Welcome to Grounded Wellness, your go to podcast for
simplified and trusted information on how to live a
more non-toxic and holistic life.
We're your hosts. I'm Bethany McDaniel, founder of
Primarily Pure, biohacking enthusiast and mom of three.
And I'm Courtney O'Connor, holistic esthetician with over
15 years experience in the healing power of touch and
holistic skin care rituals. When it comes to women's hormone
health, many symptoms are brushed off as normal despite
their significant impact on our overall well-being.
That's why I'm so excited for today's conversation with Lisa
Hendricks and Jack, author of The 5th Vital Sign co-author of
Real Foods for Fertility, and a leading expert in menstrual
health. In this episode, we'll explore
how understanding your menstrual cycle can help you live more in
tune with your body, and why it's time we rethink the way we
view our periods. Let's dig in.
Lisa, welcome to the Grounded Wellness podcast.
We're so grateful to have you on today's episode.
Thanks for making the trek down from Canada.
Thank you so much for having me, this is so much fun.
So a lot of women discover primarily appear on their
journey to conceiving and so I would love to jump right in on a
topic just to help offer them support and hope and advice on
this journey. So we'd love to hear what are
some of your top tips for fertility?
I mean, of course, coming from the background of cycle turning,
I feel like especially when women are starting to conceive,
there's so much confusion around when is the best time to try, Am
I ovulating? So I really feel like one of the
first things that we should be focusing on is obviously
learning to track our cycle. And I mean, the way that I teach
it can be very involved. So without having to go all the
way into the rabbit hole, I feel like even just learning about
the role of your cervical fluid. So, you know, cervical fluid is
it can look like a clear stretchy fluid.
It can look like creamy hat, you know, white hand lotion.
And for anybody who's not on contraceptives, you may have
noticed that there's sometimes in the cycle that you feel kind
of slippery or wet down there. You might notice something on
your underwear. You might notice that there's
times when you're wiping and you know, the toilet paper just kind
of slides. And so I think it's really
helpful just as an intro to know that when you've you know, after
you've had your period and you start to see those types of
observations, that is your fertile time, that's your
fertile window. And when you're trying to
conceive, the best time to try would be when you actually are
observing that cervical fluid in the pre ovulatory phase, and
especially if you ever do observe that kind of clear raw
egg white type cervical fluid. So just from that standpoint, I
feel like that one piece of information is a really helpful
place to start because of course, we're all taught that
the cycle's always 28 days, that ovulation always happens on day
14. So a lot of women are always
kind of focused on that specific time frame and date.
And depending on how your cycle unfolds, your fertile window
could be earlier than that or later than that.
And so for some women, they might be missing out on the
opportunity. So I would say that's a very
practical and useful standpoint because what I always say is
that the timing isn't everything because, you know, for some
couples they are timing correctly and it's still not
happening. But without correct timing, you
don't have anything. And that's why we can use
fertility awareness as a method of birth control.
Mm hmm. So I mean, in terms of the
fertility conversation, obviously there's a lot more
that you can do. I know Lily and I talk
extensively about the role of nutrition as a way to really
support your body through fertility.
So I'm sure we'll get into that quite a bit.
And there's a number of lifestyle factors to focus on.
And I would also say that we want to focus also on the male
partners. So there's a, there's a whole
lot to that conversation, but just as a a good place to start,
I feel like just being aware of that.
And then it's not all about you. We should also be applying some
of those principles to your partner as well.
I love that and we'll definitely dig into some of those
nutritional tips and how to invite your partner into that
process as well. And I know it primarily appear
being a non-toxic skin care company.
One of the things we often educate our community on is the
reality of xenoestrogens and topical products and wanting to
help minimize endocrine disrupting ingredients in
personal care products. So if you don't mind touching on
that even a little bit too and how products we apply or even
period products and how can also impact fertility?
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, one of the really
interesting things when you get into tracking your cycle is that
you can kind of see. So if you were tracking let's
say your cervical fluid, if you were tracking your basal body
temperatures, you start to get like a lay of the land and a
healthy cycle tends to range somewhere between about 24 to 35
days with an average of about 29 days.
And as you are in that pre ovulatory phase, you would
expect to see several days of mucus leading up to ovulation.
After ovulation, you would expect a healthy luteal phase to
be about 12 to 14 days. And so once you kind of have
that general sense, then you can start to see if something is
disrupting your hormone balance. And that could be specific
observations that you're making or it could even be certain
symptoms that are cropping up at different times of the cycle.
And so, you know, when you start to realize that almost all of
the products that are not intentionally non-toxic contain
toxic chemicals, a lot of people don't necessarily think of their
skin as an organ. You know, anything you, it's put
on your skin, you should also be comfortable eating because it's
basically the same, right? It's being absorbed into it.
And so a lot of women when they are tracking their cycles and
they start to have certain concerns or different complaints
if they are then switching to non-toxic products.
I mean, I've heard clients share experiences where maybe they
were using menstrual products that were not organic.
And so if you didn't know, you know, there's a lot of different
chemicals and non organic tampons and pads and, and things
like that, who had, let's say, you know, period pain or
different issues that they were experiencing.
And some women find that just by switching, it goes away.
So whether it's just balancing hormones in the more general
sense or the more specific sense of noticing a significant impact
in your hormonal balance. And then as it as it pertains to
fertility, I mean, we have a whole chapter on toxins and how
that can have a negative effect on follicular development, sperm
development. So it's really important.
And one last thing I'll say on that topic is, you know, I
remember before I had my first son and working with clients
like who are trying to get pregnant, but they're not
pregnant yet. One of the questions I often ask
is, you know, would you still be using the same product if you
were pregnant now or would you use this product on your infant
so when you become a mom, I know for me, I went out and bought
all this, you know, brought different laundry detergent.
And so the question would be, well, why are you still using
it? Oh yeah, I feel like so many
women especially find primarily pure once they find out they're
pregnant because it's like no longer just about you, but it's
about this little life when even in that preconception phase,
like starting to make those changes even before the little
one is there is so important. Well, of course.
And I mean, if you think about it, part of the benefit of
reducing your exposure to these toxic chemicals is that now your
body doesn't have the additional burden of having to remove it.
And it allows your body's natural detoxification processes
to be even more effective. You know, because if you're
constantly bombarding yourself with all of these different
products, your liver is having to kind of do that.
And your liver is busy, your liver is always working.
So if you're giving it all this extra work to do, there's other
things that are also important that may not be happening.
So very important in terms of balancing hormones and
optimizing fertility. Do you have any helpful tips to
help mitigate the negative effects of toxins in fertility
and preconception health? I mean, I think the first step
is to, I think the first step is awareness, as I'm sure you
appreciate, you have to actually learn about the, the, the stuff
that's in your products. You have to start to understand
that even though it's really nice to smell like strawberries,
whenever you have products that have these artificial fragrance,
you really have to start to, to be aware of that.
So in terms of, you know, to how to mitigate, once you're aware,
then you can start to reduce and the awareness piece can be
really overwhelming because it, you can really go down a rabbit
hole with it. It's all of the things you put
on your skin. It's all the things you use to
wash your clothes. It could even be off gassing in
your carpets. It could be the stuff that comes
off your, your mattress, it's the pots, the nonstick pans it
like, so if you really go there, it can feel very overwhelming.
So, you know, once you become aware, then we have to kind of
like calm down and start to think of practical ways to do
it. So for a lot of my clients, it's
now that you're aware as you run out of these products, you know,
once it you've reached the end of the bottle, you look for a
natural alternative, you look for natural skin care brands,
you look for natural cleaners and those types of things.
And like little by little, you can sort it out.
And just to give a little bit of context, you know, I've, you
know, it's been a while, but I've, I've gone through this
process myself and it took years.
And some of the last things that I was doing recently would be
the whole house water filter. Like that wasn't the first thing
that I did, right? Because there's another thing,
right, Your water. But you know, you kind of
gradually make these changes and don't expect, I mean, some
people are super type A. If you want to do it all in a
month, good luck. But I think the rest of us
typically take some time to sort it out.
I love that we do as well try to make it more digestible and
sustainable and practical because it can be so easy to
feel overwhelmed by all these changes that need to be made.
So where would you recommend would be the best place to start
if someone has been wanting to conceive or feeling discouraged
or overwhelmed by all this awareness that they're gaining,
What do you have? Like start here.
Well, I think one thing I usually say when we get into
this conversation is kind of like the number one endocur
disrupting thing that no one ever just mentions in the
conversation would be hormonal contraceptive.
So certainly, you know, if you think about it, you know, even
though your lotion contains these, you know, estrogens
products, like unless you brought it from primarily pure,
right, it wasn't designed specifically to stop you from
ovulating, which the pill was. So I think, you know, there's
that. But beyond that, I think just
start to be aware of the things that you use every day.
So scented stuff, you know, still to this day, you go and
visit friends and you get in an Uber and you're just blasted by
the stuff. And so raising the awareness of
those kinds of things, I would say the stuff that you use every
day, the things you use to wash with your laundry detergent, you
know, stuff that's going to go on your sheets, just start
there. Your skin care products, because
again, you're putting it on all over everywhere.
So I think that would be the first place.
And then gradually start to look it up.
