Navigating Nutrition for Fertility, Endometriosis, PCOS, and Pregnancy with Alyssa Broadwater, Registered Dietitian (RD)
In this episode of the Breath and Birth Co. podcast, host Vanessa, a Certified Birth Doula and Childbirth Educator, speaks with Alyssa Broadwater, a Registered Dietitian specializing in fertility, pregnancy, and postpartum nutrition. Alyssa shares her personal journey into this field, important nutritional aspects for both men and women in preparing for conception, and practical dietary recommendations. Topics include the significance of a good prenatal vitamin, managing conditions like endometriosis and PCOS, and ways male partners can support during the fertility journey. If you’ve ever been told, “Just grab a prenatal from the drugstore,” or handed a prescription without any explanation, you’re not alone—and this episode is definitely for you.
“So many people don’t even know what it feels like to feel good. But once you do, you never want to go back.”
-Alyssa Broadwater, RD
🔑 3 Key Takeaways from Episode 30:
Prenatal nutrition starts before pregnancy.
What you eat before conception plays a major role in fertility, miscarriage risk, pregnancy health, and your baby’s long-term wellbeing—for both partners.
Not all prenatals are created equal.
Many over-the-counter and prescription prenatals are lacking key nutrients or use forms that are poorly absorbed. Look for choline, active B vitamins, and bioavailable minerals—and don’t assume iron should be included.
Nutrition can help manage chronic conditions like endo and PCOS.
By focusing on anti-inflammatory foods, blood sugar balance, and antioxidant-rich ingredients, you can actively support hormone health, lower oxidative stress, and improve cycle regularity.
Practical Resources You’ll Want to Bookmark
Before we wrapped up our chat, Alyssa recommended a couple of favorite reads:
The Missing Piece in Nutrition Guidance
Alyssa shared that even with her years of experience as a dietitian, she didn’t get much formal education on preconception and pregnancy nutrition. That gap? It lit a fire in her. She started digging into the research, determined to understand how nutrition truly impacts fertility—and not just for women, but for their partners, too.
Her biggest takeaway? We’re not talking about this enough. Not in school, not in most provider offices, and definitely not early enough in the journey.
It’s Not Just About Prenatals (But Let’s Talk About Those, Too)
One of the things Alyssa feels most passionate about is busting the myth that “any prenatal will do.” In fact, many prescription prenatals are worse than what you’d find on the bottom shelf of a pharmacy aisle.
So what should you look for instead?
✨ Choline (most prenatals don’t include enough)
✨ Active B vitamins (like methylated folate instead of folic acid)
✨ Well-absorbed minerals (think magnesium glycinate, not oxide)
✨ No iron included, since iron can block absorption of other key nutrients and is best supplemented separately at the specific level needed
She breaks all of this down in the episode so clearly, and it’s honestly such a helpful listen if you’ve ever felt overwhelmed in the supplement aisle.
The Impact of Oxidative Stress on Fertility
Alyssa also dives into something that doesn’t get talked about enough: oxidative stress. It’s basically the byproduct of your body creating energy—and while it’s totally normal, too much of it can affect egg and sperm health.
So what can you do? Avoid smoking, vaping, and alcohol as much as possible. Focus on consuming antioxidants. A colorful plate of fruits and veggies, herbs, nuts, and seeds is more powerful than you might think. Alyssa recommends aiming for three cups of vegetables and two cups of fruit a day to truly support cellular health and decrease inflammation.
Specific Support for Endo and PCOS
If you’re living with endometriosis or PCOS, you’ll feel so seen in this episode. Alyssa doesn’t offer one-size-fits-all advice—she talks about how to tailor nutrition for these conditions in a realistic and sustainable way.
For endo, she suggests a focus on anti-inflammatory foods and minimizing hormone-disrupting chemicals (BPA, we’re looking at you). For PCOS, the priority is balancing blood sugar and reducing insulin resistance, which can have a huge impact on cycle regulation and ovulation.
Don’t Forget About Male Fertility
Alyssa reminds us that both partners matter when it comes to fertility prep. Even if semen analysis comes back “normal,” there’s still plenty of room for optimization—especially when it comes to DNA integrity, sperm motility, and reducing oxidative stress. And yes, nutrition and lifestyle play a massive role here, too.
I even shared my own experience when my husband’s results came back “normal” just before my endometriosis excision surgery. While I was obviously happy we didn’t have even more obstacles in the way of achieving our goal of natural conception… it felt like the weight I was carrying grew tenfold. Confirming it really was all on me, all “my fault.” If you are in this position, I hope you know you are not alone. Your duality of emotions is real and valid.
Your Body is Worth Feeling Good
One of the things Alyssa said that stayed with me was this:
“So many people don’t even know what it feels like to feel good. But once you do, you never want to go back.”
That. Right. There. I even shared a story of my own journey to landscaping in the brutal heat myself on the first day of my period without even realizing my period had started… after over a decade of being bedridden the first day of my periods.
If you’re prepping for pregnancy—or healing your body after years of managing chronic symptoms—this episode is your permission slip to slow down and get curious about what your body actually needs to thrive.
And remember, your nutrition doesn’t have to be perfect. It just needs to be intentional.
Connect with Alyssa
🌿 Want to connect with Alyssa or learn more about her private practice?
You can find her @alyssabroadwaterrd or check out her offerings on her website.
Subscribe, Share & Review
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📲 Share this episode with a friend who needs to hear this so they don’t feel so alone.
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00:00 Introduction to the Breath and Birth Co Podcast
00:47 Interview with Alyssa Broadwater: Nutrition for Pregnancy
01:58 Alyssa's Journey into Fertility and Pregnancy Nutrition
06:40 Misconceptions About Perinatal Nutrition
09:57 Choosing the Right Prenatal Vitamins
18:30 Preparing Your Body for Conception
29:47 Managing PCOS and Endometriosis Through Nutrition
37:41 Red Meat and Endometriosis
38:47 Dairy and Inflammation: Quality Matters
39:11 Environmental Toxins and Endometriosis
39:46 Anti-Inflammatory Diet Tips
40:27 Personal Journey: Eliminating Trigger Foods
41:12 Soy and Processed Foods: A Hidden Culprit
44:46 Reintroducing Foods: A Cautious Approach
46:12 Gestational Diabetes: Alternative Testing Methods
49:26 Male Fertility: Optimizing Health
57:08 Resources for Fertility and Pregnancy
58:40 The Importance of Real Food in Dietetics
01:04:53 Generational Health: Influencing Future Generations
01:06:31 Conclusion and Final Thoughts
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Vanessa: Welcome to the Breath and Birth co podcast. I'm Vanessa, a hospital-based DONA- international certified birth doula, and passionate childbirth educator. I love to merge the power of your intuition with the precision of modern medicine to help you navigate pregnancy and birth your way. Each week, we kick off with Monday meditations to bring calm and connection to your pregnancy.
