Holistic Health during Cold & Flu Season

It’s the season for getting sick and it seems to be hitting everyone but me. Friends, family, and almost every patient that I treat are complaining of symptoms, from common colds to stomach flus to sinus infections, plus everything in between. Even when I seem to be interacting with mostly sick people, I don’t get sick myself. How?

Well I have never had a flu shot, I don’t take a multivitamin, and I’m not slathering antibacterial gel on my hands all day. Nope, I'm boosting my immunity naturally with holistic methods. I find that many of the things that work best for keeping me and my patients healthy are the things that have worked for generation after generation. These are the tried and true methods that we know to be effective, so why fix what’s not broken?

Herbal MedicineJacqueline GabardyNovember 2, 2017immunity, cold & flu season, allergies

Egg Quality vs. Age: what you've been told is wrong

Women are born with ovaries full of all the eggs they'll ever have, unlike men who produce sperm non-stop for most of their lives. It's been the popular belief up until recently that women's eggs age as they do, and somewhere between the 35 and 45 they lose much of their viability. But, much to our surprise, recent research has actually proven much of that to be wrong!

Chromosomal abnormalities and poor egg quality are no longer a pre-determined diagnosis for women of "advanced maternal age." We know now that there is much to be done to improve how our hormones and ovaries function, and therefore produce healthy eggs, even over the age of 40!

FertilityJacqueline GabardyOctober 25, 2017ivf, infertility, egg quality, fertility, advanced maternal age

Can you use Pumpkin Spice Medicinally?

This is a serious question! Many culinary herbs and spices are used in Chinese medicine and Western herbalism, so the popular seasonal spice mix might just help with a thing or two.

Let's first look at what's in pumpkin spice, aka pumpkin pie spice.

To be clear, pumpkin spice is just baking spices meant to be added into pumpkin pie, it contains no actual pumpkin. It's often added into recipes with pumpkin and sugar, but the spice blend on it's own has no other ingredients besides cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, cloves, and sometimes allspice. These are all warming spices that improve digestion, but they all have slightly different functions.

Food + Nutrition, Herbal MedicineJacqueline GabardyOctober 18, 2017pumpkin spice, nutrition, autumn, herbs

10 Other Reasons Birth Control is Used

In honor of last week's news that Trump is rolling back employer requirements for birth control coverage, I want to share some of the other reasons birth control gets used besides just preventing pregnancy.

To be clear, I believe that women should have affordable and easy access to birth control no matter why they choose to take it. But it truly enrages me to hear so many arguments against coverage made on the basis that it is simply used when women want to be promiscuous, thus they should learn to "control themselves" or "settle down and have a family."

These arguments are made by ignorant men who will never be at risk of experiencing some of the painful and/or dangerous conditions that birth control can help to manage or treat. Denying women access to medication that can reduce pain, save money, prevent surgery, and in some cases can even be life saving, is truly cruel, inhumane, and totally fucking sexist.

So let's talk about it. Let's make them impossible to ignore. Let's teach men and children about these conditions. Let's de-stigmatize birth control coverage for every woman whose life depends on it. It's our right.

Foods for Implantation

Whether you're trying to conceive naturally or with Assisted Reproductive Technologies such as IVF or insemination, implantation is a crucial point in the conception process. Implantation happens when a developed embryo (at that point it's called a blastocyst) adheres to the wall of the uterus, usually 7-10 days after ovulation.

While implantation can happen all on its own without any support, many women who have had trouble conceiving want to do whatever they can to optimize their chances of getting pregnant. In fact, I get asked from my patients all the time, "what else can I do to encourage implantation?"

Of course moderate exercise, plenty of sleep, and stress management can help, but many of my patients who are trying to conceive already do that - so what else? Diet is another big factor that can effect conception. Let's take a look at all the foods that can help your little blastocyst lay down some roots.

Food + Nutrition, FertilityJacqueline GabardySeptember 25, 2017implantation, fertility, infertility, nutrition

PMS Sucks! How to Treat it Naturally

While there are phases of the menstrual cycle when our hormones can leave us feel energized, confident, and cheerful, there are also phases of our cycles that may cause us feeling depleted, irritable, and self conscious. The premenstrual phase (the one and a half to two week period prior to bleeding) is most notorious for these feelings, the dreaded PMS.

Premenstrual Syndrome can look very different for different women, but the most common symptoms are emotional changes, mood swings, general irritability, anxiety, or sensitivity, breast tenderness, digestive upset, food cravings, headaches, or acne. While one woman may complain of one or two of these symptoms, some women can attest to nearly every annoying symptom on that list.

But PMS isn't something we're sentenced to as women, in fact there are a number of things you can do to balance your hormones naturally and start feeling better!

How to Survive your First Whole30

I recently did my first Whole30, which is eating strict paleo for 30 days - no dairy, no sugar, no grains or legumes, no alcohol. The focus is on whole, minimally processed foods, avoiding preservatives, additives, artificial colors and processed foods.

I found it to be a great experience to reset ingrained habits, take a hard look at everything I was eating, and to get creative in the kitchen. If you're thinking about trying a Whole30 yourself, I say GO FOR IT! You can read about all the rules of the program on their website.

I'm not an affiliate or anything, in fact, there's no membership, meetings, or club to join. Just read about the program rules and eat that way for 30 days, that's it. There are Whole30 approved brands, recipes, meal plans, and books that you can use if you wish, but you don't have to use any of those to do Whole30 all on your own.

Food + NutritionJacqueline GabardySeptember 8, 2017whole30, paleo, diet, anti-inflammatory

I'm on TWO of my Favorite Podcasts!

Jacqueline GabardyAugust 28, 2017podcast, menstruation, women's health

Intro to Basal Body Temperature Charting

Women's hormones change so significantly during the course of their cycles that just by looking at graphs of daily temperatures you can see when ovulation occurs, if implantation has taken place, or when the period is about to start. It can even spot subtle signs of hormone imbalance, for example, if enough there's not enough progesterone being produced to sustain pregnancy.

Not just any temperature though, specifically our basal body temperature (BBT) is what must be measured to better understand what our hormones are doing. Basal refers to the bottom, in this case it's the lowest our temperature gets each day. For most people, that happens to be when you first wake up in the morning, after your body and metabolism have been resting several hours.

I wrote earlier about the Fertility Awareness Method (FAM,) which uses temperature charting as a major component of tracking the menstrual cycle and determining a woman's fertile window. Click the link above to learn more about FAM and if it's right for you.

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