Discovering Your Fertility Type

In Asian Medicine there are basically 5 fertility types. Are you curious to know which type or types you are ? The information gained by knowing your specific type can help guide you in which types of foods and herbs are best to help you conceive naturally or to feel your best hormonally. The information I am presenting here is basically a brief summary of the book Making Babies by Jill Blakeway, L.Ac, and Sami David, MD. They are both top fertility experts in New York who have helped so many women understand their fertility and get pregnant naturally. This book is one that I recommend to all my fertility patients. It helps my clients get more out of their treatments with me. Jill Blakeway is my hero!

In working with couples over the years, I have found that most women are eager to speed up the process of making a baby to NOW…if not yesterday. So, by knowing your fertility type, you can narrow in on exactly what you need to optimize your fertility and hormonal health. It isn’t just one size fits all with fertility stuff! Maybe you have been trying to get pregnant for awhile or maybe you are just starting out. This article is written for you. Let me break down the 5 basic types so you can identify which one you are and start eating for YOUR fertility type today!

Tired

 

Your Symptoms:

• Tired types often feel lethargic, fatigued
• May be hypothyroid and/or anemic
• feel cold
• have low progesterone
• brain fog
• dark circles under eyes
• multiple miscarriages
• put on weight easily
• may have a long follicular phase, or ovulate late.
• Your tongue might look puffy and big and/or white/pale

Fertility Goals: Improve metabolism, strengthen digestion, help with ovulation and regulating cycle

Food Therapy: Simple, well-cooked foods. Try including more complex carbs, cooked veggies, fruits, and organic protein sources. Seeds: pumpkin, sesame, sunflower, hemp. Seaweed such as kelp and nori. Whole grains( gluten free if trying to conceive). Include plenty of energetically warming foods such as rice, oatmeal, parsnips, onions, lamb, beef, chicken.

Avoid: Raw and frozen foods, dairy, wheat, soy

Spices/Teas: Ginger, cardamom, chai tea

Superfoods and Supplements: wheat grass, vitex ( chaste berry), chromium, L-arginine, herbal tinctures to build qi ( consult your acupuncturist )

Exercise: Regular, easy going exercise that doesn’t leave you feeling exhausted or depleted. 30 minutes of moderate exercise daily. Conserve energy while during moon time ( menstruation)

Discuss with your doctor: tests for anemia, vit. D levels, food allergy panels, hypothyroid test ( T3, T4, antibodies, and TSH)

Dry

Your Symptoms:

• dry skin, hair, and/or eyes feeling dehydrated
• night sweats, hot flashes, vaginal dryness( cervical mucous may be too acid or thick for sperm)
• hot at night
• recurrent miscarriages
• constipation
• low tolerance to stress, anxious
• low estrogen/progesterone( which can interfere with endometrial lining growth)
• high FSH ( follicle stimulating hormone)
• irregular cycles,  long follicular phase ( first half of cycle before ovulation)
• higher temps not sustained in luteal phase(erratic)
• long cycle with maybe short, light period( not uncommon in late 30’s, 40’s)
•  short cycle with heavy bleeding and spotting mid cycle
• varying BBT charts from month to month
• ovary function issues, may not respond well to fertility drugs
• your tongue may have cracks in it and look dry

These types sometimes have been told their eggs are too old, that they are in perimenopause, or that they are too old! If you are still ovulating, food and herbal therapy along with acupuncture can help you conceive.

Fertility Goals: Build healthy follicles ( developing eggs) and endometrial lining ( lining of uterus)

Food Therapy: High amounts of vegetables ( steamed, not roasted), complex carbs, about equal amounts of animal and vegetable protein. Lightly cooked foods. Dairy, eggs,  seaweed, green juices, spirulina. Include moistening, cooling and lubricating foods: seeds, beans, nuts, sardines, bone marrow, organic gluten free oats,  rice, millet, celery, spinach, swiss chard, cucumbers, lettuces, radishes, asparagus, cabbage, cruciferous vegetables, squash, beets, and fruits, especially pears.