Like there's so much more I could say.
You could also talk about how you store your food and reducing
plastic exposure. And like, there's so much, but I
would just say pick one thing and start there.
It's perfect. Thank you so much for that
helpful insight. It's a great and so as a Mama of
three, I would love to hear too how you prepared for your
pregnancies through this fertility awareness and cycle
tracking. Well, so as you mentioned, I
have three children. My eldest is 12 and then my
middle is 9 and my baby is 2. So I would certainly say that I
certainly learned along the way and there was much that I didn't
know when I was pregnant with my first, but ultimately I did.
I have been tracking my cycle for over 2 decades.
And so I mean, that piece of it was so ingrained that I was able
to take it for granted. So what I mean by that is in my
20s, I was tracking my cycle to avoid pregnancy.
And so in that respect, when I was ready to conceive, my
husband and I would just like do it on the days we weren't doing
it before, right? So that part of it was was
really reassuring. And I think what was really
helpful about that is when you do track, you do know quite
soon, you know, if you're pregnant.
And so you know that aspect of it.
I don't know that there was much preparation with with regards to
the fertility worse piece, because I already have that
education knowledge. But in terms of preparation,
there's a lot of things that that we did.
I mean, of course, the way that we eat and prioritizing a lot of
the foods that Lily and I talk about in real Food for
fertility. So, you know, we talk a lot
about organ meats. We talk a lot about fish and
seafood. So I mean, organ meats are
really nutrient dense. There's just, you know, iron,
vitamin AB, vitamins, choline. It's such a rich, it's almost
one of the ways to think about liver, for example, is nature's
multivitamin. You know, if you ever wondered
200 years ago, they didn't have vitamins.
So what were people doing right? They were eating these nutrient
dense foods. Fish and seafood are great
sources of, you know, sink and vitamin B12 and, you know,
obviously the omega-3 fatty acids that really play a role in
supporting against sperm quality.
So there's a lot of just, it's not to say that I wouldn't want
to give the impression that my diet is so perfect.
I mean, but at the same time, we always emphasize these key foods
and the approach that I think that we take is you want to
incorporate as many of those as possible.
Full fat dairy products. I've been getting my raw milk
for, you know, I think it's, I started to get it when my second
was born. So almost 10 years.
This would be 10 years since we've had that.
And one of the things that I think is really important is
that, you know, even when I was, we were preparing for a second
baby, I mean, I don't know that I was so on my husband or
anything, but he really took a specific, he took steps to
reduce his alcohol consumption. And so I think a big piece of it
too is for both of you to do this together.
And it's often, I mean often, not all of the time, but
sometimes if you as the woman are cooking these foods, often
he's just eating them as well. So sometimes it's really easy.
But I think, you know, for us, that was a huge part of what we
did. And obviously we were really
intentional given how deep we are into this work.
So for my second child, we started eating this way a year
before we started trying. And similarly with Isabella,
because it's part of how we eat all the time anyways, but we
just kind of ramped it up a little bit.
Would you mind on that note, speaking more about nutrition's
impact on the sperm and egg quality?
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, what's really
interesting when you dive into the research about how the sperm
develops and how the egg develops.
So for women, you know, we're born with all the eggs that we
ever have. So when we're born, we have
anywhere from, you know, half a million to a million eggs.
And then over time, that number kind of gradually declines.
So the eggs are there, but they're not ready to go.
So there's a process of follicular development that
takes place. And the research is interesting
because kind of the most significant, you know, part of
that development takes place during about that three month,
you know, three to six months prior to when you're actually
ovulating that specific egg though that developmental
process. You know, some of the studies
suggest that it starts even 7-8 months before that.
But that kind of most significant period of time that
this follicle is most susceptible to those nutrient
inputs would be that kind of three to six month period.
So in terms of the, you know, and with sperm quality as well.
So the research tells us that it takes about 74 days for the
sperm to develop and to mature. So one way to think about that
is if your partner were to ejaculate today, that sperm is
going to be a result of whatever was happening three months
prior. So when this is released, look
at your calendar, look three months prior and think to
yourself, what was I doing at that point?
And that is really the largest contributor to the egg and sperm
quality. So with that in mind, I mean, we
one of the reasons that we really focus on this concept of
like preconception nutrition and taking time before in a, in a
perfect world, ideal, if you have the time, you know, at
least three to six months of focused nutrition is how we're
really going to support egg and sperm quality.
And in terms of how that plays out, I mean, when these
follicles are developing, if you, you know, one of the
challenges with that is, is commonly talked about as women
get older would be the increased rate of chromosomal
abnormalities or DNA issues or things like that.
And we can have some control over that by focusing on
nutrient dense foods, focusing on antioxidant foods to really
minimize the effects and support the optimal development, the
optimal chromosomal splitting that has to happen in order.
And it's really a miracle if you think about everything that has
to go right. Yeah, for this.
And so it's just really essential and it's specifically
in that kind of three to six month period leading up to it.
So fascinating. And I feel like that's quite
empowering too, because it's like it's, it's also not like
decades that have led to that. So it's like, OK, we can still
make these changes now and see that benefit and that positive
impact in the near future. So on that topic of nutrition as
well, love that you brought in the Oregon meats and more of
that ancestral way of eating, which is something we educate a
lot about at Primary Pure. So I would love to also kind of
look at some maybe fertility myths versus your perspective on
fertility and really how to optimize that.
And looking at some of maybe the more popular diets, even maybe
touching on vegetarianism or veganism.
And then even what are some like conventional nutritional advice
that's given that may not actually be as effective?
I mean, I feel like there's a lot of nutritional
recommendations and research that we share in real food for
fertility that that differs from the guidelines in a lot of
different ways. I mean, one of those
recommendations, for example, would be the protein, the focus
on protein. So, you know, in the book, we
talk extensively about protein and the role it plays in
follicular development and in normalizing the menstrual cycle,
even in ensuring that our bodies are the correct temperature,
even in thermogenesis. And so, you know, the, the, the
recommended daily allowance for a lot of nutrients and for
protein and for a lot of things, it wasn't really designed to
represent what would be optimal for fertility.
So some of the research that we share would indicate that, you
know, the ideal protein intake is anywhere from 1.5 to, you
know, 2.2g per kilo of body weight, which is significantly
higher than the RDA. And I think one of the great
things about the approach of looking at the menstrual cycle
charting and actually see what's happening.
So of course, I teach charting in a specialized way so that you
can really get a sense of what's going on.
You kind of get into the nitty gritty, the mucus and the
temperature, and that gives you essentially a kind of a
reflection of what's happening hormonally.
So, you know, with the protein recommendations, there's a lot
of different thoughts on that. And so, you know, there's some
people that would be in alignment with that
recommendation. It's certainly in alignment with
the recommendation for women who are athletic because obviously
the recommendation would be higher and there would be some
who might say, well, that's like too high or whatever.
But ultimately, if you look at what's happening in the cycle,
what we've seen is that if I'm working with somebody and
they're struggling with progesterone issues, which tend
to show up in the cycle as a short luteal phase or even
premenstrual spotting or low body temperature, Or maybe their
cervical mucus is really scant, indicating that maybe their
estrogen levels are optimal to be actually stimulating that
cervical mucus production. You know, when you add
sufficient protein, when you add sufficient fat, I mean, it's so
interesting that the fat conversation is so controversial
because we know that our, you know, ovarian hormones,
estrogen, progesterone, testosterone, are literally
synthesized from cholesterol. So it's interesting that we have
to have this conversation and that there's so much controversy
about including sufficient fat. But again, when you look at how
the cycle responds to incorporating sufficient protein
of that and high quality carbohydrates, you see for
yourself that it really allows women to produce enough hormones
to, for their body temperature to get in alignment, for their
luteophase to be long enough and often for some of those PMS
symptoms to reduce. And so that would be, you know,
I'm touching on kind of the, the myths around protein of that.
And then you mentioned some of the controversial dietary
things. I mean, it's, there's so many
diets and certainly there's a camp out there that would say
that a vegetarian or vegan diet would be optimal for fertility.
However, I would argue that the, the research wouldn't I, I don't
think the research matches. There's some really interesting
research that Lily pulls into chapter 2 of Real Food for
Fertility and really going into not only the concept of protein
just full stop, but the quality of protein as well.
And so there is research to suggest that, you know,
incorporating animal protein specifically can have a unique
positive impact, whether that's, you know, there was an
interesting study that she shared where they were looking
at PMS symptoms among women and based on the differences between
their protein intake and the women who were consuming the
animal protein had fewer symptoms.
And so there's, there's different research that would
indicate that, you know, there is we we need to have a
conversation about animal protein and, and, and how
beneficial it is. And, and then we have to look at
the menstrual cycle as the evidence.
So what I can say, just what I've seen over the years working
with lots of women looking at menstrual cycles is that, you
know, when we're really limiting all animal products, like no
animal products at all. So if we're going more on the
beacon end, it seems like there's often a limit to where
we can get to if we're trying to optimize hormone balance.
So it's almost like you have to kind of go into it.
And again, I'm looking at the menstrual cycle, looking at
optimizing hormonal balance, looking at optimizing luteal
phase function. There just seems to be a limit.
And often when women are starting to incorporate those
animal foods, we see incredible shifts.