Then we build your confidence through insights, birth stories, and care provider perspectives during thoughtful Thursdays. Ready to feel supported, informed, and empowered. Hit subscribe to the Breath and Birth Code podcast today and let's embark on this transformational journey together. As a reminder, any information shared here is not medical advice.
For more details, visit breath and birth code.com/ disclaimer.
Today I'm speaking with Alyssa Broadwater, who is a real food private practice dietician that helps women and couples prepare for pregnancy, walk through pregnancy, and recover postpartum through nutrition and lifestyle changes. She has a passion for helping people sift through the plethora of nutrition information to find what is relevant and effective for them.
Her practice primarily sees clients one-on-one, but she also offers online programs for fertility and pregnancy. And your office is located in Dublin, Ohio, right? Alyssa?
Alyssa: Yep. Office is in Dublin. Although honestly, our, a lot of our clients just choose to do telehealth, so that's kind of our, our primary. But we do have an office in Dublin for in-person consults.
Vanessa: That's great. I love a good virtual consult too.
Alyssa: Yeah.
Vanessa: makes it a lot more accessible for people.
Alyssa: Totally, especially when we're thinking about postpartum. I mean, even if I have moms that I've worked with in person throughout pregnancy, a lot of times I encourage them to to go virtual for postpartum, at least for a short period of time because it's just, it's not easy to like pack everything up and, and go somewhere early postpartum.
Um,
Vanessa: Yeah, absolutely. so what brought you to this work, Alyssa?
Alyssa: selfishly, I mean, I started looking into what my husband and I should be doing differently, when we were thinking about having a family and I quickly realized that I knew nothing about fertility and pregnancy nutrition, and. I reached out to a few fellow dieticians and I was like, what books and resources do you guys like for these things?
Because I know nothing about it. I mean, I was a dietician for several years at this point, and I felt like I just, we didn't learn it in school at all. We had one class that was called Nutrition Across the Lifespan, and one section of that was about pregnancy, but it was just like super cookie cutter type of stuff that we learned, not in depth at all.
, So I just started reading every book I could about fertility and pregnancy nutrition. I signed up for the Google Scholar Alerts, and then there's another one that's like science med or something where you get all of the current research on a particular topic. So I signed up for the fertility, nutrition and the pregnancy nutrition and just started reading everything I could.
So there was really two pieces to that. One, because I, I realized that I didn't know anything about it. Whenever I go into anything, I am a researcher, I want to know everything and I'm gonna spend, my entire day if I could, like, just learning all I could about it. So I can just go into whatever I'm going into as informed as possible.
Through that process of just me learning that stuff for my family , I realized that there's such a huge need for it. Again, I was a dietician, already felt like I was pretty informed and I didn't know any of this stuff. So I thought, okay, if I didn't know it, then it's just not well known enough, period.
So that encouraged me to want to kind of spread the word , and I realized that I love working with this. Population because it's unfortunate, but a lot of times women need that like extra reason to be motivated to focus on their health and pregnancy. You have like the ultimate extra reason. So it's a great time of life that I've found to, to be able to really focus on health just for the woman, related to pregnancy or not.
So yeah, it was just through, my selfish desire to learn all of this stuff.
Vanessa: You had said that you had been a dietician, uh, for several years. At that point, what had you been focusing on, or what was your experience before coming to the fertility and pregnancy side of things?
Alyssa: Yeah. So initially when I was going through school , I knew I wanted to be in private practice, but I was really focused on athletes and performance nutrition. So that's where I focused on initially. Through that I started to see a lot of eating disorder clients because unfortunately there's a really big connection between athletics and performance and eating disorders.
And I fell in love with that population as well. I love working with the eating disorder, disordered eating population, and still do quite a bit to this day., And then have kind of transitioned to, you know, the, the perinatal space. And even with the disordered eating work that I've done, there's, you know, when I think about, when I say we specialize in fertility, that encompasses so much because there's so many things that affect fertility.
Thinking of all of the, you know, different conditions that. A man or a woman might have like PCOS or endometriosis or like all of those types of things, just hormone health in general. To me that's all fertility because all of those things are critical. We're thinking about fertility. So especially with the hormone health piece, , there's a big connection there between eating disorders and fertility too.
Because, you know, as we will probably get into, , your body really has to be in this place of safety to be able to get pregnant. And of course, when you're in an eating disorder, your body's not in a place of safety at all. So there we kind of see that connection already. So it was a nice transition.
Vanessa: , So I would love to hear maybe what are one or a few of the biggest misconceptions around, , perinatal nutrition. , You mentioned that a lot of times, people don't have the information, but when clients come to you , early on, let's say, what are some misconceptions that you're seeing either in their habits or the advice that they've been given or the things that they've been reading on the internet , and how do you guide them through that?
Alyssa: I think first and foremost, just understanding that it, it is something to consider, like you should consider your diet and lifestyle before conception. Like just that is a huge, step for a lot of people because if you're like me, I mean, I went to my OB GYN A couple years before my husband and I really made the decision to start having a family.
And I kind of knew the answer I was gonna get, but I decided to ask the question anyway. I asked, okay, if we're thinking about, starting a family, what are the things that we should be doing? And it was just the cookie cutter, , stop your hormonal birth control or, stop birth control.
And that's it. That's, and then if you have trouble, then we'll kind of readdress. , That's really the only answer I got. That's kind of what I expected. But, you know, I was not pleased with that either way. If you're lucky, your OB GYN is gonna say, take a prenatal, go ahead and start one right now. But even then, you're lucky if they say that.
And if they do say that, they'll just say, take any old prenatal off the drugstore shelf. Or even worse, in my opinion, here's a prescription prenatal. I dunno what it is, but every single prescription prenatal I have ever seen is terrible. Like worse than the cheapest prenatal that you can pick up at your pharmacy shelf.
So yeah, just that like initial, like, Hey, your nutrition preconception matters tremendously. It matters for your chances of getting pregnant, both a man and a woman's nutrition and lifestyle before conception matter. For getting pregnant, for staying pregnant, risk of miscarriage, for the health of the pregnancy, , and trying to be able to stay low risk, especially to have the birth choices that you want and for the long-term health of your child.
A lot of times, if you just know that, that kind of like kicks you in the butt a little bit to say, oh, okay. Those are big deals. Let me kind of focus on my nutrition a little bit. , I think the other big misconception is that you don't have any control over a lot of these things.
I tend to hear this more secondhand from fertility doctors. Some fertility doctors are good, some are not so good on the lifestyle aspect of it. And a lot of times they'll say, you know, there's, there's really nothing you can do lifestyle wise to improve your fertility and you know what you eat.
As long as you're not smoking and you're not drinking in excess, then you're fine. It's just completely inadequate. So I think honestly, those are the biggest two misconceptions. And if you wanna get into more details of like, what does a fertility diet look like and things like that, of course we can.
Vanessa: . Yeah. Oh, I would love to dive into that. But first, a few things on what you've mentioned. So far, you talked a lot about,, prenatals,
Alyssa: Mm-hmm.
