the biofilm as it relates to pregnancy and over fertility and pregnancy and overall health. So I'm glad you brought that up. One question I wanted to go back to, the use of of dim in in instances where someone's actually presenting with lower Astra dial, would it would there ever be a case in which you would you would still use them?

If somebody has lower estradiol levels? Yeah, that's a great question. So you know, we I always remind people, you know, it's a combination between the person in front of you, what they're telling you, their symptoms are and their history with the labs.

Testing Gut Health and Microbiome Imbalances 21:38

And so and the labs are only going to be telling us what we can test, right? I mean, it's really hard to get labs that tell us, you know, full details about what every system in the body is doing in this moment. So we have to remember that, you know, the testing is helpful and it gives us information, but it's a piece of the puzzle. So we may see that gravities is high. And their estrogen, at least the way we're testing it is low. But are you testing estrogen just in the blood? Or you're looking at the saliva, or you're looking at the urine?

You may see different levels depending on which way you're testing. and so if someone has high beta is maybe low estradiol in the blood, but they're showing symptoms of estrogen dominance, I may still try a little bit of stim. Maybe I'll go low and slow. or for that particular patient, I may just put them on the calcium gluconate, which I know is going to help more at the gut level, but not necessarily affect circulating estrogens. So, you know, I think it's important to individualize and see who's in front of you.

There is a time and a place where you could use them, even if someone has a little bit of a lower estrogen level. But I typically will use the calcium great. First and foremost, see if that does enough. and then kind of see if we can add it in later if it's necessary. thank you for that. I love that, a little bit about how the, the gut microbiome affects or is related to the vaginal and uterine microbiome. Yeah, absolutely. So this is great because it brings in the short chain fatty acids. So I'm really excited to talk about this.

So that. Yeah. So we talked about the ester below. And this is kind of a direct this makes sense right okay. That makes sense how the microbiome is directly connected to regulating hormones which can affect her ability. Well the gut plays so many roles indirectly, which, still play a really important role with fertility. And one of those is the metabolites that they produce metabolites. So think about when we breathe our metabolite is carbon dioxide. Right. That's what we that's the product that we give off when we are doing.

you know respiration. Well microbes have the same thing. They have metabolites that they give off as they're doing different, processes in the body. And one of those is producing something called short chain fatty acids. Short chain fatty acids are extremely critical for supporting immune function but also barrier protection. and when we have a healthy immune system, this is kind of the indirect connection. When we have a healthy immune system, this helps support hormones because hormones and immune system are very intertwined.

there's a lot of research showing that estrogen is very immune stimulatory or immune modulating. So balancing and same thing with progesterone. It tends to be immune modulating. So if we have this heightened immune system and we're not producing short chain fatty acids well and are barrier to our gut lining is is in is not intact, then the immune system can be riled. And this can affect hormones. Right. So that's kind of an indirect step. So short chain fatty acids are really important. They help us maintain a gut barrier.

They help to primed the immune system and support and support it and functioning. They help with brain and metabolism and all sorts of stuff. But they definitely can help with the barrier not only of the gut, but also the vagina, the uterus, and so forth. So we do see, you know, when you have a healthy microbiome and you're it's creating healthy metabolites that can directly help to support a healthy vaginal, environment as well as uterine environment. and we do see that microbes from the gut can kind of translocate or become part of vaginal our vaginal flora as well especially.

And from there, you know, we see it affect the uterus, the cervix and so forth. So lactobacillus in particular is a really common one. Most women will probably know a little bit about that if they've ever had, you know, yeast infections or B or something. They know that lactobacillus is a really important strain for vaginal health. And if we have good Lactobacillus species in amount in our gut, this can really help our vaginal flora, too, because there's less crosstalk between the two. This is so incredible.

One thing that I another connection that I want to make is that the the gut lining is, often implicated in autoimmune disorders as being a leaky gut, for example, or problems with the tight junctions are often, one of the root causes, if not the main root cause of an autoimmune disorder. And we know that autoimmune disorders can really interrupt fertility and, and healthy fertility, healthy pregnancy and having healthy children and as we often talk about, autoimmune thyroid disorder because Hashimoto's, because it's so common and because fertility challenges are so common, but really all autoimmune disorders, we see multiple sclerosis, lupus, so many things

Supporting Detox and Balancing the Microbiome 26:48

we can make fertility so much harder for people, and yet they're becoming more and more common. And so this is really, really important. So what are what are your favorite strains or to feed the, the bacteria to produce more short chain fatty acids? Yeah, that's a great question. And I will also kind of, mention to I mean, auto immune diseases are found 80% more in women than they are in men. And a lot of that is because of our hormones, right? We talked about estrogen being immune stimulatory. It's it's again by nature it's design.