So again, it's not about take my word for it, it's about look to
see what the research has to say and then also look at how the
cycle responds. And that is really going to be
the true test of of all of this. I love that.
I love that you keep going back to the cycle and letting that
speak to you. Obviously your first book, The
5th Vital Sign and how it really is that marker of health.
And so really tuning into our bodies and looking at the
messages it's sending us. So I think that's really
valuable of like making these changes and then tuning in to
see how you're seeing that impact overall.
And so we've obviously spoken a lot on the female perspective
for fertility. And so I would love for you to
speak to how can we also focus on the male side of things and
inviting our men into this conversation.
It's not just solely based on women's bodies, but obviously
optimizing fertility for men as well.
Well, I mean, you had asked about different fertility myths.
And I feel like one of the myths, if we want to call it
that, is that the fertility issue is a woman's issue.
And if there's something happening, if conception is
delayed or if you're struggling to conceive, that it must be an
issue on her side. And so again, when we look at
the stats, you know, 30% of fertility issues are solely
related to male infertility. And then up to 50% of the time.
So half of the time, if there is a fertility issue, there's at
least a male contributing factor.
And I mean, it's so interesting because if you think about it, I
mean, he's contributing 50% of the genetic material.
And there's just so much interesting research about how
important his contribution is. So there's research to suggest
that, you know, if his sperm is of poor quality or if there's
DNA damage or, you know, other various chromosomal
developmental issues that it can negatively impact the
development of your placenta. And there's, you know, even
research that talks about the quality of his sperm have an
impact on your child's likelihood of developing certain
childhood diseases. So I feel like in in terms of
bringing your partner into the conversation, we just have to
first start to raise that awareness.
And as soon as you say it, it's like, Oh, yeah, that makes that
makes perfect sense, right? Another thing that I'll say
about it is that after working with a lot of different women
who are trying to conceive, when I do have clients whose partners
have been tested, their results have been tested, they're often
like almost 100% of the time told that his results are fine.
And so that's a big topic that we tackle in Real Food for
Fertility. We have this really extensive
sperm chapter. There was a time when I wanted
to write a book about sperm. So instead of that, we wrote
this chapter. So it's kind of like full jam
pack full of information. But that's one of my biggest pet
peeves because basically we have the the sperm guidelines that
were set in 2010 by the World Health Organization.
And, you know, it's really interesting to look at the study
that was the foundation and basis for that recommendation.
And so, you know, they took approximately 2000 couples who
were trying to conceive and they were testing their sperm
quality, like the male sperm quality.
And so, you know, they had all these couples trying to
conceive. And so all of the couples that
were successfully able to conceive within one year, they
measured all of the sperm qualities of the men.
And so if you look at the study, they put them on a graph and
they organize them by centile. And so if you're looking at the
graph, you know, like back to math class, you have like the
5th centile, 10th, 25th, 97th or whatever.
So now you have the picture in your mind.
And in order to set those guidelines, they took the lower
5th centile. And that is what represents
normal according to the World Health Organization guidelines.
So it's really interesting because when I pull out the
study, you know, in a session and I show the client, they're
always like, what do you mean? Why?
And so I think that when you're setting a standard guideline,
they would have different requirements for public health
than we might for looking at what would be optimal.
So the first thing to understand is that those guidelines were
never set to be optimal. And so they were set for a
different reason. And I think they have to make
these decisions because if they're setting it at a certain
point, it means that if a person is lower than that, they're
going to, you know, recommend medical attention.
And I think there's some concern maybe on their part that if they
put it too high, they'll be too many false positives.
We also talk a little bit about how those guidelines have
changed. So there have been, I think,
four or five different iterations of those guidelines.
And so in 2010, it was like they made it a little bit lower than
it had been before. So the implications of that are
that there were men that previously would have been
identified for screening but now are not.
But all this is to say that, you know, for women who've been
trying to conceive and if their partner was tested and they were
told that they were fine, what we argue for, you know, in Real
Food for fertility is that you have this lower guideline that
is not optimal. And then if you look at studies
that are trying to determine what is actually optimal,
they're going to ask a different question.
So there was this one study and essentially they were looking
at, OK, at what point is the negative sperm quality starting
to have a negative impact on time to pregnancy?
So it's a very different question because they're trying
to say, you know, if you think about it after a certain point,
if he has like 600 million sperm, is it really helping you
to get pregnant faster? Like there's probably a point
where it doesn't have an impact. And so they identified a
specific marker of when it is it starts to have a negative
impact. And so their marker was about 48
million sperm per milliliter, like in terms of the
concentration, about 12% normal morphology.
So the sperm that actually just looks normal and about 63%
motility. So that was what they identified
as like beyond below this, we start to see a reduction or like
an increased time to pregnancy. And the World Health
Organization identifies 1515 million sperm per milliliter and
they identify 40% motility. And these words like you just
say the words, oh, motility, whatever it means the sperm that
are moving. And so it's like 60% aren't
moving. And then the morphology that
they list is 4%. And so again, 4% means out of
104 have a normal appearance and 96 have an abnormal appearance.
So basically you have these low parameters that the, so if you
had to test and your partner was told he's fine, he meets those
guidelines and we have what this study identified to be optimal.
And so in the middle we have this Gray area and that's what
we're trying to point out. Like that's the whole point of
this all what I just said. We want to be aware that there's
this Gray area where it doesn't mean your partner is not
fertile. You could get pregnant, but the
implications of his sperm being less optimal or that it could
take you longer. So that's where the nutritional
components come in. That's where these strategies
come in. That's where that time frame of
a minimum of three to six months come in because your partner
could be fine. But like we're talking about
your children here. No one wants fine.
We want optimal, we want the best possible health for our
children. And so armed with this
information, we can actually make a huge difference.
And it's wild, like, you know, I've had the, the, the pleasure
of seeing clients kind of follow through with a lot of these
things. Do the sperm test initially or
have that initial amount work at this for several months.
And the one great thing about sperm that is different from egg
quality, we can't just go and take an example, you know, is
that you can actually see the positive improvements and it can
be very exciting and it obviously then can improve your
chances of conception as well. Fascinating.
I know I appreciate all the research and the background and
just all that detail. I know our our community does as
well. So thank you for just unpacking
all that More. So would the ways to optimize
male fertility be essentially the same for women in those
product and lifestyle swaps and incorporating more animal based
proteins? And is there anything different
than men that men should be focusing on?
Well, I think overall there are definitely these kind of
foundational tenants that apply to both parties.
So obviously increasing the quality of the foods that you're
consuming. You know, we called the book
Real Food for Fertility. It's obviously part of Lily's
series Real Food. But if you think about what does
it mean real food, it means food that is as close to natural as
possible. So obviously, you know, we're
not purists to the point that you can ever buy anything in a
package. But just to have that concept
of, you know, what does it mean to have processed food or highly
processed food? And how does that affect the
quality of the food? So if you have, you know, flour
or sugar, for example, you could put it out on the table and we
wouldn't be able to tell what grade it came from or the sugar,
like what what plant it came from because it's so highly
processed. So you can think about that when
you're trying to think about what is real food.
If you know what it is, you can look at it and you can
understand where it came from. You know, starting with that
aspect, looking at the quality of your food and then starting
to incorporate. So I would say, you know, that's
part of the foundational aspect of it, incorporating some of the
foods that we've talked about that are highly nutrient dense.
Of course, for both male and female fertility play a really
important role. And I think some of the unique
aspects that men can focus on. You know, often when I think
about improving male fertility, I feel like I always think about
this analogy of like, you know, what if, if you're driving a
car, you know, you have the, the gas and you have the brakes.
So the brake would be, you know, smoking all the pot, the
marijuana products, there'd be smoking cigarettes.
There's a lot of evidence to suggest that that has a negative
impact on sperm quality. There is evidence that suggests
that, you know, sauna or hot tubing, like having the
testicles hot a lot has a negative impact.
So there are specific things we want to look at for men.
And those would be my example of like taking your foot off the
brake, because sometimes when you have a really poor sperm
quality test, sometimes there are very specific kind of red
flags that are like, oh, well, maybe if we improve this habit,
then that would improve it. And then in terms of putting
your foot on the gas, that comes in terms of the diet and really
prioritizing key nutrients. So we know that vitamin A plays
a really crucial role in sperm production to the point that
there are research studies that have looked at kind of
interfering with vitamin A metabolism in men as a
contraceptive. So, so there's animal studies
that would indicate that vitamin A is like the on and off switch.
So that's where like the liver or the cod liver oil kind of
piece comes in. You know, folate plays a key
role in sperm development. Zinc plays a key role, vitamin D
in both male like, and all of these nutrients play a key role
in both male and female fertility as well.
So just really prioritizing that I think on both sides.
And I mean, I could go, but I'll kind of pause, pause there.
So helpful. I think it's great too, just to
give these practical pieces of input for both parties.
And I'm it like it takes 2 to tango.
And so empowering both the women and the man and taking those
proactive choices to optimize, as you said, optimize.
So circling back to the pill, which you mentioned is one of
the first places to start for a woman who is in that process of
wanting to conceive, when would you suggest having it removed or
stopping taking the pill in preparation for pregnancy?