Vanessa: , And how prescriptions don't have a lot of the qualities that you're looking for. So can you share what our listeners should be looking for in a good prenatal for that nutrition benefit?
Alyssa: Yeah, this is one of my , kind of primary questions that clients come with me , with. So I have a, a free guide that goes into like exactly all the details on this, but the high level things are one, it shouldn't be a one a day by definition. A one a day or a gummy is just not gonna have enough of the really important nutrients that we need.
For example, choline. Supplement companies are starting to get , smarter and they're realizing that consumers are looking for choline in their prenatal because I mean, even five years ago, it wasn't in most prenatals, and it probably still isn't in most prenatals, but it's becoming more popular.
Choline is a b vitamin like compound that is just as important for preventing neural tube defects as folate is, but it's something we don't hear about very often. It's really important for cognition and brain development, and 95% of pregnant and breastfeeding women don't meet the minimum requirement for choline, and the minimum requirement is probably way too low.
So choline. It is definitely something you wanna look for in your prenatal, but I say choline is one of the reasons why like a gummy, prenatal or a one a day is gonna be inadequate because choline is a very large nutrient. It takes up a ton of space, so it's just physically impossible to fit any significant amount of choline into gummies or a one a day.
You need more capsules. Magnesium is another big nutrient where you're not gonna have nearly enough magnesium in like a one a day. Other things to look for your B vitamins should be in the active form. So, specifically like folate, you wanna look for methylfolate is the most popular as opposed to folic acid.
, For B12, you wanna look for methylcobalamin instead of cobal cobalamine. And then the forms of minerals matter too. So. Each nutrient comes in many different forms, just like we talked about with, B12 and folate. There are different forms of the same nutrient for minerals. That is true as well.
Minerals compared to vitamins at least, are challenging for our body to absorb. So when a mineral is chelated, which all that means is it's attached to an amino acid, then our bodies can absorb it better. So supplement companies will label this differently. Just kind of depending on preference.
Sometimes you'll see the word chelate next to a mineral, so it'll, on the supplement fax label, it might say zinc, and then maybe parentheses. It'll say like, chelated, zinc, or, you know, something like that. You can also look for glycinate. So in general, minerals in the glycinate form tend to be better. So on the label, again, you would wanna see like zinc glycinate as opposed to zinc oxide or magnesium glycinate as opposed to magnesium oxide.
So looking at the forms of the minerals, um, I should say for the dose of choline. Because some supplement companies are starting to put like just a little bit in there so they can say, Hey look, we have choline. Yeah. Ideally you want at least 200 milligrams, if not three or even 400 milligrams of choline in your prenatal.
Vitamin D, most prenatals have vitamin D, but again, the dose is pretty low. So I like to see a prenatal that has about 4,000 I U's of vitamin D. That's the dose that. Has been showed most effective for kind of the average pregnant female. I don't like to see iron in a prenatal. Iron is very, very important in pregnancy.
However, I mentioned that minerals are generally hard for our body to absorb and minerals interact with each other, and that interaction is one of the reasons that they tend to be hard to absorb when it comes to those mineral to mineral interactions. Iron tends to kind of be the bully on the block.
So the primary example is with calcium. When you consume iron and calcium at the same time, whether in a food or in a supplement, you're never going to optimally absorb either one. So that's one thing if you, most prenatals have calcium in them. So if you're consuming a prenatal with both calcium and iron, you're really not getting the full benefit of either one.
And iron is the bully on the block in the way that it can react to other nutrients and cause some oxidation of the other nutrients. Oxidation is no good, especially when we're talking about fertility and sperm quality and egg quality. We need to focus on antioxidant support and reducing oxidative stress as much as possible.
And then just the balance of other minerals. If you, especially with iron, if you have too much iron, then it's gonna. Negatively affect your copper balance and other things. So I like to have iron be separate if and when an iron supplementation is needed. I like it to be separate than your prenatal, so you don't have those interactions.
And so we can fine tune the dose a little bit more. Same thing for the Omega-3 fatty acids. , Especially like DHA is really, really important in pregnancy. So is its kind of brother EPA, but I don't like to see those in prenatals. The Omega-3 fatty acids are really fragile and they're prone to oxidation really easily.
So if we can have them separate, some supplement companies now will give you like a pack. It'll come in like five different capsules, but all kind of packed in one. But the capsules are separate. That's what's important for like an Omega-3 supplement or a fish oil supplement. You just want it to be a physically different capsule than your prenatal.
And then that's fine. I think those are the kind of major things to look for. And then the quality, your prenatal supplement should be doing third party testing, especially in pregnancy because our supplement industry is, is not regulated for better or worse. So things like heavy metal contamination are not uncommon in our supplements and especially in pregnancy.
That's even more important that we really wanna make sure that the supplements we're taking are high quality, so they don't have any heavy metal contamination. What's in the supplement is on the label, and there's nothing else besides what's on the label in the supplement.
Vanessa: Mm-hmm. Yeah, that all makes sense. I loved your description of the importance too, of what to look for and the different forms of, and as somebody with endometriosis and hypothyroidism, which is commonly comorbid, I remember having to be very particular about when I was taking my thyroid meds and when I could take my prenatal, and I also was anemic during pregnancy. And so it was like, you know, I had to, I had specific times when I had to, take everything separately.
And again the balance throughout the day of making sure that each was doing its job separately.
Alyssa: Yeah, that can get really complicated when you throw thyroid medication in the mix because of course you have to do that fasted. Ideally you kind of wanna do iron fasted as well, but then you don't wanna like take iron close to your thyroid medication. It's, it's complicated.
Vanessa: Yes. Yeah. And it, it was, and it was like literally I would have to set timers on my phone to remind me what, when to take what. And then, like you said, the
Alyssa: Yep.
Vanessa: I was taking more than one a day of those, so then I had to spread those out too. So the description, I guess, behind everything helps validate my experience and just the importance of that.
It's worthwhile if you're in that journey right now of having to, be careful. It's important. It has a purpose, , so my next question was what are some practical tips for preparing your body for conception? Oh, and I did remember this, and it might feed into this question, but you talked about egg quality and sperm quality. And I remember in my fertility journey in the research that I was doing it was really amazing to me to learn how preemptively you need to be planning and how long it takes your eggs, to mature as compared to sperm. So can you dive into your knowledge and perspective on that as well?
Alyssa: Yes. So the quick, easy answer is minimum three months.
Vanessa: Mm-hmm.
Alyssa: So it kind of gets confusing sometimes because a lot of times we know that, I mean, females are born with all of the eggs that we're ever going to have. That doesn't mean that our eggs are just sitting there mature, ready to ovulate. They still have to go through a maturity process.
And that maturity process is longer than three months, but the last three months is like where the most intensive maturity comes in, and that's where we can make , some really significant changes. So really, it's never too early to prepare for conception. But three months is really what it takes to see a significant change in either egg or sperm quality.