And we need to have really healthy robust immune systems to help us procreate. Right. but on the flip side, if we have too much, if we have an imbalance in the microbiome that can influence us as estrogens, it can lead to a over response of our immune system. and so bringing that back to balance really does come back to focusing on the gut, because we know that 80% of our immune system is located in our guts. So it is really important. And with any autoimmune disease that there's some aspect that supporting gut microbiome health, 100% every patient that comes in with any autoimmune condition, we are working on their guts at some point.

so I just want to mention that. And yes, having the right beneficial flora can really help to drive that. You know, that's one piece of the puzzle. Like we said, we want to support any kind of dysbiosis and get rid of the ones that shouldn't be there. Calm down the inflammation, support that leaky gut, and and repair the lining, the integrity of the gut. But yes, adding some probiotics, prebiotics can really help, the healing process more quickly, and help people feel better. So some of my favorites, we actually have one at Biocide in called Pro Flora for R, and it's a spore based probiotic.

So what I love about this, the spores come naturally from the soil and they're extremely resilient. They can get through temperature change and acidity. Right. So through the stomach acid into the intestines where they need to be. So you'll often see that there's a lot less of them on the bottle. There's ours has 4 billion CF use. but that's all you need because we have most of those getting to the intestine, which is great. And then they don't need to be refrigerated. So they're very easy to take.

And I think what's really great about the the spores in particular is besides being so resilient, is that they can help recondition our guts. What does that mean? It means it helps support an environment where beneficial flora can thrive. So in our particular product, there's three different strains, different, bacillus strains that have all been, you know, human clinical trials and research on how they support gut and cardiovascular and immune function and inflammation, but they help the body in supporting any of the flora.

That's maybe a little bit low to thrive, which is incredible. and a lot of times we'll see keystone species like Aker. Yeah. So that we do have a study that showed, you know, how probiotic abundance went up in patients using some of our products. And Aker Amancio was one of those. And that's a really keystone species that is a high producer of short chain fatty acids. So I think the spores are really great for that. you know, general refrigerated multi strain probiotics can still have a place can still be helpful.

But I always kind of describe it as what you take is what you get. You know you're going to get exactly what you're taking. And a lot of times the amount that you get is a lot less than what's on the bottle, because it has to get through the stomach acid and the churning in the stomach. And it's a long passageway to get to the intestine. So you're getting a lot less, and you're only getting what you take where a spore is really helping to repopulate things and recondition things so that, you know, anything that needs to thrive can thrive.

And then on top of the spores in our product, we also have something called quercetin, which is a natural antihistamine. It helps to support those tight junctions of the gut. It's also an antioxidant, and it has some organic marshmallow root and aloe vera, which are the muscle, since that means it's soothing and calming to the gut lining so it's easy to take. It's well tolerated, and it really helps support with that healing of the gut besides supporting the beneficial flora. So I really like that one a lot.

sometimes people do need some actual short chain fatty acids. So there are supplements out there where you can actually take butyrate or a combination of butyrate, acetate, propionate. I always think of it that's like giving a man a fish versus teaching him how to fish. And sometimes there's a time in place for that. You know, someone's short chain fatty acids are super low, so they need that really big boost. But I always still like to give those, you know, probiotics, prebiotics, fiber, all the things that we know that help to feed the good flora and help them produce the short chain fatty acids on their own.

If anytime we can turn on the body like that and help it function as it's supposed to, that's always I feel like one of the best ways to go. I love that so much. This is really beautiful. And one thing is that there's there's also been some research to show that certain forms of aloe vera can help to reduce, thyroid antibody. So anybody we are just talking about autoimmune disorder and Hashimoto's specifically. So that's another potential benefit which is wonderful. And it's not easy to find. And Aquaman's supplements.

So you really have to find the things that will promote the production of this really incredible and important strain. So I love that so much. thank you for all of this. I would love to ask you if a person could only do one thing to take care of their fertility and their future super babies in your mind, what's that? One thing? And I know it's really hard to choose one thing, and most of us need a multi-layered, multivariate approach to optimize fertility, even when we expect that everything will go well for prime mastering or preconception or preparation, but especially if there's been difficulty getting and or staying pregnant, or a previous pregnancy hasn't been healthy or a previous, an existing child wasn't born as healthy as as someone wanted.