I mean, I feel like with that question, this is something I
could talk on for for such a long time.
I think the first thing I'll say is that there's not necessarily
one answer for everyone because there's a couple different
situations. But in terms of the pill, I
think what what I like to do is I like to actually go to the
research because what can happen is when you learn about some of
the negative aspects of hormonal birth control.
So especially the conversation about the side effects and how
it can have a negative impact on mood and on sex drive and, and
nutrient deficiencies. I mean, we know that it's
associated with like causing deficiency of B vitamins like
folate and B, like these are the vitamins that we need in order
to have a healthy pregnancy. So there are some kind of
general aspects of it that that everyone should be aware of.
And I think that the most important message that I like to
share about the pill is that, you know, there's no evidence to
suggest that the pill has a permanent negative impact on
fertility. So I feel like that's good news.
So although I'm very critical about the pill, I don't want to
be kind of overstating this issue.
But with that said, there is enough information in the
research to show that it does create this temporary negative
effect to this temporary sub fertility when a woman comes off
the pill. And that's certainly exacerbated
by long term use. And the research typically
defines long term as two or more years, which is interesting
because when when I say that people are always like, what?
Because a lot of women are using the pill for five years, 10
years, 15 years. I had a client who used it for
30, right? So, so that's something to
consider. So what we can learn from the
research. And this is a whole topic.
There was this paper that recently came out recently, like
2024. And it was this whole, I feel
like it was this whole damage control thing because they were
kind of, you know, all of these health influencers have been,
you know, talking negatively about the pill.
And so we're here to set the record straight.
And so they kind of like glazed over a lot of the the issues to
try to minimize them. But when we look at the
research, one of the ways to look at how the pill impacts
fertility is to look at the time to pregnancy studies.
And those are studies that have women who are on contraception
and then they come off and they kind of compare them to women
who hadn't taken contraception and see like, how long is it
taking them to conceive? And so I take issue with some of
these studies because they're often presented in a very
specific way. So most of these time to
pregnancy studies, basically they take these women off the
pill and then at the year mark, they look at how many of them
got pregnant. And then they say, oh, you know,
80 something percent got pregnant in a year.
So it's, it's good. We're like, it's, it's fine.
It's the same as regular, you know, conception rates.
So we're good to go. But when you look a little bit
deeper, those studies exclude anybody who had any type of
cycle issues. So if you had irregular cycles,
if you were put on the pill for period pain, if you were put on
the pill because you had, I don't know, like you didn't have
a cycle at all, you're not included in the study.
And we know that there's a lot of non contraceptive reasons
that women are being put on the pill.
So first of all, if you were on the pill legitimately to quote
regulate your cycle, which we could talk about, then that
study doesn't apply to you. Furthermore, those studies look
at the 12 month mark period and full stop, they don't look at
well, how like how many months? Like was there like did they
conceive in month 2 or did they conceive in month 6 or did they
conceive in month 9? And these are very important
questions because of what literally happens when women
come off the pill. So when you have lived your
whole life under the lie that we can get pregnant every day and
under the immense fear of an impending pregnancy, and you've
basically spent your whole life like trying to avoid pregnancy,
right? At all costs, you're under the
impression that when you come off the pill, you're going to
get pregnant immediately. And so by month, maybe month one
or two, you might be like, OK, but by month three, you're
already freaking out. By month 6, you're at the
fertility clinic. And by month 12, you might have
already done some procedure. Like this is how this plays out
for women. So one of the studies that I
shared, I think I shared it in both books, was the study where
they actually broke it down month to month.
And so they had women who had used condoms.
They had women who would use like the regular kind of
combined synthetic estrogen progestin pill.
They had women who came off the hormonal IUD and they had women
who also use the shot and the implant and when they broke it
down month to month, the women who had stopped using condoms so
non hormonal methods like their cycles didn't need to go through
any type of transition. Four months was the average time
to conception the combined pill 8 months.
So double the time, average time to conception the shot, 18
months, which I mean, the shot is not my favorite.
It certainly does have the the kind of longest, most
significant suppressive effect on ovulation.
But that study is very telling because in that study, it took
the women who were on the pill twice as long on average to
conceive. Now, of course, some women get
off the pill and they conceive immediately and some women dope.
But that's one of the studies that shows that there is this
temporary suppressive effect. And I would say that some of the
scary stats, there's a couple scary stats that I've shared
like the the the stats that kind of make people the most nervous.
And so one of those is the effect of the pill on ovarian
reserve parameters. And so women who are on the pill
across the board have lower ovarian reserve parameters.
And that includes ovarian volume and includes AMH levels, anti
malaria and hormone and antral follicle count.
And I mean, if you think about it logically, well, of course it
does because what does the pill do?
So different formulations and different hormonal
contraceptives have different, you know, like modes of action.
But generally speaking, like if we're talking about just the
combined synthetic estrogen progest, and I always make a
point of saying it because it's not the same estrogen, right?
But the those, the primary mode of action of, of, of those is to
depressed ovulation and that's why they work.
So this is part of the strategy. And they do that by interfering
with the hypothalamic pituitary ovarian communication that's
happening. So they shut down ovarian
function. So then logically, if we're just
stopping that function, then they're not, they're not in use.
So it does make sense that those ovarian parameters, ovarian
reserve parameters are suppressed.
So the scary stat is that the ovarian volume in women on the
pill has been shown to be, you know, up to 50% less, meaning
that the like shrinks like, right?
Like that's why it's the scary stat.
So, you know, again, that information, when you look at
the studies that are looking at this, there's no research to
indicate that those changes are permanent.
So of course, when you bring it up, people are like, Oh my God,
shrink it, the ovaries. But again, so there was a, a
really interesting study that looked at this and it was a
fertility preservation study. So sometimes when you want to
find out the research, you have to go to where the money is.
So of course, fertility preservation is when you have a
woman who is, you know, concerned about her future
fertility and she's trying to either save egg, you know,
follicles, egg follicles, or she's trying to save embryos.
And So what they were finding was that women who were doing
this, if they're, if they just stopped taking contraceptives
and immediately go in for the procedure, they weren't getting
as good of a yield. And so they did the study to
see, OK, well, if you come off the pill and just do it right
away versus if you wait, then is it going to improve?
And so in those studies, they saw that if you, you know,
waited six to seven months or more, the AMH values would
improve, the overall parameters would improve, and the OOH site
yield was better, too. So then what do you think the
researchers suggested? They said, oh, well, if you're
doing fertility preservation, then it would be a really good
idea to wait. You know, come off the pill
about six to seven months before you want to do the procedure,
and you'll get a better yield. So just think about this for a
minute. You know why doesn't that advice
carry over for women who are trying to conceive naturally,
right? So this is the longest answer to
your question, right? The long answer.
Right. But ultimately the first part of
the answer would be, okay, so now we understand that there is
this temporary period of sub fertility postpaid.
It doesn't mean that you can't get pregnant, but it's like, I
have insurance for my car. I don't expect to get into an
accident, but I know I could. So I have this insurance so that
I'm prepared if I do. And so I feel like the approach
that we should take when we're thinking about when to come off
contraception is to be aware that there's this temporary
period of self fertility so that we can plan ahead.
Because nobody tells you this. The amount of women that I've
spoken to who you know, I'm getting married in the fall or
my partner and I are planning to get pregnant next year.
So I made an appointment with my doctor to ask if I should come
off the pill. And I'm always like, OK, so you,
you like put on your clothes. Like you took a shower that
morning. You put on your clothes.
You drove across town to have your doctor tell you like, no,
you don't need to come off early.
If you, if you come off now, you'll just get pregnant right
away. Don't worry about it.
You can just, and this is like the standard thing I've heard
over and over again, but there was something inside of you that
caused you to ask that question, right?
Because there was something that was like, maybe I should give
myself a little bit of a break. So I really think that since no
one is talking about this, we have to go to the research.
And so minimum, I would say six months, but you know, ideally I,
I feel like 12 months should be the minimum, but that, that's my
perspective on it. And the second part of it is
that, you know, if you were put on the pill for a specific
issue, if you know that you didn't have regular cycles, if
you know your period pain was super extreme, if you know that
you weren't cycling at all, then I would say 18 months to two
years. And that means coming off the
pill when you're not trying to get pregnant, like when you're
still actively avoiding finding another alternative so that you
can actively prevent pregnancy until you're ready.
But giving your body time to normalize and also taking the
time to just to see the lay of the land.
Like maybe you've been on the pill for eight years.
Maybe you've been on for 10. You don't even know what your
normal cycle is like. You know, this would give you an
opportunity to track your cycle and start to see what's going
on. Observe your cycle.
Go through that transition period without the added stress
of also trying to conceive at the same time.
I love that. And I think too then kind of
moving into obviously the pill is often prescribed to not
balance these symptoms, but more to mask them.
And there's so many symptoms of our period and our menstrual
cycle that leads to that prescription.
And so I would love to kind of turn the conversation into that
perspective now. And so looking at what like, how
can we begin to reframe our periods, especially for women
who are suffering with these more severe symptoms like you've
just mentioned? And how do we optimize our
health instead of just enduring those symptoms and that
discomfort or masking it with the pill?
It's such an important conversation.