So especially for females, it's never too early to prepare because those eggs are already in our bodies. So everything that we are doing. You know, years, decades prior to us, actually conceiving is affecting our egg quality to some degree. How it differs with males is males. That roughly three month time period is important to how a man continually produces sperm.
And the maturity process, basically the, lifespan of a sperm is roughly three months. So every three months they're forming completely new sperm. So the sperm he starts to form tomorrow is likely the sperm that's gonna be ejaculated in three months from now. So yes, a man's lifestyle before that three months still plays a huge role in fertility, but it's a little bit more controlled, I guess, for him, if you want to think about it that way.
When we're thinking about that process of those cells maturing, whether the egg or the sperm, that process takes a lot of energy. Anytime our body produces energy, we get oxidative damage. It's just a normal consequence of producing energy. The egg especially is probably the cell in our body that has the most mitochondria, meaning that it's, it's really, really energy intensive.
If you, you know, remember like high school science class mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell. You need a lot of powerhouses in that one single cell because it takes so much energy. So that goes to show that it's very sensitive to oxidative stress. Which means from a nutrition perspective, we want to decrease our exposure to things that are gonna produce oxidative stress and really, really focus on antioxidant intake.
If there was one simple takeaway thing for both a man and woman to focus on fertility for nutrition, it would be focusing on that oxidative stress balance, reduce oxidative stress, and we can talk about things that produce that and then increase your antioxidant intake. So the, the easiest way to think about it, like what foods have antioxidants is a lot of your plant foods, , fruits, vegetables.
Nuts and seeds, beans, things like that. , I'm sure it'll come up. I'm a huge, huge fan of animal protein. This is not like to say you shouldn't have animal protein. I think there's a lot of really compelling reasons to, to have it, in my opinion. But as far as that oxidative stress, balance plants are really what kind of comes in for that.
Vanessa: Okay, great, thank you. so yeah, along those lines then, can we go into what, , what both sides of that are of,
Alyssa: Yeah.
Vanessa: that you would recommend or add to the diet or things that you would look to avoid for that oxidative stress?
Alyssa: Yes. So the things you would wanna avoid, , just general lifestyle things like , smoking, vaping, excess alcohol use, all of those things produce oxidative stress. The alcohol piece, it's like, okay, well what's excess? Optimal is no alcohol at all. But if you have a little bit, it's not the end of the world.
It's one of those things that's you just, you wanna reduce it as much as you can, is the best way to think about it. , Pollutants will produce oxidative stress, thinking of like air pollutants, environmental toxins. , What else? Those are the big ones. Things to include. So a good starting point is at least five cups of whole fruits and vegetables every day.
, You can just keep it simple and focus on that. Or if you want more specific breakdown, if you do like three cups of vegetables and two cups of fruit, if you're doing at least that as far as your fruit and vegetable intake every day, you're doing pretty darn good on your antioxidant intake.
Which fruits and vegetables are highest in antioxidants. Again, if you're just simply getting five cups of, fresh whole fruits and vegetables a day, you're doing great. You don't need to worry too much about it. However, for fruit, things like berries give you the most bang for your buck for antioxidants and for fiber, and, you know, glycemic control and all of that which matter too.
, For vegetables, dark leafy greens, for sure. And then the cruciferous family. So that's things like cabbage, broccoli, brussels sprouts, cauliflower, kale, those types of things are, , kind of the two main categories that I would focus on for vegetables in addition to those fruits and vegetables. Like I said, nuts and seeds are good antioxidants.
Again, you don't have to be really too picky about which nuts and seeds. If I had to pick, I would definitely throw Brazil nuts in the mix because Brazil nuts are a really easy selenium source and, and selenium can actually act as an antioxidant, especially in men. But , most of us probably aren't getting enough selenium, especially if you have any kind of thyroid issue.
A lot of times we have to focus a little bit more on making sure that you're, you're getting selenium, so just a couple of Brazil nuts a day is a good option for that. Walnuts are great. , Almonds for seeds, like hemp seeds, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, but really, as long as again, it's like a whole nut or seed, then you're, you're doing pretty good.
Um, beans and lentils are actually a decent antioxidant source. And of course you have , the fiber and kind of gut health component coming in with that too. , And then herbs. So thinking of your culinary herbs, so common things that we're probably all using like parsley and basil and those types of things.
Loading up on those is a really great way to increase your antioxidant intake a bit dried or fresh, but especially if you're, you know, maybe trying to do salads more or something, getting those dark leafy greens, then putting some fresh herbs into your salad is a really great way to make it tastier and to get those herbs too.
But then more , we'll call them kind of medicinal herbs that you might just have like in tea or a tincture, things like that. So like nettle is a really big one that's great for antioxidant support and female health. Really throughout all of pregnancy and it's really high in antioxidants, , you're probably not going to get just like a pure nettle tea.
It's probably not gonna taste the best, but it's often a component out of herbal blends. So I like that too, especially if we're trying to maybe reduce caffeine intake a little bit, putting in some herbal tea just for that extra kind of boost of antioxidants there as well.
Vanessa: Yeah, on my own journey, I'm gonna say I was addicted to green tea. I was never a coffee drinker, never liked the taste of
Alyssa: Mm-hmm.
Vanessa: but I survived architecture school with green tea. And so when I started really honing in on the nutrition and lifestyle component of my endometriosis and trying to level my hormones and everything, was like, how am I gonna get rid of my green tea?
And so I shifted to the herbal. and even ultimately during pregnancy, I say I really learned that it wasn't about was in the drink that I was drinking, it was around the ritual of having something warm to drink in the morning.
Alyssa: Yep.
Vanessa: even during pregnancy, I, was not drinking my peppermint tea anymore.
I was drinking just hot water with fresh squeezed lemon juice. And it really was, it was just the ritual of having something warm. And I think too as anybody might be approaching, nutrition conversations, dietician conversations, and maybe having to give up or shift their mindset around certain food groups that they're like, oh, I could never give that up, or I could never stop eating that. For me it was just, it was really, eye-opening and just , reflecting on that, like, is it actually, I. The food that I'm craving, or is it the ritual of the food that I'm craving? And let's focus on what I can have and exploring new foods that are in those groups, like you said like Brazil nuts. I had never eaten a Brazil nut before.
And then like you said, I learned that it was something that was easy and important for me to have, and now I have them in my mixed nuts all the time, you know?
Alyssa: Yep. Absolutely. And I think that's a huge, I mean, with our approach when we're working with clients, that's, that's really it. We're focused on what, what can we add? A lot of times focusing on what we add, kind of inadvertently, like takes away some of the things that should be taken away anyway. But it's just that, it's that human psychology.
You tell someone not to touch their big red button, that's all they're gonna want to do. So if you tell someone don't have X, Y, and Z, that's all you're gonna think about. So if you focus on what should my meal look like? What are the foods that I wanna try to get in every day? And if you're doing that and you have, a treat every once in a while, it's not a big deal.