Gut Health, Short-Chain Fatty Acids, and Immune Function 33:08

But but if you if you had to focus on just one thing in your mind. What's that one thing? Okay, I'm going to kind of answer it in two parts because I think, okay, hands on. Is it a person that's been having difficulty for a long time versus someone who's just trying for the first time? So, okay. The first one that's just starting is, cheating a little with your with your question, but. I love it. It's a great question. So I think in general, people who are just starting out for their fertility process, I think there's so much information out there and we talk to our friends and we hear about all these supplements, and what should I do?

And I think for that person, just like work on stress and work on like your body is made to do this, this is literally I mean, the human body, the female human body, right, is literally designed to create life, which is just so beautiful and amazing and such an honor to have this ability. And I think if we can just like, hone in and, trust that your body is made to do this and, you know, whether you're taking this supplement or that supplement, you know, it's going to happen in the way in the process, it's supposed to.

So that's the one piece I think I get all of. That sounds. Over, you know, in our heads. And I mean, I'm the same way, right? Like, oh my gosh, I, I want to control all the different variables and make sure it's just right and just perfect. Like trust the process. That's basically what I would say and try to work on stress. We're all overachievers and and yeah. And so the tendency is like, you know, do more take everything out and also to try to control everything. So I love that. Like right. In a way.

In a way what I think you're really highly fighting for everyone is don't look outside yourself because you'll be like a, you know, a squirrel or a chicken running around and instead come back in and come back home to yourself and focus on what's happening inside of your inner world. And as part of that, soften. I know it's hard to say. Relax into the process, but soften into the process and yeah, and whatever it's there to teach you. Exactly. I love that soften into the process. It's a great way to put it.

And then and I and I've loved to share my story with that briefly. But the other. Yeah. Well the other for the other people that have been trying and struggling and I would say gut health, if you haven't already focused on gut health and specifically working on micro microbiome health, I think that that is just so, so key and maybe even that kind of gut vaginal connection, gut uterine connection specifically, if you need to kind of get a little bit deeper. But I would say that is something I would highly recommend working on if you haven't already worked on it, or just kind of find someone that can work on it and a little bit of a deeper layers.

if you've already kind of worked on it, but just been taking probiotics like that may not be enough on its own. So find someone that really understands those nuances and those connections. I love that so much. And we have so much of the semester protocol dedicated to that gut health and the microbiome, because it's absolutely essential. It's a foundation. Yeah. And I think it's pretty mind blowing to people when they see the depth of the work that you can do, because a lot of people know about the microbiome these days.

A lot of people know about probiotics, and a lot of people don't even know, especially the people who are struggling to get and or stay pregnant, have heard likely, that their gut plays a role in their fertility, and that there may be things going on there that are interfering, but to understand that there are so many different mechanisms and pathways for addressing this, I think it's it's pretty mind blowing. It is. But then when you do that in service of your fertility and having a wonderful pregnancy and having your super kicking it really transforms your health and well-being.

Because absolutely. As you said, 80% of the immune system is in the gut. And as we were talking about before, so much of your mood and your personality are actually dictated by the microbes inside of you because you're more of them than they are you as you. So beautifully said. So it's I mean, doing it for your super baby is enough. But yeah. The domino effect is absolute incredible. And the reality is, I will say quickly, is you're going to be, you know, with a good, you know, fertility process.

You get pregnant, you have a baby. Well, then you're a mom. And nothing is worse than being a sick mom because it's very those those kiddos need you. Rather whether you're, you know, have a fever or not. And I can speak from experience. A few weeks ago, my both my husband and I had Covid at the same time and it's rough. So it. Is. Working on your gut microbiome, and your immune support is just going to help you be a stronger, better mom, too. And a lot of ways. So always doing it for ourselves is great, is great.

Yes, I love that. I love that point. So sorry you guys had Covid. And you know we're used to it now or. It's. Tough. We've got our our bio siding and our all of our and our support that we do to just support overall immune function. So yeah, you know got our tools. Yes. and you're right, I, I think it's so the, the quality of the mothering experience and the parenting experience is so much better when you are well and when your children are well. And so we, we really can't say enough about how important that is.

I think it's easy when you're and you've been caught in a cycle of feeling like a failure in your your reproductive life. You just want you just want to hurry up and get to your baby. Absolutely. Taking the time to build that really strong, solid foundation. Epigenetics genetically, in terms of your microbiome, which is part of your epigenome and your your genome, makes such a difference and is so worth it. And we we were actually talking about that before we began recording that. It's so easy for people to feel like they're running out of time.

