7 Holistic Fertility Tips
When it comes to trying to conceive, it can feel distressing when you have struggled with infertility and feel as if the situation is out of your control.
There are medical fertility treatments available, but there are also holistic fertility methods that prepare your body to carry a pregnancy.
You can speak to a ton of different women about fertility, and you might receive all kinds of different advice and perspectives.
Well… here is mine:
Align your diet with your goal to conceive
The most important thing to keep in mind about fertility and about pregnancy, is that your body is your baby’s home. When you are trying to get pregnant, an intentional diet can help with conception.
Folate-rich foods like leafy greens, avocados, and citrus fruits help with early fetal development. Protein supports reproductive hormones. Omega-3 fatty acids, sourced from chia seeds and walnuts, can improve egg quality. Iron is necessary for blood flow and ovulation. It doesn’t matter how you get these nutrients, it just matters that you get them. Finding and preparing new recipes to support your fertility goals can be a fun activity to keep you occupied and positive throughout the wait that can often seem unbearable.
Red Raspberry Leaf Tea
You’ve probably heard other moms or doulas rave about red raspberry leaf tea before. It’s not for no reason! This tea tones your uterine wall, which helps to prepare the uterus for conception and supporting a healthy pregnancy. When your uterus is well-toned, you have a higher chance of implantation and can lower your risk of miscarriages. The tea is packed with vitamins and nutrients.
Red raspberry leaf tea balances your hormones and regulates your menstrual cycle. This makes conception easier by making ovulation more predictable.
This tea isn’t just good for fertility, or for preparing your uterus for childbirth, it's good for reproductive health in general. It helps to reduce PMS symptoms and menstrual cramps. Every woman needs a box of red raspberry leaf tea in their home. For some, herbal tea is an acquired taste. If you don’t like it and can’t stand to drink it, there are a variety of different ways that people have found to make it taste better to them. I personally drink 2 plain cups of red raspberry leaf tea a day–one in the morning, and one at night when I’m ready to unwind for the day. Aside from the benefits of the tea, it also gives you nice, calming moments where you are consciously working toward your goal.
Drink your tea slowly, and enjoy where you are in your conception journey.
Walk for 30 minutes a day
Keeping your body moving will enhance blood flow to your reproductive organs. When your uterus and ovaries get more oxygen and nutrients, your egg quality and uterine health increases. Not only that, but regular walking helps to regulate your hormones. It is a stress reliever, it strengthens your immune system, and it can help you to maintain a healthy weight. All of these benefits make walking daily a great habit to have when you are on your conception journey.
De-stressing
Releasing as much of your stress as possible is necessary when you are hoping to conceive and support a healthy pregnancy. Stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline can disrupt the balance of reproductive hormones like estrogen and progesterone. This interferes with ovulation (and with sperm production in men.) Irregular ovulation caused by stress makes conception difficult, and in some cases of extreme stress it can even cause anovulation, when the ovaries do not release an egg.
Stress also kills libido. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that the suppression of your libido can affect your ability to conceive.
One of the best things that you can do for your fertility journey, is to eliminate any stress that you can. The good thing is, everything on this list has the added benefit of reducing stress. So, there you go.
Yoga
Yoga poses that support implantation are going to be your best friend in the time period between trying to conceive, and peeing on sticks. You may be feeling like you’re going crazy when you have such an important and meaningful goal in mind but you can’t do anything but wait in uncertainty for a few weeks, hoping for a sign. That's when downward dog comes to the rescue.
There are tons of wonderful content creators online who specialize in fertility yoga if you like to have instruction. If you’re just looking for some poses to help with your goal, my favorites are bridge pose, legs up the wall, child’s pose, and cobra pose.
Sing (no, seriously!)
Singing stimulates your vagus nerve. This lowers your cortisol levels and increases the release of neurotransmitters such as acetylcholine. Its role is to calm your nervous system. This balances your hormones, reduces your stress levels, and improves your blood flow.
Of course, singing alone will not get you pregnant. But, it's great practice. You don’t even have to be good at it!
Swap obsessively peeing on sticks for a more productive ritual
Hey, I do it too. Guilty as charged. But if we’re real with ourselves, obsessively testing when it is still too soon, busting the tests open, holding the HcG strip up under the light, maybe even putting a negative filter on it to really give us the answer we’re looking for… all of that is stressful! It may be exciting, yes, but stressful. If you are trying to conceive, and you’re in a window where it may be too soon to test, try to find another simple ritual to satiate that need for confirmation.
For example, you may decide that you’re going to do fertility yoga and drink red raspberry leaf tea every night. While it doesn’t give you the confirmation you’re seeking, neither do tests that leave us uncertain. Tell yourself that regardless, you are preparing your body for this pregnancy. Instead of looking at it as desperately hoping you are pregnant, it helps to tell yourself that you ARE going to get pregnant, whether it is this month or the next, and you are actively preparing for it.
If you are a spiritual person, you might lean into that during this time. Many women have their own little rituals, like wrapping a baby blanket to put under the tree at Christmas in hopes of manifesting a baby. (My friend did this, and she is currently very pregnant! Just saying.)
For me, I can’t cook an egg without rubbing it across my lower abdomen/womb area first. When I eat the eggs after preparing them, I envision myself carrying a healthy pregnancy. It’s a small routine that takes about 30 seconds out of my typical day, and it brings me immense comfort on my TTC journey, which is what matters.
What are your favorite holistic fertility tips?