Vanessa: Right. Right, exactly. So along those lines then, do you have any clients or patients that you see that do have endometriosis or PCOS and, , what are your typical conversations? I know that it's really particular, obviously based on the patient and their specific, symptoms of what they're looking to solve for.
But generally speaking, are you able to offer any advice for our listeners?
Alyssa: Yeah, I would say endometriosis. Adenomyosis too is something that we see quite often and, and really from our perspective anyway, the, the treatment lifestyle wise is pretty much the same. , And PCOS are, those are probably our two most commonly seen , fertility related, hormonal kind of conditions, however you wanna classify them.
So. Yeah, all of the things we've talked about so far are gonna be applicable to both of those things, like just generally reducing intake of processed foods, getting more plants in, getting a lot of antioxidants, balancing out that, that oxidative stress. , All of that's gonna be no be beneficial for both of those things.
I really like to see additional testing for both of those things. For PCOS, it is very common for there to be a insulin resistance component. That's what we see most often. However, not always, and it is very possible to have PCOS without having insulin resistance. So I really like to see some testing around insulin resistant markers and then maybe even some kinda more detailed hormone markers to see exactly what we're dealing with.
Because especially even when you look into like what it takes to be diagnosed with PCOS, you realize it's not. It's like not one condition by any means, it's just a description of symptoms. So everyone's gonna be really different, but in general , most women with PCOS need to focus on that insulin resistance piece.
So it's really focusing on balancing blood sugar throughout the day. So that looks like making sure that we have a really good protein intake, um, kind of split up evenly throughout the whole day. A lot of times we tend to have our biggest protein meal at dinner, so it's putting more emphasis on getting protein enough protein for both lunch and breakfast too, especially that breakfast.
If we can start the day off with a really good. Balanced breakfast, adequate fat, adequate protein. It the rest of the day just goes so much better with that blood sugar balance. And when blood sugar is more balanced, our hunger is more balanced, our mood is more balanced, our concentration is more balanced.
, And moderating carbohydrate intake, that doesn't necessarily mean reducing carbohydrate intake, but it means being picky about the carbohydrates that we're eating, trying to get really good, high quality as little process as possible, carbohydrates. And then more thinking about the context in which we eat them.
Carbohydrates are the nutrient that's gonna impact our blood sugar the most. So if we're thinking about insulin resistance, the more we can balance our blood sugar, the easier it is for our body to become more insulin sensitive, which is what we want. Fat, protein and fiber are all things that slow down the absorption and digestion of carbohydrates and thus blunt that blood sugar response.
So when you are having carbohydrates because you need some carbohydrates, you wanna make sure that it's a high fiber carbohydrate as much as possible. So thinking, you know, basic things like, a whole grain or sprouted bread versus white bread, you know, those kind of basics and have it in the context of protein and fat.
Typically we do this fairly well in a meal, maybe with the exception of breakfast, if we're, if we're not thinking about it, it's really hard to get enough. Protein at breakfast and breakfast can be really carbohydrate. Centric. Um, but most often where we get in trouble with this is snacks. It's really, really easy to have a just purely carbohydrate snack.
So being really intentional about, you can have the carbohydrate, make sure you have a protein and or fat with it. So if you want crackers, have , a cheese stick with it, or, you know, have a handful of nuts at the same time. That type of balance. For endometriosis, we really wanna look at inflammation and oxidative stress.
Again, both of these are, are still gonna be important for PCOS, but kind of they're more primary for endometriosis.
Vanessa: Yeah, that's been my experience too. Managing the inflammation was key.
Alyssa: Yes. I mean, it's, we kind of tend to think about it as a hormonal condition, but really it's an inflammatory condition with just a hormonal. Component to it. So things that are going to affect that inflammation piece, just that general shift away from, , processed ultra processed foods to more whole real foods, things that you're making in your kitchen.
Um, using more. I, I'm a really big proponent of using like stable saturated fats in cooking. And this is because saturated fats, the way the chemical bonds are, they are, they're simply more stable. They can hold up to heat, especially more and just like I mentioned with the Omega-3 fatty acids being really fragile and they'll oxidize easily.
One of the reasons that they do that, it's because they're a polyunsaturated fat, polyunsaturated fats kind of get, um. You know, kind of ragged on right now, but omega threes are a polyunsaturated fat and it's a really, really important nutrient. However, that category, the important thing to know and why sometimes they get ragged on is they are really fragile and the like seed oils kind of fit into this category.
There's a lot that goes on into what makes seed oils inflammatory, but one of the reasons is because they're so unstable that when you heat them or when they're exposed to light, they oxidize and they oxidized fats will create free radicals, oxidative damage, and you know, they just use up your antioxidants quicker than you can get your antioxidants in.
So I'm a really big proponent of using saturated fats to cook things like grass fed butter, , coconut oil, those types of things. , For lower heat cooking, extra virgin olive oil, avocado oil is good too. And trying to reduce those. I omega six seed oils. So things like corn, sunflower, canola, soy oil, , reducing sugar, sugar's gonna be a big cause of inflammation.
Ultra processed foods in general, how I think about ultra processed foods is just foods that you simply couldn't make at home. It has ingredients that you would not have in your kitchen. Like you couldn't make Doritos at home because there's, you could make a Dorito like chip at home, but you're not gonna make Doritos at home.
Vanessa: Right. Right.
Alyssa: Um, what else? Um. Conventional meat and dairy can be a contributor. A lot of times we see the, a recommendation to eliminate dairy and especially red meat in end in endometriosis.
Vanessa: Mm-hmm.
Alyssa: necessarily subscribe to that. A lot of the research looking at that association is just that there's an association.
The women that tend to eat more red meat tend to, uh, get endometriosis more so it's an association. Although, you know, most of our nutrition research is association, so some of that's helpful, but when this is a gigantic black hole, but like the basics of it is a lot of times when research looks at red meat, they're combining, a beautiful local grass fed, grass finished steak with.
bolgna. Like they're literally making those equivalent in research. So that's where we see a lot of this research that says red meat, you know, is equal to smoking, like six packs of cigarettes a day or whatever the ridiculous headline is. , So you want to for sure reduce processed meats.
Absolutely. But I am not necessarily a fan of reducing, especially organic grass fed red meat. And one of the reasons is zinc, which we can come back to, but , I'll just leave that there for now. Same thing with dairy. Dairy can be inflammatory for sure. The quality and the source is really what determines whether it's inflammatory or not.
So getting like an A two grass fed, maybe even raw dairy, is likely not gonna be inflammatory to most people compared to just your typical dairy that you're gonna get at the grocery store. Obviously there's some genetic differences there. Other things that can kind of push that inflammation piece is xenoestrogens and endocrine disruptors in our environment that, you know, especially things like B-P-A-B-P-A has a really, really big association between its exposure and endometriosis.
So we really wanna focus on, on kind of all of the endocrine disruptors and environmental toxins over time as much as possible. Things like phthalates and parabens and all of those, but especially with endometriosis, BPA is probably where I would start . and then thinking of things that help reduce inflammation that can come from the diet.