I think one of the ways is to start recognizing that your
cycle and your period, it's not only important when you're
trying to get pregnant. I think we have to start
understanding that as if, you know, if you're a woman of
reproductive age, your cycle is a part of the whole picture.
And essentially, you know, This is why I titled my first book
The Fit Vital Sign because it is that's exactly what it is.
So a vital sign and some of the most common that we're familiar
with would be like your blood pressure or your heart rate or
your respiratory rate. And so we all know that if your
doctor measures your blood pressure, that there is a normal
range, and if it's too high or if it's too low, it also
provides a doctor with some idea of what could be causing it to
be too high. So I think the first thing is to
have a different understanding of our cycle as when we think of
it in this light, then instead of thinking it's separate from
yourself and it's just problematic for no reason, you
start to understand that if your cycle is really off, if you are
having irregular cycles or if you do have really intense pain,
that's your body's way of trying to communicate with you.
I mean, your body can't like e-mail you, right?
So it can't communicate with you in that way.
So your body communicates with you through symptoms and when we
start to understand that those imbalances are a reflection of
what's happening, that's the first step.
And then the second step is to learn about what are the things
that we can do to support hormonal balance so that we can
bring it back. I think that's one of the
challenges is that, you know, when you're at the beginning of
this journey until you start kind of diving into the rabbit
hole and learning more about it and finding resources to really
support your body's natural function, you might just feel
like, well, this is always going to be this way.
There's nothing I can do. And many of us have have been
told that. I mean, you might go to your
doctor and you say, look, I'm only ovulating.
Like when I was I had AI had a photo shoot.
This is it this week. This has been a busy week.
I had a photo shoot this week. And so I went to this, I went to
Mac to get lipstick. And so, you know, what do you
do, right? I'm talking to the girl, the
counter and she tells me that she gets her period once or
twice a year. And you know, and this is this
happens to me all the time because everywhere if someone
asks me what I do, right? So this is like one of the
gazillion times has happened. But basically, you know, this is
my issue. I went to the doctor and they
were just like, go on the pill. And she's like, I didn't want to
go on the pill because, you know, I feel like there's
actually something wrong. And so this is a part of the
conversation. We have to shift.
So many women have had that experience where they, they know
that there's something wrong and they're just being told to go on
the pill. But what the pill does is the
pill it, we talked about it, it suppresses ovulatory function.
And so I like to teach with analogies.
So I have to ensure this analogy.
So, you know, if I had like a summer house, which would be so
fun and you know, I go up there and you know, there's like water
all over the place because I have a leaky pipe or like my
pipe burst or whatever the case. So the pill is like this
situation where I just shut off the water.
I didn't actually fix the pipe though, so I shut off the water.
I get the people in to help with the water remediation or
whatever, and then I go back home and the following summer I
go back up there. Well, what happens if I turn on
the pipe if I didn't fix the pipe?
So I feel like, yeah, the first step is to start to understand
that the cycle is actually part of us.
It's reflecting what's happening health wise.
And like you said, the pill just is masking these issues.
And one of the challenges is that some of the issues that
that show up in the menstrual cycle can imply really
significant things. So for example, if somebody has
is not cycling at all, so a woman of reproductive age, she
used to have her cycle and she just doesn't have a period for
six months or more often that's, you know, caused by hypothalamic
amenorrhea, which is characterized by under nutrition
over exercise and stress, like a combination of those.
So basically you're not getting even enough nutrition to to to
ovulate like to support normal hormone function.
And if a woman has that condition and it goes on for a
long period of time, I mean, she can develop early onset
osteoporosis. Like this is a serious issue.
And so when we go to the doctor and they put us on the pill as
the first port of call, that like, that is not like, I don't
think that's the appropriate response.
I feel like we should be assessing her dietary intake.
We should be looking at this more significantly because she
could bring her period back through a process of nutrition
and, you know, identifying what's happening with her
exercise, looking at her stress, looking at all of these factors.
And then she doesn't have to develop osteoporosis.
Or we could put her on the pill and just ignore it and and then
what does she do later on if she wants to get pregnant?
Wow, I think that's so fascinating as well because it
invites in that long term perspective.
I think so often we're just in that short term temporary
mindset of those quick fixes really.
And often we educate a lot on holistic health and healing.
And, and really it's it's been months or years that have
contributed to these imbalances. It's going to take time to
restore them. And so looking at some of these
imbalances in the body, what would you say then are actually
markers of health looking at the menstrual cycle and what are
signs of a healthy cycle? Yeah.
I mean, I alluded to a few of them.
So I mentioned that a healthy cycle typically somewhere
between 24 to 35 days average of about 29 days.
So I think it's helpful to to note that the cycle doesn't
always have to be exactly 28 days for it to be healthy.
If we if I take you through the different phases of the cycles,
if we start with the period, the first day of your true flow
would be the first day of your period, the first day of your
cycle. And, you know, a healthy period
typically is averaging about four to five days and we would
expect it to start kind of moderate to heavy and then, you
know, gradually taper off. There can be some changes in
flow. But you know, you would expect
I, I, I usually say the period should be like a sentence.
It should have a beginning, a middle and an end, and then it
should be over. And so if you're having bleeding
that's going on for days or weeks, if you're having kind of
bleeding throughout the cycle, it's not uncommon for women to
have spotting leading up to their period.
But those situations are not optimal, and we should be
looking at those. And, you know, one of the things
about the period is that it's also very common for women to
experience pain with their periods.
And although it's common, again, I'm always here with my
analogies. Imagine any man in your life who
had such severe pain in his penis that for several days of
the month, he maybe couldn't even go to work.
No one would say that that's OK. You know, I think the only time
that we think about pain as being kind of an acceptable part
of it, a natural process, would be childbirth.
And so that's something that that we should talk about.
You know, while it's common for women to experience pain, you
know, I, I delved into the research on periods.
I wanted to have a really good understanding of what was
happening there. And so a period is a normal
inflammatory process by which we shed the functional layer of our
endometrium. And so in order for that process
to happen, there is a certain amount of inflammation that has
to take place in order for this lining to be shed.
And so from that perspective, when they compare women who have
kind of moderate to severe period pain to women who are
not, the women with the severe, you know, moderate to severe
period pain are having upwards of four times the level of
prostaglandins, which is an inflammatory marker.
So just by looking at the research, I mean, if there's a
difference between the women who don't have pain in the women who
do have pain and they have higher inflammatory markers,
then even just at the most basic level period pain would be an
indication of, you know, more significant inflammation in
these women all the way up to a more severe condition like
endometriosis, which is a really severe, chronic debilitating
issues. So back to like what's normal.
I would say we, and it's funny because sometimes I get pushed
back from from saying that, you know, pain isn't normal and
menstruation, cause a lot of people say, well, it is normal,
it's common. But I think again, our body is
trying to speak to us and if we don't listen to the whispers,
they become screams. So, you know, and a lot of women
with moderate pain where it's not so severe can achieve a
complete resolution of that by focusing on reducing
inflammatory markers. Some women that have more severe
and intense pain, it's going to be more of a process.
Like you said, if it took all these years for this process to
develop, it's not just immediately going to resolve
overnight, but most women can experience some relief of their
period pain and that would indicate that it's a normal
process going awry. So, you know, and once so to
kind of keep this going, so I just talked about the period.
So to kind of get into that first half of the menstrual
cycle, signs of health, first of all are that the cycle is
ovulatory. And in order for the cycle to
fall within that 24 and a 35 day period, you know, ovulation has
to happen somewhere between days 10 and about 22 or so.
And so we would look at kind of the quality of that follicular
phase. We would look at, you know, are
you making cervical mucus? In a healthy cycle, we would
expect two to seven days of mucus.
Are you having at least one day where you're making some of that
clear stretchy cervical fluid that looks like raw egg whites?
And we could also look at your mood.
How are you feeling? You know, what's what's going
on. Once you've ovulated, then
that's when your body starts to produce significant
progesterone. And so in a healthy luteal
phase, we would expect it to last about 12 to 14 days.
And you know, in a healthy luteal phase, you're producing
significant progesterone and it kind of it goes up and it peaks
at mid luteal if you don't conceive.
And then it gradually, which is the keyword lowers and, and then
you get your period. And so one of the signs of
hormonal imbalance, especially that we can see in the post
ovulatory phase would be, you know, women who have a sharp
drop in their progesterone where it's kind of stopped like kind
of coming down before it should be.
That's associated with increased PMS symptoms in really severe
cases, PMDD, it's associated with that spotting that you see
before your period. So there's a lot that we can
gather just by paying attention to the cycle.
And again, this is going back to that concept of the vital sign
where when you understand your cycle that way, then first of
all, it demystifies a whole lot because now you kind of know
what's going on. But you can really start to see
how you can kind of tell if your hormones are balanced or if
they're not. And it's a really, I think it's
a really powerful way to kind of gauge your hormone health.
Definitely and I feel like so many of us, at least I feel like
in our generation weren't raised with this education.
Like honestly I'm 38 and only a few years ago did I come to
realize oh I have 4 phases in my cycle.
How? How am I in my mental late 30s
and only just learning this information?
