Can you change your ovarian reserve? | How to Improve your Ovarian Reserve Naturally

Can you change your ovarian reserve? | How to Improve your Ovarian Reserve Naturally

Transcription :

You might have heard that women are born with a set number of eggs, but this understanding or knowledge may be changing as new research is coming out. If the old understanding is true – that you have a limited number of eggs that you’re born with – and each cycle that passes you are running out of eggs or you’re decreasing that number of eggs, I can see how this might be causing a lot of stress for many of you as you age and want to start a family.

Some of my colleagues and I have been questioning this for quite some time as we see otherwise in our medical practices on a regular basis. And some might actually call us “ovarian optimists”. I know it sounds like a funny term. So if you’re trying to get pregnant, improve your egg quality and reserve, and have been told that there is nothing that you can do and that each day that passes your chances of becoming a mom are less and less, but you don’t want to believe it, stay with me here today because I’m going to show you some research that shows that this old theory might not actually be true.

If you are born with millions of eggs and testing AMH is a representation of that, that would mean that this number can only decrease over time, right? But I see AMH increase daily with the members of my program, and so do so many other functional medicine practitioners. Recent research shows that you may be able to change the number of eggs that you have, and in this video, we’re going to talk about this research, my take on it, and how it affects you if you’re trying to get pregnant.

If you’re excited about this, which I am, give me a thumbs up. Comment below letting me know by using the words “ovarian optimists”, because I know many of you are actual ovarian optimists, just like me, and we want this to be true. We need this to be true, and we need our fertility to improve. And I want you to know that you do have the power to improve it, and that’s exactly what we’re going to talk about today. Okay, so yes, do I typically see the glass half full? I do. I typically approach life where the glass is half full. So, someone might say, “Well, Dr. Marc, you’re just an optimist. You believe that everything’s good. All things can be improved and changed.” Yes, that might be true, but I’m also a realist and I want real information and real knowledge. And I’m not here to mislead anybody in any way.

I do believe that we have the power to improve our fertility, but when we’ve been taught something for generations, it’s really difficult to be told something different and for you to believe it, right? So if we’ve been taught this whole time that we only have a finite number of eggs and as we age it goes away, and now we see new research that might say something different, it’s really hard to change our minds, and it’s really difficult for so many in the fertility space to actually see this any different than what they’ve been taught before because it’s so ingrained in them.

This change takes time. Like, we need to allow time to impact this and science to catch up with it. Science does evolve and change, and as a result, we are allowed to change our viewpoint and our understanding as we get more information about this or anything else and as new research comes out. So don’t feel pigeonholed into a certain viewpoint or understanding about how you view the world, how you view fertility, how you view egg reserve. Let’s be open to the possibility as long as the research and information are there. Let’s not be closed-minded just because we’ve been taught something else from the beginning.

So do we run out of eggs? Well, maybe, maybe we do, and that’s what the new research is showing, is that maybe we do or maybe we don’t. There is so much more information out there that we are learning over and over now, and as research evolves in this field of reproductive medicine and in this field of ovarian reserve, we’re going to learn a lot more because more resources are going to be put into this area to actually understand if this is possible and if this actually happens.

The next logical question that comes up when we’re talking about eggs is, well, if I’m approaching menopause or perimenopause or if I have gone through menopause, do I actually still have eggs when I’m menopausal? The answer that we are learning is definitively yes. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of eggs still there in the ovaries when you go into menopause. So you don’t have zero eggs left when you are menopausal. That is a misconception, and I want all of you to understand that, that this knowledge, this thought that we or you believe that once I hit menopause there are no more eggs or once I’m perimenopausal I don’t have any more eggs, is not really true.

Just because the function of your ovaries changes and the hormones that your body produces and your ovaries produce changes, doesn’t mean that you run out of eggs. And that is also something that we need to shift in our understanding of how our bodies function because I think that will give you additional hope to know that you can do something and that you’re not, like, running out to zero eggs. It’s not like a gas tank that goes to zero. You will still have some even when you go into menopause.