So like Omega-3 fatty acids, reduce inflammation, huge fan of increasing fish intake, and then probably even supplementing with some kind of fish oil or Omega-3 fatty acid. And you know, just fruits and vegetables overall, just like we talked about with the oxidative stress piece. There's a lot of rabbit holes I could go down in any of those things I said.
So I'll let you take it from there. And if you have follow up questions we'll, we'll,
Vanessa: Um, well, no, this is all so, so interesting to me. . And very much validating too to my own lived experience. It is interesting hearing your perspective on the red meat and dairy, just because my personal journey has been, I actually, that was the first food that I eliminated
Alyssa: yeah.
Vanessa: early on before I even had my endo diagnosis.
Um, back when they thought it was Crohn's or, and then they just classified it as IBS like I was having upper endoscopies, I had blood in my stool. I was like literally hunched over in pain and we linked it back to me eating red meat was a trigger food for me. And once I cut that out. , A lot of my symptoms ended up going away, and then eventually that just led into me becoming full vegetarian.
I never liked the taste of fish. and I didn't eat a ton of chicken after that point, so it was just like, felt natural for me just to be like, okay, I'm vegetarian. Like, just, just evolved into that. Um, but then years and years later when I was having more consistent flareups of my endo and was basically in chronic pain and chronic inflammation, that's when I started exploring, reducing dairy, soy, actually soy, when you talk about processed foods, for me, I had suspected that soy was a trigger, especially because back in the day that was pretty much your only dairy alternative was soy milk or soy products.
And I actually felt worse eating those than I did. I. Regular dairy things. So I was like, okay, that, that all makes sense. Like let's, let's try to cut out the soy. And then as I was doing research and reading labels, I'm like, soy is in absolutely everything, absolutely anything that is processed. And so I was like, okay, how, how far can I take this?
How far is necessary? But it really me lean into, like you said, the more fresh fruits and vegetables, the less processed foods, like it opened my mind to cutting out processed foods altogether. And again, understanding that like, okay, something processed here and there is not going to hurt me. But the general note that soy is in absolutely everything that's processed and it is so hard to fully eliminate.
Alyssa: Yeah.
Vanessa: And, again, like it helped me shift my mind to like, okay, instead of this processed gluten-free or dairy-free alternative that's gonna have all of these other ingredients in it that might be inflammatory, I'm going to do maybe a spaghetti squash instead of gluten-free pasta or azule, a zucchini noodle or something, you know?
So I really like the complete 180 of only fresh fruits and veggies. And then I, I, you know, over the, it's been almost seven years now that I've been vegan , mostly gluten free. still soy is in processed foods that I eat, but I don't, you know, try to eat soy as like a whole food.
Alyssa: Yeah.
Vanessa: and then the alcohol and caffeine too.
I do eat chocolate now. You mentioned sugar too. That was another thing too that was really hard for me, but I did explore was limiting all refined sugar and then again, finding that balance in between of like what's too much before my body starts to react to it. And I've, and I found like, I know, um, I know some trigger foods.
I'm interested though to explore maybe with you offline throughout the years I've tried to reintroduce foods to see how my body reacts, especially after my excision surgery. I'm interested, um. I, I would not doubt it if my body, you know, is in a different place now.
I'll be 40 years old this year. I've had my exes in surgery now six years ago. Um, so anyway,
Alyssa: Yeah, well, no, there's,
Vanessa: tangent there, but
Alyssa: well, there's a couple of things there. Like soy, one of the reasons,, I tend, I mean, there's a lot, but one of the reasons , I like to include animal protein is from a, from a behavioral perspective, it's what you're doing is really, really, really hard. It very arguably is the best thing for you.
It's really hard to be able to like, you know, eliminate all of those things, at least to, to the, you know, best degree that you can. And of course, soy tends to be a really big protein source when someone is vegan or vegetarian. And that can really. Do more harm than good in the case of, of endometriosis especially.
Well what's interesting too about thinking potentially reintroducing some of these things, it's really important to know, even like totally outside of the context of endometriosis, when you have been avoiding a certain food or food group for a long period of time, your body is going to get used to you not eating that.
So it really takes time to like get your body kind of revved up and like, oh, I need to produce more of this specific enzyme to digest this red meat. I haven't been able, I haven't been eating red meat for years, so why would I spend energy making this enzyme that I don't need? So a lot of times people will add back in a food just once or twice and say, oh, I felt terrible after eating that.
We have to pay attention to that because that's obviously a very valid experience. We also have to consider, does your body just need a little bit more time to like rev up some of those digestive processes? Do you need maybe a little bit more digestive support, like a, you know, bile acid or something like that while you are introducing that and then wean off of that additional support.
So yeah, it just gets complicated.
Vanessa: Yes. And that's where a professional can be super, super helpful in that journey. Um, and. The sugar. So too, to that point, when I was pregnant and had to do, the glucose test, I actually advocated for how an alternate,
Alyssa: Yeah.
Vanessa: I actually tested my blood sugar because I knew at that time I knew my body was not handling sugar in the way that it was, supposed to,
Alyssa: Yeah.
Vanessa: generally speaking.
And at that point, I had not had much refined sugar at all. And even like fruit juice would make me sick.
Alyssa: Yep.
Vanessa: So I'm like, I, I'm not even gonna try to drink this drink 'cause I know I'm just gonna puke it up and then you're gonna have me do the three hour one and I'm gonna puke that one.
Alyssa: Yeah,
Vanessa: so, yeah, so I just, I tested my blood sugar levels, I think it was like for two weeks or something, and we recorded it just based on my typical diet for the gestational diabetes and everything was fine. And I'm like, I know if I drink this drink, my body is not used to processing this and it's not gonna go well.
Alyssa: that's typically what I recommend. I did the same thing. I just tested my blood sugar. I think I did it for like five days or something. But that's typically what I recommend because it's, well, for several reasons. One, I, I just think you can get actually better information by just. Finger pricking for even just a few days.
You know, drinking the drink is only gonna give you one tiny little snapshot. And again, it's just a screening test. So if that doesn't go well, then you have to do the full diagnostic three hour and do it all over again. It's just not, it's not fun. And then it probably doing your best to avoid, you know, high sugar intake anyway.
So do you really want like 50 grams of sugar? , It's in the big scheme of things, health wise, it's not the end of the world by any means to have 50 grams of sugar, maybe twice or 75 grams if you had to do three hour. But you're probably working pretty hard to make sure that you're not getting a high sugar intake.
And then there's a lot of false positives. So you have the added stress of. I have to go do the diagnostic, or even I get diagnosed with gestational diabetes, but I don't actually really kind of have it once. I like start looking at the numbers. So you go through that added stress and then once you get that label on you, a lot of times that's really gonna restrict your birth choices,
Vanessa: Absolutely.
Alyssa: So yeah, I'm a huge proponent of just doing like the finger prick testing your blood sugar for a couple days, couple weeks, whatever it ends up being.
