Nutrition for Fertility
Learn how to properly regulate and track your menstrual cycle being sure that you ovulate every month.
Repairing damaged uterine tissue, building healthy ovaries and corpus luteum
Days 1-14: Follicular Phase
The first 5-7 days of your cycle are menstruation and this is a cleansing of your uterus in order to prepare for pregnancy. During this phase progesterone stays level and slowly rises as you approach ovulation as demonstrated in the chart vs estrogen which increases rapidly after menstruation as you approach ovulation. Your body is working hard to prepare the preovulatory follicle for an egg to drop also known as ovulation.
Estrogen is the dominant hormone during this phase and slowly decreases as we move into our Luteal Phase.
Days 14-28: Luteal Phase
During your luteal phase, progesterone should spike and reach its peak after ovulation and then decrease as you approach menstruation once again. If you aren’t ovulating, during your luteal phase you will see low progesterone levels instead of that peak - caused by an estrogen dominance, meaning progesterone is unable to become the dominant hormone during this phase when it needs to be.
Corpus Luteum
The main focus, when thinking about fertility, should be on building strong ovary tissue which in turn will then create a strong pre-ovulatory follicle thus producing a healthy corpus luteum each time we enter ovulation. Your ovaries, pre-ovulatory follicle and corpus luteum are all made up of cells that manufacture estrogen and progesterone. The healthier your ovary cells are, the healthier your pre-ovulatory follicle will be and the healthier your corpus luteum will be because a part of your ovary actually becomes the corpus luteum. It becomes a gland that makes progesterone in order to prepare for pregnancy.
When we look at the big picture it’s important to remember that our cell's number one function is survival. Our cells will enforce specific survival measures in order to cope and survive and many will not live through the famine and will die off without the creation of new cells to replace them. If your cells are missing the necessary nutrients they need to thrive, then they are going to be performing their functions poorly because they lack energy from working overtime to survive and assisting other cells, instead of putting the focus on their primary functions.
Survival is their primary function. So when we look at sickness and disease it is extremely important to look closely at the area that’s being affected and the specific processes that are struggling the most because that’s where our cells are taking the most hits and damage, those are where your cells are living in survival mode or even starting to die off.
Ovary cells that are focused on survival aren’t going to be producing a strong and healthy egg, meaning reproduction and ovulation is going to be low. Getting our body and cells out of this survival state is the number one thing we can do for our menstrual cycle, fertility and ovulation.
Sick and dying ovary cells lead to a direct disruption of the body’s production of progesterone. Inflammation, estrogen and cortisol (stress) are also things that compete with progesterone and make our body even less responsive to the progesterone it’s making.
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