Avoid: too much spicy food, sugar, bad fats, alcohol

Spices/Teas: chysanthemum, marshmallow, nettle, anise. Can buy loose in bulk and make an infusion or buy individually and make as tea.

Superfoods and Supplements: EFA’s (essential fatty acids), L-cartinine, liquid chlorophyll, floradix, herbal tinctures to nourish yin ( consult your acupuncturist)

Exercise: Avoid intense, exhausting exercise. Choose energizing such as yoga( not hot yoga), yin yoga, tai chi, qi gong, swimming, walking, hiking. Meditative and repetitive are good.

Discuss with your doctor: FSH levels, test for estrogen and FSH, AMH on day 3. Test for progesterone day 21

 

Stuck

Your Symptoms:

• hard hormonal transitions/PMS
• ovulation issues
• poor circulation
• fibroids
• stress, internalized stress( stress bad for luteinizing hormone and progesterone)
• tension headaches and migraines
• nervous stomach
• tight muscles ( especially neck and shoulders)
• mood swings
• breast tenderness and/or fibrocystic breasts/hormone imbalances
• critical
• painful periods
• long follicular phase, irregular cycles, painful ovulation, and/or estrogen dominance ( cortisol levels can compete with progesterone levels)
• your tongue may look purplish or darker red

Fertility Goals: Unburden the liver and regulate cycle, balance hormones, eliminate painful cramps, improve blood flow

Food Therapy: Unprocessed foods, and nothing synthetic. Aim for high amount of veggies and fruits, complex carbs, and clean, lean protein. Include lots of fiber, especially in phase 4 ( before period starts/possible pregnancy). Cruciferous vegetables/cabbage family especially important to metabolize excess estrogen, EFA’s ( essential fatty acids), calcium and magnesium rich foods to combat stress, vegetable juices for Vit. A and C. Include sour foods move the liver and help hormonal balance such as small amounts of citrus, vinegar, and lemon water in am.

Avoid: Red meat, caffeine, overly salty, dairy, alcohol, soy

Spices/Teas: Turmeric( turmeric latte), basal, mint, and garlic

Superfoods and Supplements: Zinc, b complex, mag/calcium, evening primrose oil, red raspberry, talk to your doc about low dose aspirin, herbal tincture to move blood and qi ( consult your acupuncturist)

Exercise: Vigorous, regular exercise is great for you to get rid of stress and quiet your mind. Sweat!

Talk to your doctor: Flushing of Fallopian tubes, vit. d levels, estrogen day 3, progesterone day 21, hypothyroid ( if feeling depressed), thyroid in general ( hyperthyroid if anxious), cortisol tests

 

Pale

Your Symptoms:

• pale skin, lips
• brittle nails
• dry skin
• blurry vision
• hair loss
• light menstrual flow
• trouble falling asleep
• tired
• rapid heartbeat
• shaky, dizzy when standing up
• inflexible,tight muscles
• anemia
• easily hurt physically and emotionally, weepy, anxious
• light and short periods, blood is watery and not always bright red in color
• PMS type is weepy, and wiped out after period
• Blood loss due to many heavy periods can cause this Pale type as well
• your tongue may look pale and flabby

This type can be undernourished due to poor diet and/or not enough blood nourishing type foods such as grass fed meats, and iron rich foods. Low estrogen may be an issue, as well as thin endometrium making it hard for an embryo to implant.

Fertility Goals: Nourishing your blood supply with iron rich foods, improving pelvic blood flow for follicular development and building up uterine lining ( implantation)

Food Therapy: Emphasize and prioritize clean, grass-fed protein, complex carbs, and organic vegetables and fruits. Marinated meat and/or slow cooked meat are ideal. If you are vegetarian, make sure  to eat a variety of protein rich foods and high iron foods. Consider eating meat and whey protein. High quality and high amounts of protein are very important in the first half of your cycle while re-building blood, sending blood to nourishing follicles, and building endometrium. Eat regularly, do not skip any meals. Include iron rich foods: black strap molasses, eggs, lentils, meat, liver, and all red foods including tart organic cherries, and goji berries. Soups, stews, chili, raw cacao, and bone broth soups.