They can't take the time. And yet, right, taking the time in advance almost invariably shortens your pathway, but also enriches the quality of quality, not just the pathway to getting to your super baby, but then what life is going to be like with them. And for them and for you. So absolutely. And I get it. We all we all wanted to be pregnant yesterday, right? Or a year ago or two years ago. So it is it's a very it can be a very difficult journey for some that that deal with those kind of, those obstacles.

But once you do have your baby, you look back and you're like, you know, you're taking me a year to get pregnant. It's like it was no time at all. You know, when the baby's there, the final product and your beautiful super baby is there. It's like you don't think about spending an extra 4 or 5, six months working on your health because it was. It was worth it, you know. Worth it. So at least that's a that's how I experience, you know, in my own in my own journey. tell us. That tell us a little bit about your journey, please.

If you don't mind. I would love to share. I would love to share. So, you know, I, I've always known I've wanted to be a mom. I knew that was going to be my most important job in the entire world, which I know a lot of people feel the same. Yeah. And so I was knowing what I know, right? I'm like, okay, I'm going to spend six months a year and detoxify my body and get all ready. Well, I did work on a lot of that stuff. and we were kind of getting ready to try. Had just been about six months after I got married.

and my mother in law had something called polycystic kidney disease, which is an autosomal dominant gene. It means that there's a 50% chance it can be passed on to your children. And unfortunately, she has kidney issues where she has to get dialysis and she'll need a kidney transplant. terrible disease. You know, it's been genetic. And so my husband was actually going to donate one of his kidneys and, for his mother, and he found out he has it as well, right before we were trying. Yeah. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. Yeah.

But the silver lining is that we found this out before we tried to have children. And so, you know, after a lot of soul searching and thinking through, you know,

Probiotics, Prebiotics, and Gut Repair 41:28

what we were going to do, you know, that 50% risk just seems so high. We decided to do IVF with something called Pre-Implantation genetic testing, where you can actually test, you know, that you get I we used my embryo, his sperm, but we test. I'm sorry. My eggs, his sperm. We tested the embryos to see which ones had the genes and which ones didn't. because we've just seen how it's affected my mother in law's life, so we just didn't want our kids to do. We don't want your children to go through that, right?

Right. It did 50% of the embryos. Have they. Yep. Yep. So they it's crazy like they do. Yeah. They they they give you all the embryos and half of them don't make it because chromosomes are abnormal. And then out of the other half 50% hadn't have 50% didn't. So I mean, I'm, I'm so happy that we did this. But this path even though as a natural path like Doctor, you know, to go through something where I was thinking, okay, like you said, just, you know, wham, bam, it's done and the natural way. And, you know, I had to really change my mindset and be opened to this change in my path.

And it took a little while to do so, you know, knowing I was going to have to, you know, do all the injections and the hormones. And, I mean, I would do it a thousand times over because it was it was so worth it in my book, you know, for us to choose path and have a really healthy, you know, children. So, I think just being opened and, you know, is is difficult as it can be sometimes. I mean, again, I was also grateful as much as I could be that we didn't have specific fertility issues. so that was great.

We had a few little bumps along the way as all IVF kind of processes can compounds, but that's right. Overall, you know, when my I'm looking at my kid in front of me, like I don't think about any of those other details, you know. Right. Yeah. you just celebrate him being. Exactly. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. And I did I will say I did spend quite a long time doing because I know I had some time right to do this, and I already mentally knew I wanted to do some cellular detoxification, gut cleansing. And I will say, I think that helped the IVF process so, so much.

I mean, we got pregnant right away. No issues, knock on wood. yeah. Go for baby number two soon. Okay. We're holding the intention. Thank you. I repeat, so beautiful. Yeah, but it's true. Doing doing that work in advance really buys you time and buys peace and saves you money. Because let's be honest, each cycle you have to do is costing you a fortune. So it's it's really, really critical. And also the emotional. I was just going to say the emotional toll. Yeah. You know, hearing women who have gone through, you know, multiple transfers or multiple, you know, extractions and are having trouble.

I, I feel so much for you. I know it's extremely, extremely difficult, financially, but but emotionally. My goodness. So taking this time to work on gut and immune and hormones and mental health, highly, highly recommend doing that ahead of time if you have the ability to do so. Absolutely, absolutely. Doctor Emily, this has been so beautiful. I would love to. In closing, ask you two questions. So first, the first question is what does super fertility mean to you? that's a great question. I love that term.

