Traditional Chinese Medicine Helps Women Get Pregnant
I'm always finding success stories about women over 40 who use alternative treatments or traditional chinese medicine to get pregnant. Although I didn't use these methods to conceive my daughter, I certainly think they are a good option for some couples. I did, however, work on increasing pelvic circulation as I show in my DVD on Fertility Bodywork (www.getpregnantover40.com).Read more about Dr Xiao-Ping Zhai:
The first – and as yet only – woman Zhai sent over to the London Fertility Centre successfully conceived on her second try – at the age of 43. Amanda (not her real name) married when she was 40 and started trying immediately with no success. Her baby is due on 1 January next year and she is over the moon.
See also: alternative medicine and home remedies for miscarriage at www.getpregnantover40.com
and
Acupuncture for fertility (getpregnantover40.com)
"I'm now 44," she says. "I'd had three IUIs and IVF before going to Zhai, and my consultant told me to give up because I was just too old and my eggs were too weak. I saw Zhai throughout 2008 and then we did one IUI in the LFC and I got pregnant but miscarried. The second time, in April, it worked. I was 43. I still can't believe it. It can only be because of her – not only did she improve my egg quality, but the IUI at the LFC, with her in charge, was completely different to any other clinic, where you are aware that, really, you have people around you thinking you're past it and should have a donor egg."
Watching a Zhai consultation is bizarre. She will check the tongue, the pulse, sleep patterns, whether a patient is thirsty, peeing a lot and their bowel movements. Often changes are made to the diet – no sugar, coffee, alcohol, dairy, wheat, spicy foods – and every month a woman is asked to keep a temperature chart.
Slowly, through the use of herbs and acupuncture, Zhai begins to regulate the vital energy, or Qi, that flows through the body. According to this ancient practice, good health and metabolism depend on Qi. As it flows, it provides warmth and distributes body fluids.
Each organ has its own pattern of Qi and each organ is represented on the tongue, which presents Zhai with a kind of map of the body's health. If one organ is not functioning properly, it affects the rest of the body: "It only takes one thing to be wrong to throw the whole system out," she explains.
Common diagnoses seem to be too much liver heat and blood stagnation, damp-heat obstruction in the abdomen, slow blood circulation to the ovaries – you get the picture.
Zhai says she can start seeing changes within three months but will not put a time frame on treatment: "Every woman is different."
The herbs she uses are mostly shipped in from China and made up to her prescriptions, although she is currently looking at manufacturing them in the UK. They include carthamus flower (huang hua) for regulating the flow of Qi to alleviate pain, glossy privet fruit (nu zhen zi) for nourishing the kidney and liver, as well as peach kernel, angelica root and codonopsis root.
from: www.guardian.co.uk