 

Avoid: Caffeine, simple sugars, liquids with meals, dairy in excess, cold, raw foods, eating while stressed, soy

Spices/Teas: Green tea, goji berries, nettle leaf tea ( nettle infusions daily are awesome)

Superfoods and Supplements: Floradix daily, liquid chlorophyll, L-carnitine, herbal tincture to nourish blood ( consult your acupuncturist )

Exercises: 3-4 times a week is probably sufficient for you. It is not a good idea to start a strenuous, vigorous routine, or intense weight lifting. Moderate, meditative, consistent is best.

Talk to your doctor: Anemia test, thyroid, vit. d, estrogen day 3, progesterone day 21.

 

Waterlogged

Your Symptoms:

• PCOS ( polycystic ovarian syndrome)
• ovarian cysts
• poor metabolism/gain weight easily/metabolic disorders
• insulin resistance/pre-diabetes/diabetes/sugar cravings and blood sugar fluctuations
• pelvic inflammatory disease
• chronic yeast infections
• chronic allergies
• nausea
• edema, swelling, excess mucous
• fibroids
• fibrocystic, fatty nodules ( lipomas)and cysts, swollen lymph nodes
• overthinking
• endometriosis
• inflammation/painful joints/headaches
• constipation/cloudy urine
• weak immune system
• polyps
• blocked fallopian tubes
• your tongue may look greasy, yellow coating especially in the back, or white coating

Fertility Goals: prevent accumulation of mucus, improve circulation, minimize issues with fibroids and endometriosis, improve metabolism and optimize blood sugar regulation, improve ovulation, regulate cycle, improve egg quality

Food Therapy: High vegetable intake, clean protein, low in complex carbs. Nutrient dense foods, diuretics such as barley, and green tea. Lots of water! Keep diet low carb. Include lots of leafy greens, fish, and nourishing soups. Consider Whole30 diet with no sugar, bread, alcohol

Avoid: Over-eating, raw, cold foods, sugar, rich, fatty foods, cow dairy, spicy, alcohol, wheat, yeast, fungi, beer, soy, empty carbs

Spices/Teas: Chai tea, barley tea, cardamom tea, green tea

Superfoods and Supplements: Chromium, probiotics, vitex ( PCOS), herbal tincture for pelvic blood flow and cysts ( consult your acupuncturist)

Exercise: Daily exercise important. Yoga, walking, running, weights, feel free to choose from a wide variety and keep it daily and consistent to help with weight management

Talk to your doctor: Flushing of Fallopian tubes, diagnostic ultrasounds, tests for Vit. d, insulin, full PCOS work up blood panel if haven’t been tested previously

 

These are the 5 types in a nutshell. You might be thinking that you fall into one or more of the types. Yes! Welcome to real life. Usually you have one dominant type with an underlying 2nd or 3rd type. Common combos are pale and tired or stuck and waterlogged.

Be your own advocate and take charge of your fertility and health! Ask for what you need and educate yourself on the many natural options you have on your fertility journey. I highly recommend the book, Making Babies by Jill Blakeway, L.Ac and Sami David, MD from which most of the suggestions in this blog came from. Get the book here: Making Babies

Find or create your own support system and don’t be afraid to ask for and seek help. I love supporting couples on their fertility journeys. It is my life mission to empower women to take back their fertility naturally. Feel free to send me a message if you need guidance at joy@nourishedrootsacu.com.

 

Fertility, peace, and vitality,

Joy, L.Ac., MSOM

Licensed and Board Certified Acupuncturist

Owner of Nourished Roots LLC

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

References: Making Babies by Jill Blakeway and Sami David