And so I think this is a very empowering conversation that I'm
so excited to share. Even if women have been familiar
in tracking their cycles and aware of their phases, I think
it's just a good reminder of just really tuning in with our
bodies and using our menstrual cycle as this 5th vital sign and
not as something to like be annoyed by or to disregard.
But when we really look at it as a marker of our health, it can
be very empowering and very transformative.
And can I say one thing about that?
Because, you know, and I want to acknowledge like some women do
have a, a really rough go at their menstrual cycle.
So for some women, like it is annoying, it is uncomfortable.
Some women have really extreme pain and just a lot of different
symptoms. And so, you know, I don't want
to paint this picture that it's all rainbows and sunshine.
But again, if we look at it as that this is your body's way of
communicating to you. Because I think the biggest
issue in women who've had a lot of these negative experiences is
that they really have to struggle to find the answers.
They really have to struggle many times to have a doctor take
them seriously. The stats on endometriosis are
just ridiculous. On average, it takes a woman 8
to 12 years to get a diagnosis. There was this study that I kind
of allude to in in the endometriosis section.
The study was a qualitative study.
I always find it kind of fun when I find a qualitative study
where they're actually talking to the people and hearing what
they say. Anyways, so they called the
study that one doctor because it was a thing.
The theme that kept coming up, they interviewed all these women
who were ultimately diagnosed with endometriosis and many of
them taken, you know, for a decade or, you know, to get
someone to listen to them to get.
And it was, they would always say it was that one Doctor Who
told me, have you heard of endometriosis?
Or that one Doctor Who took them seriously and actually pushed
them to get those additional testing.
So I just want to kind of say that because it it's it's hard.
It's not easy. But if we reframe why you're
having the symptoms, then at least gives you some hope that
you can find the answer. A. 100%.
So Lisa, I know that you often speak to your custom protocols
and obviously working directly with a woman and seeing how
their cycle is speaking to them. Yet do you have any general
holistic recommendations for more of these unwanted or
unwelcomed period symptoms such as mood swings and period pain,
which I know you mentioned lowering inflammation markers or
even hormonal acne. Would love to just hear your
perspective on any holistic support that would be
beneficial. Yeah, and I mean.
I know that you mentioned like one of the benefits about diving
into the menstrual cycle is that we can really customize based on
what's actually working for the cycle.
But one of the things that I tend to like to focus on are
what I often refer to as the foundational factors.
Because when we kind of start there, we can often reduce some
of the the symptoms or even just the intensity of them and really
focus on what's what's happening.
So for example, many women under eat protein specifically in fat
and I know in real food for fertility, there's a variety of
places where we share just really interesting research on
how you know, the the link between women who are under
eating protein or fat specifically and how it can
disrupt ovulatory function. So I think one of the most
consistent themes that I've seen working with clients is that,
you know, many of us are just, you know, inadvertently under
eating. It could be in effect from the
90s to focus on calories and, and a lot of women are really
concerned about weight loss. And that's a whole conversation
about how to approach it. But I think the questions we
have to ask in terms of balancing hormones and, you
know, overcoming certain period issues, as you mentioned, for
me, it always comes down to what is the most important thing for
this client right now. Because if your biggest concern
are those hormonal imbalances or you're having really severe kind
of PMS, sometimes even bordering into PMDD territory where it's
having a negative impact on your days.
If you're trying to conceive and you have really significant
concerns about your cycle, then I think the first thing we need
to do is really look at some of those foundational factors.
So, you know, one of the things that we've already talked about
is just the importance of getting enough protein.
And again, you've, you kind of brought up how many different
diets there are. And now everyone has their own
curated social media. Well, I didn't grow up with
social media. You know, I graduated from high
school in the year 2000. And so I didn't have a cell
phone at all. And social media didn't come
into play until far later. And now everybody's phone has a
different curated feed. And so everybody has all of
these different ideas about what it means to be healthy.
And one of the things, I mean, I could take this in a lot of
directions, but one of the the things that I always kind of
pick on is that a lot of us follow these male influencers
who talk about these ideal ways to eat, but maybe aren't the
best for the female body, right? And so in terms of, you know,
those foundations, I would say ideally what we recommend is to
have three meals a day to start your day with breakfast, so not
to skip breakfast. So we could talk a little bit
about the intermittent fasting influence if you want, but in
order to support hormone function, what the research
would indicate and what we found is that we want to really have
that nutritional foundation. So three meals a day with
sufficient protein, fat and high quality carbohydrates.
It sounds really simple. And I know sometimes you say
that and people are like, but it's not about what you know,
it's about what you're doing. I mean, anyone who's listening,
think about the last seven days, How many days did you have
breakfast? And when you did have breakfast,
you know, did you have sufficient protein in that?
And I mean, one of the ways to check to check if you had
sufficient protein in that in your breakfast was like, how,
how long were you satiated? So I mean, I grew up eating
oatmeal every day for breakfast. I'm not anti oatmeal, you know,
but you know, I, I had the experience of eating my oatmeal
for breakfast and being hungry 30 minutes later.
So, but when we're talking about supporting hormones, it's
incredible what a difference that can make.
There's even studies that show that women who eat breakfast
have a lower risk for, you know, period pain where there's,
there's studies that kind of link the breakfast aspect.
There's stories that show, you know, women with PCOS who just
start their day with a higher protein breakfast, that it helps
to normalize some of those cycle issues.
So, so that would be one of the first things I would say, let's
look at the nutritional aspects. And you're not going to have
balanced hormones if you're skipping meals, you're not going
to have balanced hormones if you're just not eating enough.
And we also have to look at your activity level because again,
you know, if I pause and talk a little bit about a stereotype,
So stereotypically, a lot of men when they're working out,
they're trying to bulk up. So a lot of men when they work
out are going to incorporate more protein or more calories.
And women, stereotypically, we're often trying to lean up.
So it doesn't even occur to us that we might need to eat more
even though we're moving our body more.
And you see this in the cycle. So again, you know what I
typically see. So let's say, for example, you
mentioned the hormonal acne and you mentioned the mood swings.
So if I have a client that might be struggling with some of those
issues, it's not uncommon if we look at the menstrual cycle to
see that she's struggling with her luteal phase.
And that could either be that it's too short or it could be
that she's seeing some spotting, or it could be that she just has
some really heavy intense PMS symptoms that are specifically
around that time. And so before I jump into
magical supplement territory and all that stuff, there's a place
for supplements. Of course, we want to get those,
excuse me, we want to get those foundations really strong.
So, you know, it sounds, it sounds easy, it sounds simple,
but it's not. And I can even jump into some of
the very common trends and habits that we see.
One of the kind of controversial things, and I think we were
talking a little bit about this before we started recording is a
caffeine consumption, right? So it's, it's, it's
controversial, I would say because it's very common, it's
very acceptable and people love their coffee, right?
And again, if you drink your coffee every day and your cycle
is totally fine and you have no hormonal issues, like no
hormonal concerns, no fertility issues and we don't have to talk
about it. Like that's great.
Do you do you think, but when I'm working with clients, it's
if we also have these hormonal imbalances that we just should
have a conversation so that you can be a little bit aware about
how coffee or caffeine consumption could be
contributing. And so one of the ways that I, I
see caffeine contributing to hormonal imbalance is a bit of
an indirect function because if you are drinking coffee first
thing in the morning and pushing breakfast till 10/11/12,
whatever, then you need to be aware that caffeine is an
appetite suppressant. So this is something that I've
seen very, very consistently where you know, you have a
suspicion that your client is under eating because you're
looking at their menstrual cycle and their food diary and maybe
they're either intentionally or unintentionally skipping
breakfast. And coffee is not breakfast, for
the record. And so again, I've seen huge
shifts where my clients are kind of like they do the experiment,
they cut out the coffee for a cycle, they end up sleeping
better and all this stuff after the week of feeling horrible
from the coffee withdrawals. But what tends to happen is they
naturally are all of a sudden hungry now in the mornings.
So that's the whole piece of it. We can talk about sleep quality.
I mean, if you're not getting good quality sleep, your
hormones will be balanced. And then once we address and
there's there's others, I mean, obviously we touched on
xenoestrogen exposure, chemical exposure.
So you know, that would be one of the foundational factors as
well. Really looking at your products
and your exposures, venomizing, pesticides, all of those kinds
of things, especially as it relates to fertility.
There were some really interesting studies on male
fertility. So the studies often show a
positive effect for men eating leafy greens and high
antioxidant foods and and also citrus fruits because of the
high antioxidant quality. But the studies where the men
are eating pesticide laden leafy greens as opposed to organic
show a specific benefit to eating organic to reduce the
pesticides. So, you know, there's a lot of
these different foundational aspects that we want to focus
on. And then once we have that in
line, what's really interesting is you often see a general
overall improvement absolutely in mood and all of these things.
And then if you still have some of those lingering symptoms,
like if it brings you 60% of the way there or 80% of the way
there, then we can look at introducing some key supplements
and looking deeper to see if there's other contributing
factors. Like for the acne piece, maybe
we need to look at, you know, there's some studies that show
that zinc supports right normal, like reducing acne and obviously
looking at gut health and different factors.
And you know, with with PMS symptoms, boosting progesterone
further, focusing on magnesium, focusing on key nutrients.