Vanessa: Yeah. And like you said, it was super informative for me 'cause I had never gone through that before, so I was curious and
Alyssa: Yeah,
Vanessa: it was just interesting too. And, um, I. Yeah,
Alyssa: we,
Vanessa: another way to advocate for yourself and knowing that a lot of people don't realize they have options around that in terms of which drink you drink, or even just saying, I don't wanna do that.
I'll do this instead. I'll test my blood sugars after, like fasting and then after meals, and give you
Alyssa: yeah.
Vanessa: instead and we can go from there. So that is an option.
Alyssa: Absolutely.
Vanessa: Yeah. Like you said, there are so many different rabbit holes we could go
Alyssa: I,
Vanessa: there.
We did talk about, um, male fertility and sperm and everything, but in terms of if we're, um. about male partner relationships, and if, um, you have a female that is experiencing infertility or on this fertility journey and you have a male who has, been tested and healthy or whatever, what are ways that that male or partner can support the birther in their journey? They don't have to necessarily participate for their own health diagnosis. You know, what are ways that they can offer support?
Alyssa: There are a couple things that that come to mind. First one, I just have to say it because, , this is just who I am. Even if a man has been told that his semen analysis looks normal, I would look into that because like any other labs normal is not necessarily optimal and we keep dropping our criteria for what normal sperm health is, which is not a good thing.
So just because it says it's normal, I wouldn't agree with that. I have a male fertility guide that lists what I consider the optimal , parameters. I believe the book real.
Vanessa: that through, , sorry to interrupt, but I've seen that through thyroid diagnosis too,
Alyssa: Yeah.
Vanessa: where the, the range of normal has shifted
Alyssa: Yes,
Vanessa: and it is nowhere near optimal.
Alyssa: absolutely. Yeah. Especially when we are thinking about like thyroid and pregnancy. But
Vanessa: Yes,
Alyssa: for sure. I believe the book, real Food for Fertility also has the differences between like, what's normal, what's optimal for semen analysis, though I just had to throw that in there.
Vanessa: Notes.
Alyssa: , Even if all of his parameters look good, there is no downside to him making all of these nutritional lifestyle changes.
Even if on paper things look good, you can still always optimize. So having him. Go along with the changes that the woman is trying to make is going to make it easier on the woman, especially. You're probably eating at least, hopefully eating at least one meal together each day. So supporting those changes , that the woman needs to make in that meal.
Whether that means simply not complaining about what's being served or if you help prepare or help grocery shop, you know, those types of things like really getting involved there. And you know, him making those changes are only gonna gonna continue to benefit him. And the, and the partnership and the , future baby too.
Like I don't think we understand truly the amount of impact we can make on the future health of our. Child by focusing on our lifestyle and nutrition pre-pregnancy, and then of course throughout pregnancy for the woman as well. So just having that again, understanding, like hopefully that just helps with that motivation piece.
, I think reading these types of things like that, the book I mentioned, real Food for Fertility, they have a chapter on male fertility, so at least just reading that chapter,, downloading my guide and reading through that, like just really simple things. So at least the woman doesn't feel alone in the process because for whatever reason, the woman is going to take it on more herself.
If, you know, quote unquote who's to blame or not in the infertility journey,, the woman's gonna kind of take that on . obviously if, um, it's hard for the male partner too, but a woman just tends to kinda like internalize that a little bit more. So just being there to support and trying to make some changes, or at least at bare minimum don't make the changes.
She's trying to make any harder.
Vanessa: Right. Yes. And I mean also all of my experience as well, I have an amazing supportive husband partner that was tested in everything too. And like you said, everything came back normal. He was still very supportive. He's always been like the grocery shopper for the family and helps with meal prepping and is really good at label checking for me.
And anytime we even go out to restaurants, we look at menus beforehand, things like that. But it was still very hard for me knowing that at the point when he got tested right before I went in for my exigent surgery, 'cause I'm like, I'm not going through all of this only to learn three months after my surgery that you've got shit to work through too. You know? So I was like, let's get that cleaned up now too. Um, but anyway, and then everything came back normal and he was like, oh, okay. Like I can, you know, still go out drinking with my friends and do whatever. But he found ways obviously to be supportive, but like you said, it almost added this additional weight on myself.
Like, okay, now it really is all up to me.
Alyssa: Yeah,
Vanessa: And it was those little things that he could do day to day that helped alleviate some of that, ,
Alyssa: it made me
Vanessa: like mourning,
Alyssa: Yeah, exactly that. You, um, mentioning that made me think of something too. Typically when a man is getting his semen analysis done, they're not checking DNA fragmentation. Some fertility clinics do this, some don't. But it's expensive. It's just an expensive test for whatever reason. So especially if you're going through insurance, insurance is probably gonna say, no, we're not gonna cover that.
So oftentimes it's just not tested. So one, that's something to know if you're going in for a semen analysis, make sure that they're testing DNA fragmentation. But it made me think of it because. If you get a quote unquote normal semen analysis result and you don't have your DNA fragmentation, , there's a potential there that there's probably something missing that can be affected.
And DNA fragmentation is basically just looking at like, what's the integrity of the DNA in the sperm. It can often be kind of like a marker of like oxidative stress. And really this is one of the biggest issues with male fertility is oxidative stress. So if you're not testing the test, that's the biggest way to determine, then you're gonna be missing, you're, you're kind of missing that, big chunk.
So even, even if like, you know, counts, good, motility is good, morphology is good, can still. Optimize the DNA fragmentation, which basically just comes down to, you can still optimize that oxidative stress balance. So keep that in mind
Vanessa: Well, you for that little tidbit there. That's why I asked the question too, just from my own experience, is that I think that a lot of times partners just say, okay, I checked the boxes and I'm good to go. And so good luck to you. and I hope that's not any of our listeners' experience, but, um, just that reminder there that your partners can still very much be supportive and involved.
Alyssa: and the, the health of the sperm, again, even if things look perfect on paper, the health of the sperm are still gonna help determine things like miscarriage rate. Like chances of getting preeclampsia. A lot of that goes back to the health of the sperm. So again, even if you have enough sperm to get her pregnant pretty easily, how healthy are those sperm like that that should be part of the equation.
Vanessa: Yes, yes. Thank you. We've talked a little about, bit about resources and books . Is there anything else that you would typically recommend that we haven't mentioned in terms of resources, books, if there's any, I don't know, websites, podcasts, et cetera, that you'd typically find yourself recommending to clients?
Alyssa: Depends how, how deep you wanna dive. I mean, I have a number of blogs on my website. I have the prenatal guide and the Environmental Toxin Guide, the male fertility guide. All of those are available through the website. I mentioned the book Real Food Fertility for Fertility. The, the kind of preser precursor to that was real food for pregnancy, which I highly, highly recommend both of those.