You use motility super babies. I think it just means optimizing where we can, to create an experience that is, as you know, smooth and balanced as possible, both for mom, for families, for, you know, the growing fetus, and for, of course, your baby after your baby's born to, to set them up for that lifetime of healthy success. you know, preconception is just so critical for setting up a healthy foundation, as you were mentioning. And I think Super Fertility is all about that, you know, that that honing in on preconception not only for the process of getting pregnant and your pregnancy, but but creating babies and that will grow into healthy adults.

so beautiful. I love that so much. And I think it's really, really important to say that that experience of super fertility, it is available to us. It doesn't have to be that you're either born with it or not, or you're somehow selected for that and that it's to me, it's a form, it's just like any other form of growth mindset or incremental learning. We have it available to us and we can tap into it and build up that muscle and really accentuate it so that so, so beautiful. And and again, the work we do, it's so meaningful for generations to come, not just for the the pregnancy that we're trying to achieve.

What is last question? What is the best way to mother yourself in preparation for having your super baby? Wow. Good question.

Fertility Mindset and Dr. Emily's Personal Journey 46:38

I think being at least for me, open to receiving. I think as moms in general, so much of it is about giving. But we can't give with a cup that's half full or you know, the tank is empty or, you know, running on fumes, whatever kind of analogy you want to use. But I personally have never needed my mommy as much as I have when I became a mom. and so yeah. So yeah. And I'm lucky to have such an amazing mom. Oh my gosh, it's just been incredible. But even my husband, too, I mean, I think I'm a very independent, strong woman.

I like to do things myself and, learning to be more receptive to help and being open to that. I mean, it really does. I know it's cliche, but it does take a village, and even even before the baby's there, you know, with just the doctor visits and the mental component of it and getting enough sleep and enough nutrients and I think we really have to be open to receiving the support that we need. So just kind of a good little reminder to fill up your cup as a mom. Love. I love that so much. Being open to receiving.

And when we allow ourselves to receive, we have so much more to give. And I think that's a beautiful reminder and something that we easily forget in the busyness of life. Also, how you talked about never having needed your mommy more than when you became a mom. That almost made me cry. I lost my mother at birth, so so yeah, I know it's like, can you imagine, like never having experienced a mother's love? Like, oh my God, not really. I can't it's like. I mean, that's why I do this work. I, I wanted to help as many families as possible, have reproduction, be a beautiful experience.

I'm so thankful to be able to say anything, even though I had that really rocky, horrible start to life. I have had beautiful reproduction and I have such a beautiful family, my super family, my super babies. But I really, I really can see and feel that, you know, if you're going through a fertility journey, you'll feel like you need your mom, especially if she's a supportive mother when you're pregnant, when you do, when you're giving birth, when you have a newborn, a toddler, and really every stage of raising them and it does take a village.

I always say it takes a village to make and grow and raise our super babies, but also to to make and raise and grow us as parents, as mothers. so beautiful. And I will say, for you and for anyone else out there that maybe doesn't have their their physical mom. I mean, I think moms come in many shapes and sizes, and I'm sure you experienced this through your life, whatever your mom figure is. And it doesn't necessarily have to be female. I mean, there's so many ways my husband's been there for me to.

He's so nurturing that, you know, so so whoever that like mom energy is for you. And, you know, that's kind of also. So I'm happy I don't. So. Oh, you brought me to tears too when you mentioned your your story. But, I hope you have some mom energy. Mom figures in your life and so. Blessed with amazing. My magical hubby, my. Yeah sisters and. Soul sisters in the world. And just so many angels that have come into my life and and I think that's really important because I think it's easy for us to feel like support is this kind of optional thing, but actually it's so essential.

And, and we have a mountain of scientific data that shows that, yeah, everything we want to do and be and have and achieve, including healthy fertility and healthy, healthy babies, really requires us to have the support we need. So I love that you, you said the best way we can mother ourselves and as we Primemester for our super babies, as we're making and raising them, is to be open to receiving. Thank you so much for that. Welcome. what a magical conversation. Thank you for this. It's been so beautiful.

I mean, so, so practically important, so much new understanding for people, but also, you know, so soulful and nourishing. So thank you, Dr. Emily, for being here today. Thank you. So welcome. Take care everyone. Thank you. And thank you to you mama, dada, parents of all genders listening. And I love to have you join me in the next interview.