Even vitamin C has been shown to support progesterone production
luteophase. But what I always go back to is
that if you start with the supplements without addressing
the foundations, you may get some benefit, but you're not
going to get the full benefit if you start with the foundations
and then use supplements. The hint is in the word
supplement. You're supposed to supplement
what you're doing and if you have the nutritional
foundations, if you are improving the micronutrient
intake as well as getting sufficient macros.
So the macronutrients, the protein, the fat, the
carbohydrates, we need that. Those are the building blocks
that we need in order to make hormones, in order to normalize
all of this. The micronutrients are what we
need to make everything function properly.
It's what we need to optimize the egg quality.
It's what we need for all of these different functions in the
body. So that's the foundation and
then we can add supplements. And truly what I found is that
that's when you really see the best overall result.
And so it does take time and work and effort.
I can sit here and talk about, oh, just eat breakfast,
whatever. But a lot of my clients are
super busy and we spend a ton of time strategizing around, well,
what can that look like? What are some of the options?
You know, you're super busy. How can you organize this?
Like can you pre plan what you're going to have on hand in
your office? So a lot of it is the practical.
I hear what you're saying, but I don't have time to XYZ.
How can I do this and make this a real part of my life on a
regular basis? Do you have any practical tips
to help busy woman, busy Mama to actually put these into
practice? Yeah.
I mean, one of the things is that it depends on what your
life looks like, and it also depends on how much of A
priority it is for you. So one thing I know for sure is
that no one has time. I mean, what woman do you know
over the age of 20 that just sits around all day and has all
this time, regardless of whether you have children yourself or
whether you have a family, you have friends, you have nieces,
nephews, you have job, you have right?
Like all of us have are busy. None of us have time.
So the first of all, the first thing is like, we just have to
acknowledge that there's not going to be this like sky
opening, like time. That's just going to open up for
you. You have to decide that it's
important. And then the second part of it
is you have to kind of look at the reality of your mornings or
your evenings and think like what is doable.
So you know, some of our, you know, some of my clients over
the years, they'll do a shake and that'll be the way for them
to get it in. Some of my clients will do
leftovers. So leftovers are a wonderful
option for breakfast because you can get in your protein.
And I think it also shifts like who decided that breakfast was
like a croissant and a bagel? I mean, I always from a
practical standpoint, even if we're not like, can we just
pause from the nutritional benefit?
Can we just talk about the practical aspect?
I'm a busy woman. I'm like, there's all kinds of
stuff going on. I don't have time to be hungry.
Hangry all the time I don't have time to be right like you we, we
have to think about breakfast as an actual meal and I think that
is really helpful so and and that helps us to get out of
thinking that it has to look a certain way.
So if you made soup the night before, you could have a little
bit of that with a little bit of the protein that you had if you
so we have to be creative. A lot of my clients will do
eggs, they'll, you know, boil a bunch of eggs and have them like
hard boiled egg or soft boiled egg or whatever.
So, you know, and I'm sure that in the show notes page, I mean,
there's like Lily has some great, great articles with, I
think she literally just released an article with like 25
breakfast ideas and half of them aren't eggs.
So for people that don't necessarily want eggs, right?
So there's a lot of different things that you can do.
I think the best thing, I can't sit here and say this is what's
going to work best for everybody, but I've shared some
ideas that I've, I'm sure I've sparked some, some kind of ideas
for everyone who's listening. And I feel like just take 10
minutes and write down, you know, 5 things that could work
for you and don't, they don't need to be perfect.
They don't. You don't have to take a picture
of it and put it on Pinterest. It just has to work.
And ideally it would have sufficient protein and be
balanced. Balanced macro nutrients,
protein, fat and some carbohydrates.
I love that because I feel like too, when we prioritize that
breakfast and these habits and practices that you've suggested
and mentioned, I feel like it actually allows us to be more
productive during the day. And I feel like it just saves
time because then we're not scrounging for snacks or
whatever we can find and then we feel pretty terrible come mid
afternoon. Like, I feel like this is
actually setting us up for success, to feel better, to show
up better and just, yeah, live a more vibrant life.
And one other thing that came to mind, I mean, I was focusing on
breakfast, but you know, strategizing with clients over
the years, it's lunchtime. The question is like, do you
have anything on hand? Like do you have anything for
when the days don't go perfect? Because also we have to
recognize that every day isn't going to be perfect.
And sometimes you're going to literally have to fly out the
house and you won't have time. So sometimes it can be helpful
to think, OK, so should I buy some beef jerky?
Should I buy like some cheese and put it in my fridge in the
office? Like is are there other things
you can do to kind of plan so that you have just to make it
easier for yourself in the moment?
And again, it doesn't have to be perfect.
This is a process. You just want to start somewhere
and you'll see what works. So what doesn't work?
And gradually it'll become easier.
Definitely. OK, Lisa, as we kind of close
out our combo today, I feel like a lot of our listeners are Mamas
with their own little girls or little boys, and I know you have
three of your own. I would love it just for you to
share how you are raising up your children with this
awareness of their bodies or what you plan to put in place
with your daughter. And how can moms in our
community start to educate their children on this whole
conversation that we've been talking about today?
Oh, I love that question. It's so funny because my, my
son's already. So how about I share this one
story with you 'cause I, I think it's funny and then we'll get
into it. So when I started, well, back in
the day, there's a company and they make this product called
the Wondrous Vulva. Puppet.
What is it called? Wondrous Vulva.
Oh, Puppet. OK, cool.
So. They make these teaching tools
where it's and so look it up, you'll find it.
I'm not affiliated with them, so this is just like just me saying
it. But they have these like full
size like pillow type vulvas that you can use for training
purposes and like to educate and things like that.
And I've wanted one for such a long time, but I didn't get one.
And this Christmas I was like, you know what, it's my 10 year
anniversary for my podcast. I'm going to get myself a bubble
puppet. So it comes in the mail.
And your son finds it first. I open it out and my my eldest
is like, what is that? And of course, I'm like, it's a
vulva and he's just like mom. So I feel like that's a good
entrance into the. Yes, OK everyone just buy this
wonders Volvo puppet and start the conversation.
Yes, the reason that I bring up this Volvo puppet example is
just to illustrate that one of the ways that I'm raising my
children is by being open about the body parts and talking,
giving, talking about them, using the correct terminology
and answering questions as they can come up.
And let me tell you, even last week there was some very
interesting questions that my eldest has been asking now,
because of course, he's just about to be in junior high.
And even questions that make me uncomfortable even though I'm
quite comfortable talking about all of these topics.
But I just have made this commitment to myself that when
the questions come up, I need to answer them and you answer them
in a way that's age appropriate. And I do my best to educate.
And so for example, you know, my eldest son is in grade 7 and,
and this is the age like he's 12.
And so this is the age when girls start to get their
periods. So we had a whole conversation
about, we've had many, but one of the conversations we've had
about periods is for them to understand what it is and, you
know, for them to know that it's normal and natural.
And, you know, I'm the kind of mom that was like, okay, so you
know about periods and it's difficult sometimes for girls to
navigate this in those early years.
And so if you ever have a girl in your class where you see a
little something, you're going to be the mature one who doesn't
laugh at her. You're going to be the one
that's like, periods are normal. And you know, so, you know,
that's kind of tongue in cheek. That's kind of my style.
But I would say that it's, it's not one conversation.
It's conversations that happen on a regular basis.
They know a little bit about what I do.
My younger, my youngest son, I like because of course, in my
house, words like cervical mucus and all kinds of stuff for all
the time. And he's like, you know, what's
that? And like, right, because he's 9.
But it's just they, whether they like it or not, they are around
this all the time. And I know that it's really
going to benefit them. And As for my daughter, I mean,
she's 2 1/2. So we have a little ways to go.
And one of the things is that I've been in the field long
enough to have seen what happens even for women like myself who
have a lot of knowledge around it.
So sometimes depending on your daughter, you might think I'm
going to do all this stuff in the throw her period party.
And like, she's mortified and she wants you to not be like
that. And she might even try to hide
when she gets her period because she doesn't want her mommy to
throw her like. So I think with all of that kind
of experience that I've seen, I, I plan to kind of take the same
approach of being open, being honest, providing information.
And I mean, I hope that she'll be open to it.
But I also remember like those years are a little bit awkward.
Your whole body is changing things.
So much is out of your control. You just like, I mean, at least
with the charting aspect of it, you can predict your period.
But that's something where a lot of girls, they, it's so out of
their control. Like for some girls, that's why
they go on the pill because they don't want to be surprised and
they don't want to, you know, to get their period too soon.
And I think for women who are listening, who have young girls,
one of the ways I think that can be really helpful to talk about
the cycle is to talk about it in a positive way, to share about
the different phases of the cycle, like we touched on, and
to talk about how your energy and mood can be different and to
normalize that. So one of my favorite ways to
talk about the cycle is inspired by the work of Alexander Pope
and Shawnee Hugo Wurlitzer. They wrote the book called Wild
Power. And in that book, they talk
about the seasons of the menstrual cycle and liken it to
the seasons of the year. And so you know, your, your pre
ovulatory phase when you're leading up to ovulation is like
the inner spring because if you think about it, I mean, your
follicles developing your ovaries to ovulate, that's very
much like fruit trees flowering and you know, the fruit
preparing for ripening. And then ovulation is like the
inner summer. And you know, every woman isn't
the same, but generally speaking, a lot of women feel a
lot of that creative energy in that spring phase and the summer
energy when you know, they, they feel more outgoing.