Now I was inspired to do this video because one of my colleagues and good friends also did a lot of information and research on this topic, and so she inspired me to talk about it a little bit more because this field is changing. And so she shared with me a whole slew, there’s 10 or more, maybe even a dozen research articles here. I want to really just highlight one because there’s a lot of information here. Research is difficult to understand, and that’s not what my fertility TV channel is all about, diving into this research. So I’m actually going to give you her video on this topic as a resource at the end of this video so that you could go back to that, where she dives much deeper into it.

But there is a research study here in an article called “oocyte,” which is, you know, the follicles that your ovaries create, the oocyte stem cell, fact or fantasy? And one of the things that is covered there, and I’m going to just pull that up, is this final conclusion, which I really think speaks really true to where we are right now and what’s happening.

And it says, “The field of postnatal genesis is controversial and highly polarizing. Many scientists believe it to be the next big breakthrough in reproductive biology. I do believe this is the next big breakthrough. Others believe in the existence of ovarian stem cells but are skeptical about their role in functional oocyte development. And others believe that ovarian stem cells do not exist, and that belief in their existence arises from misinterpretation of ambiguous results or culture, which I don’t believe is true. Compelling evidence for postnatal neo-oogenesis exists; however, as always, further research is needed to focus on the interactions between ovarian stem cells and the wider ovarian environment. This will provide the greater understanding, the context needed to definitively prove the existence, function, and potential usefulness of these elusive cells.”

So it shows we know that there are ovarian stem cells. As a result of this, which tells us that stem cells are the cells that we grow from, and when we’re doing ovarian rejuvenation, we’re using those stem cells or can potentially use those stem cells to regenerate and create new cells, new ovarian cells or follicles, and improve the quality. And that is something that is so valuable and so important because this, we’re on the cusp of something magical and impressive, but it’s going to take a shift in knowledge and understanding and potentially consciousness to get there. That is the big thing that’s happening because there’s so many of us that don’t want to believe that it’s possible. The information is not definitive, but we do have research that does show that our understanding of this process may be dated and old. We do have research that shows both that we do not and that we can create new eggs or follicles.

So we have research that shows both, which tells me there’s a possibility, there’s a potential, there is hope. And as that final paragraph that I just read to you stated, what it shows us is that we need more research. But one thing that I can say to all of you is that clinically the results show that you can improve, that we can see new eggs, we can see an improvement in your AMH, we can see that number go up. And so that’s something that I just can’t ignore, and I don’t believe that any of you should ignore it.

I don’t share this to give you false hope. I say this to challenge some of the information that we were taught and that we are made to believe. This is not a new debate either. It’s actually been around for so long, many, many years. We’ve debated, can we create new eggs or not? And there’ve always been scientists and doctors and researchers on both sides of the fence. So I’m going to link a video here from a very close friend, like I mentioned before, her name is Aimee Raupp, and she dove much deeper into this topic about the research around this topic, the pros and cons and the good and the bad. And I want you to check it out so that you can hear it for yourself.

But I will tell you it is heavy information. There’s a lot of science that’s in there, and I don’t want them to deter you. But I do want to say that it can be slow but it is optimistic and hopeful, which is why I’m going to share that. I would like to finish by saying that I believe that women can create new eggs. I have seen what I believe to be this phenomena happening in couples that we support on a daily basis. Does this mean that all women can create new eggs? Probably not, but I believe that the possible ability is there and that we need more research on this topic. But we do need to remain open to the idea, and as science evolves and treatments evolve, I do believe that we will see this happen and that we will see this to be true.

I’m sure that there was a lot about this video that was new and interesting and fascinating to all of you. So I want to hear from you. What did you think was interesting? What opened your mind? What questions do you have about this? Comment below and let me know. I also want to thank you for watching this video to the end because I know that it takes a lot to keep you engaged, but I hope that this topic really did that.

There are many other pieces of the fertility puzzle that might need a deeper look to get more answers on your fertility journey, and the one we talked about today is just the tip of the iceberg, as you could imagine. If you want to really go deep into your fertility, find the root cause that’s not allowing you to get pregnant, then be sure to fill out the application using the link in the description below so that you can speak to a real human on my team and so we can identify if this is the right next step for you and see if you fit to join the Hope Fertility Program.

Now I want to leave you with another video that gives you more information, and this is on how to improve ovarian reserve to get pregnant after 40. So we’re staying on the same topic. Use that link in the description below to check it out. And until the next video, stay fertile.