If I was gonna recommend someone read one book about fertility and or pregnancy, it would be those. I really like the series. Um, it's Awakening Fertility, nine Golden Months. And then the last one is first 40 days. I always get the fourth. The fourth trimester is good too, but it's the, the first 40 days.
That series of three books is fantastic. She's takes kind of a traditional Chinese medicine approach to fertility, pregnancy, and postpartum. I don't necessarily agree with everything she says nutritionally in those books, but I love the overall feel of them. I love the focus on. Nervous system support and mentality and just mindset.
Those are probably my top sources. Um, yeah, I'll keep it simple at that.
Vanessa: Awesome. cool. Thank you. What's one change that you wish you could see in dietician care today?
Alyssa: Education around fertility and pregnancy. Just it's, it truly is a specialty. If you just go to a random dietician, the chances are they know little to nothing truly about fertility and pregnancy. Which is really unfortunate, I think. I think actually the field is becoming more and more popular, which is really good to see, but it truly is a specialty.
So you, if that's what you wanna focus on, you really wanna seek out someone that. That, you know, has extra education in those fields. 'cause it's not something we learn about in school at all. So I think that would be, um, kind of number one, just simply getting dieticians to understand fertility and pregnancy nutrition more.
And then if I had to add a second one, I would put the emphasis on real food or whole food. There's a lot I could say about my profession. Sometimes I don't love being a dietician. Sometimes I do love it. I don't love the influence of food industry over my profession. You know, you go to my, the dietician main professional.
Conference every year, and you're gonna see like Coca-Cola in General Mills being the primary sponsors. I don't love that influence. And I think a lot of times that influence shows up in the way dieticians practice. So I wish there was a bigger emphasis on like, just real food.
Vanessa: Love that. What keeps you passionate and motivated to stick with it?
Alyssa: I don't think people understand how good they could feel. I'm gonna use an exercise analogy, which I don't know if this will resonate or not, but I, I started in the health industry as a personal trainer and I worked as a personal trainer through like dietetic school and everything. It was really evident and I always thought then like, if you've never consistently, I.
Worked out for any significant period of time, like more than a few months, you don't know how good you could feel. And I think that's true with the nutrition piece as well. I just think most people don't know truly how good they could feel eating a nourishing real food diet. And that includes the psychological aspect.
I mean, the psychological aspect of food is gigantic and it's something we focus on a ton with our clients. So that concept of feeling good isn't just about the physical. Do I have energy today? How is my mood? Those things are absolutely influenced by food, but it's also the psychological of do I have enough concentration to get my work done?
Do I have drive to. Do the things on my to-do list. Do I have enough energy to play with my kid At the end of the day, like all of those things are directly influenced by the foods you eat. And can I enjoy this homemade chocolate chip cookie that I just made? Like that is part of that feeling good.
Um, so yeah, I think, I think that's it. You just, I want people to know how good they actually could feel.
Vanessa: Yes, I love that. And that reminds me of, um, a story where it was at that point, probably, I don't know, four to five months into my full on deep dive fertility journey. I had already seen my endometriosis specialist, but we were in between that first consult and determining I was going to go forward with the exci oxygen surgery.
So we were trying to make the dietary lifestyle changes and everything to see what my body could do in terms of like regular cycles and hormonal levels and all of that. So I was a few months in and before this, I mean I was basically bedridden at least the first day, if not first and second days of my periods. My husband and I were, we were digging up some old plants or shrubs in our front yard and digging holes and planting new arbor verde trees. And I remember just like how physical that work was. And it was like hot summer day, I think. I went inside and I went to the bathroom and I was like, oh my God.
I started my period. Like, oh my, like, I feel so strong and like so,
Alyssa: Yeah.
Vanessa: so good. But like, I didn't even know that I had started my period and I would've been like before that. I mean, we, days leading in, I would've been like, back cramps, stomach cramps, headache, foggy, like, my period's coming, is it here yet?
Kind of thing. And I ha I was completely blown off guard. And like I said, I was feeling so strong and motivated in my body to do this really hard physical, strenuous work on the first day of my period
Alyssa: That's amazing.
Vanessa: that I was on my period. And so when you say that, like literally you don't know how good you can feel, I've lived that and that is what continues to motivate me to be, like you said, it is really hard to be even just vegan and gluten free.
Alyssa: Yeah, yeah,
Vanessa: It's, it's becoming easier with alternatives in restaurants, putting some more things on their menus, but it's really hard. And like that is what motivates me, is I know how good my body can feel
Alyssa: yeah.
Vanessa: when I've optimized that piece of it.
Alyssa: Absolutely. I have to
Vanessa: you don't realize how bad it was until you feel good too.
Alyssa: Exactly. And honestly, you, us, I mean it's, it's such a silly example, but because we're finally very slowly coming out of winter, it's top of mind. It's like you go through the grayness of winter and then it's like, oh, this doesn't affect me too much. And then you have that first sunny day and it's like, oh my gosh, I enjoy life again.
It's.
Vanessa: Absolutely. Yes.
Alyssa: to add something to my answer too, 'cause it popped into my mind and it's just too important to let it go. I think also it's the influence of our future generations. This is a conversation I have with clients a lot in both ways. It's hopefully a motivator to make the changes now because you can influence the, the health of your, of your future child,
Vanessa: Mm-hmm.
Alyssa: means you're influencing even the health of your future grandchildren.
Like it does pass. You can pass generationally that way. It also means that your parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, have influenced your health now. So that conversation a lot of times comes up when it's like, Ugh, why do I have endometriosis or PCOS? Or I'm like, Ugh, I'm doing all the right things.
Why do I have to work so much harder than someone else? It's like there's just some genetic. Factors that we just have no control over and we will never know how much that's influencing where you are now. And that I think, is my personal biggest driver of that I can influence the health of my child and my grandchildren.
Like that is just beyond cool to me.
Vanessa: Yes. Yeah. And even just we talk a lot about it in birth work, how were a cell in your grandmother's body,
Alyssa: Yes.
Vanessa: And now you're here it's like literally physically, worth of, of health that you're impacting.
Alyssa: Yep. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I feel like as a culture, we have some work to do to kind of fix that generational hail health. So.
Vanessa: Yes. Yeah., can you share again how our listeners can find and work with you?
Alyssa: Yeah, so everything's through my website, alyssa broadwater rd.com. We do one-on-one consults, and then we have an online program for fertility and an online program for pregnancy.
Vanessa: Awesome. Well, thank you so much for your
Alyssa: Thank you.
Vanessa: I feel like this was an so much information and amazing episode.
Alyssa: This was fun. Thank you.
Vanessa: Thank you so much for spending time with me today. I hope you found this episode helpful and encouraging on your journey. Don't forget to hit subscribe so you never miss a future episode. And if you enjoyed today's conversation, I'd be so grateful if you left a quick review. It helps others find the show.
For more information, resources, and links mentioned in this episode, be sure to check out the show notes. You can also connect with me on instagram@breathandbirth.co for more support and inspiration. Until next time, remember. You've got this, and you're never alone in this journey.