So generally speaking, a lot of women resonate with that.
Once ovulation takes place, you're kind of moving into the
autumn, like the fall. And so that the burst of that
summer energy is kind of coming to a close and we're kind of
moving into the winter. So for some of us, we don't want
to do as much of the outgoing work or maybe, you know, and it
kind of explains, I think for a lot of women, why they might
feel a certain way. They might feel hard on
themselves because maybe they they don't feel as energized in
these other phases as they do in the summer phase.
And they might feel bad about that because the expectations
that we're always supposed to be on.
But understanding the shifts can be really helpful.
And then of course, the winter would be when you're on your
period. And so it can kind of give you
permission not to, I don't know, not to want to run a marathon
when you're actively bleeding or and some of us need that
permission. But going back to talking to our
daughters about this, this can be really helpful for them to
feel like they have some control and some agency and help them
better understand the different changes that they're going
through. And I also think that cervical
mucus is a great thing to talk about with young girls because
again, if you don't talk about it, it could just be this gross
stuff that's on your panties, right?
And the concept of vaginal discharge.
And it can feel very yucky if no one explains to you that
actually this is a really good sign of health.
When you're making mucus, it means your hormones are healthy.
It means you can know when you're when you're ovulating.
And it also means you can predict when your period is
coming because literally just by tracking when you have mucus and
when it when you have it and when it stops, your luteal phase
when you're healthy is kind of stable, kind of constant.
And so you can have a good idea when your period is coming just
by tracking that. So I feel like those are some, I
don't know, some practical ways you can talk to your daughters
about it. And it doesn't, I get the
question sometimes about, you know, do you think, when do you
think we should teach fertility awareness to our daughters?
And I think that there's a way to bring cycle awareness without
going straight into sex and contraception.
I think we can bring that cycle awareness first and then when
it's appropriate, we can certainly talk about the more
contraceptive or conceptive conception aspects of it.
So, so much, so much we can do. I thought that's so valuable.
And I know, again, as I mentioned, I was 35 when I
learned we had phases and just learning more about my body and
my cycle. So I think it's so empowering to
be able to raise up this next generation to have that
awareness earlier on. So thanks for sharing.
So Lisa, from your perspective, why do you think that our modern
healthcare system really shuts down women when they come in
with these imbalances and symptoms, rather than wanting to
truly help them find a cure for the cause of these, really just
wanting to put this kind of Band-Aid on their symptoms?
I mean, I think that there's a couple of reasons.
I think first and foremost, we have to understand what our kind
of traditional medical system is.
So we have to kind of understand the concept of allopathic
medicine, which is essentially that the the foundation of our
contemporary medical system. And it's quite literally a pill
for every I'll the modern medical system.
And I know some people might disagree if I say this, but
ultimately it is symptom management.
So although today we're highlighting some of the issues
with Women's Health in particular, this is a theme in
all areas of health. I mean, if your blood pressure
is high, you're given a pill. If your cholesterol is high,
you're given a pill. At the end of the day, this is
what our medical system is. So I think the first step is
actually acknowledging what it is.
So because I've been in this field for a long time, maybe
I've gone through all the stages, like brief, you know, I
don't know. But when the the problem comes,
when you expect something different.
So I think one of the big challenges is that when women
learn about this information and they learn about their cycle and
they start charting their cycle, it's like they expect their
daughters to or doctors to throw a party or something.
So then they go to the doctor's office and, you know, they bring
their charts and, you know, look at what I'm doing.
First of all, the doctor didn't learn in medical school how to
read a fertility awareness chart unless they specifically took an
elective that would allow them to do that.
So if if someone brought me an EKG and was like, oh, you know,
read, tell me about my EKG, I would have to say I'm not a
medical doctor. I don't know how to read an EKG,
but certainly you can go to your doctor to read it.
So I think we have to first have a clear expectation.
And again, I love teaching with analogies.
So just imagine if I went to, what's a good example?
If I went to Walmart and I'm like at the teller, like the
regular cashier and I'm yelling at her because I want her to
change the tires on my car. So someone would videotape me
and put me on TikTok and be like, what is wrong with this
person? So obviously if I want someone
to change the tires on my car, I need to go somewhere where
that's what they do there. And so I think the first thing
is that we really have to understand as women what our
medical system is, and we have to learn about how doctors are
trained. And, you know, on my podcast,
I've had the pleasure of interviewing many doctors.
And when I would interview doctors, especially years ago,
like I had this question too, I was like, well, what's going on?
What are you being taught in Med school?
Tell me about it. And so overwhelmingly when I
interview doctors, what they tell me is that in medical
school, first of all, they're not taught about like they're of
course taught about the Physiology and anatomy, but
they're not taught about the fertility awareness method.
And literally they are taught that when there are cycle
irregularities, the pill is the like, that's what they're
taught. I think having just
understanding that that is where they're they're coming from and
that is what their knowledge base is.
And that is how they're taught. It helps us to understand.
So then the question is, can you really blame them because their,
their modality isn't designed to be looking at the root cause.
And so that's difficult because then it puts the pressure and
responsibility back on you. If, if you don't want to be put
on the pill, if you don't want that approach, then you may have
to then consider putting a care team together.
So the way I always talk about it is I call it my boardroom
analogy where you know you are at this the the head of the
table and you have your doctor there.
But if you decide that I want to prioritize my hormone health, I
want to optimize my nutrition, I want to learn how to track my
cycle. Then in addition to your primary
care doctor, you might also need to have a nutritionist.
You might also need to have a holistic coach or a fertility
awareness coach. You might have to have more
people on your team to actually address your needs in the way
you want to. And it's just, I don't know, you
can just bang your head against a wall if you just spend all
your time being upset with doctors.
We have to learn about what they do.
We have to, you know, we, we need doctors.
I've had clients who are so, so anti establishment that they
proudly say like, I haven't seen a doctor in 10 years.
And I'm like, I don't know if that's the way to go.
I feel like we have to just acknowledge what it is that they
do and and then find a way to really navigate and get our
needs met. And sometimes people need to
hear that your doctor was trained in medical school in a
certain way and they don't know everything.
Doctors that I've interviewed, they tell me that they get like
an afternoon of nutrition. So if you want like in the
whole, however many years that they do it.
So your doctor is not your nutritionist unless they also
have that certification. They're not your fertility
awareness coach. They're not your, you know, you
have to kind of, and if you want a doctor that specializes in
root cause medicine, then you want to find an MD that has
trained in that functional medicine approach, right?
So we have to start being a little bit more critical about
who we're seeking care from. It's so good.
I think that's such a great reframe and like setting that
expectation of going to someone who is trained in that modality
and putting together your care team.
I love that it takes a village in every way.
Elisa, thank you so much for joining us today.
I feel like this conversation was insanely insightful and I'm
personally super grateful because I'm getting married this
year and this fertility conversation is very relevant
and really excited to dig into your book.
And just learn more in a very specific way in this season.
And I know our community of Mamas and women and men are
going to have so many takeaways from our conversation.
And could you tell our listeners where they can learn more about
what you do, your work and just to follow along with your
journey? Yeah, absolutely.
So first of all, thank you for having me.
This was so much fun. It just has been a great
experience and it was really nice to get to meet you.
And you can find out more about what I do.
I mean, I'm on Instagram at Fertility Friday, so I hang out
there. I have my podcast, the Fertility
Friday podcast. We are in.
We've just celebrated our 10 year anniversary, which is wild.
So there's over 500 episodes to dig into.
So I mean, you can just type Fertility Friday into your
favorite podcast player and there's another organization
that took Fertility Friday as well.
So I'm the pink 1. So when you search so you'll see
a lot of pink and then you'll know that it's me just.
Like your book? Just like the book. 5th vital
sign. So my first book, the 5th vital
sign, my second, well, my second book is the fertility where it's
mastery charting workbook. So I had a paper charting
workbook that I made and real Food for fertility just came out
last year. So lots of great content to dig
into for the, if you're wanting to kind of just get a, a sneak
peek, you can get the 1st chapter of Real Food for
Fertility for free over at Real Food for fertility.com.
And just some fun facts about this book.
I mean, we surveyed just thousands of papers in the
writing of the book and we've cited over 2500 citations.
And so when we were deciding on printing, we had to decide what
we were going to do. But all these citations, if we
had included the citations in the actual book itself, it would
have been 700 pages instead of 400 pages.
So fun fact, if you're reading the book and you're wanting to
grab those citations, you can find more information on our
website because we actually had to put them separately as a PDF
download. So all this is to say that one
of what I've realized is one of the reasons why people gravitate
to my work and Lily's work is because we we do, we spend a lot
of time reading all of these complex research papers and we
just have a knack for distilling that information in a really
accessible form. So even though it has enough
data for it to be like a textbook, you know it doesn't
feel like that when you're reading it.
Yes, I've so appreciated your analogies and really breaking
down sometimes more complex concepts.
And so I feel like you've just been overflowing.
So naturally all the information was done you hold within you.
So thank you so much. Thanks again.