My Experience With Pregnancy Achievement Using Chinese Herbs and Acupuncture

A coupla things before we get started: I'm not a doctor and have no medical or scientific training (aside from what I learned in high school) but I strongly urge you not to try herbal treatment on your own at home. Go to a trained, licensed practioner of herbal healing, whether Chinese or European. Everyone says herbs can't hurt, and that is probably true for the right dosages, but too much of anything, taken for the wrong reasons, will not do you any good. It might not make you sick, but it won't get you the results you want, either.

Also, this is based on my personal experiences and even if you follow the exact same protocol, you might get different results. However, I wish you the best of luck and if you have any questions, feel free to mail me at joannaw@inch.com.

NOW READ ON ...

I began acupuncture treatment in April of 1995, having stopped taking bcp about 12 months beforehand, hoping to get pregnant. In that 12 month period I had 4 periods--cycles of 34, 54, 63 and 65 days, with then NO period, and no sign of one, for 5 months. As you can imagine, I was very upset by this. I had in the past (when not on bcp) had irregular and very long cycles, but had menstruated roughly about every 8 weeks. I went to 3 doctors: the gyn I was seeing (who said she couldn't prescribe Clomid because I needed to lose 40 lbs--I weighed ~175 at the time, which granted is on the high side for someone who's 5'4"; she did my hormonal levels and pronounced them normal), my PCP, who wanted to start me immediately on Metrodin/IUI, but whom I didn't trust or feel comfortable with, and a gyn I paid for out of my own pocket, who is reputed to have a good success rate with infertility (at the time I had not been diagnosed with anything, and in fact had had several u/s's and I guess my ovaries must have been OK, because no one said anything), who recommended clomid/IUI. I was frightened by the apparent lack of consensus and not really ready to start treatment when no one seemed to actually know what was wrong. And I found that my insurance would not pay for any of it.

I had also developed asthma during the same period and was reacting badly to the asthma meds. I had heard that acupuncture was good for chronic disorders and after a frightening visit to the emergency room following a particular severe attack, where I was given an adrenaline shot so I could breath again, I was pretty much ready to do ANYTHING to ameliorate the asthma. I knew some people who were having acupuncture and I got the name and number of an acupuncturist (Selma Rondon; 212/979 1931). I went to see her and she had me fill out a complete history, which of course revealed the whole thing about the irregular/nonexistent cycles. When she did her intake with me, she mentioned that she had had good results with women who had had trouble getting pregnant and if I wanted to try some of her methods, it was up to me. She recommended reading Toni Wechsler's book, Taking Charge of Your Fertility, and said that before trying to get pregnant I should first try to establish a regular menstrual cycle.

So the first few months I took herbs for the asthma, and a Dong Quai mixture and a Lindera mixture for "feminine balance," so to speak. I also charted my BBT and my cervical mucus. The two herbal mixtures were in tablet form and I took 3 tablets 3x a day. Both are made in Europe and say "Seven Forests" on the label. The US distributor is:
ITM, 2017 SE Hawthorne, Portland, OR 97214.
The dong quai mixture is labeled "Tang-kuei 18 (Bu Xue Pian)" and contains: tang-kuei, peony, lycium fruit, salvia, bupleurum, rehmannia, cnidium, curcuma, gardenia, cornus, ligustrum, astragalus, achyranthes, ho-shou-wu, atractylodes, ginseng, cyperus, moutan. The Lindera says "Lindera 15 (Li Qi Hui Xue Pian)" and contains: lindera, cyperus, melia, chih-shih, sparganium, corydalis, tang-kuei, achyranthes, red peony, persica, moutan, cnidium, cinnamon bark, carthamus, licorice. These cost me $12/bottle (buying them through the herbalist) and there were 100 tablets per bottle, so each one lasted about 11 days.

In those few months, I got a period about every 28 days but my temps were all over the place and it wasn't clear if I was ovulating or not. And if I was ovulating (it was difficult to tell--I would get a temp peak for three days, and then the temp would drop back down again and not go up) it was pretty clear I had a luteal phase defect.

The next thing she suggested was that I try "herbal soups" which were the straight herbs in natural form (twigs, leaves, lumps of resin, lizard scales ... Chinese medicine is bizarre) with a different mixture prescribed for each phase of the cycle. This was an individual prescription, and she wrote it out in Chinese for me to take down to Chinatown, so I have no idea what was in it (however, have copies of the prescription and could make copies for anyon interested). It cost about $70 for two months worth. I still have some left, in fact. I did this for awhile, but I was under a lot of stress and my cycles got a bit longer and were still somewhat irregular, but the temps were looking a bit better. I was also using progesterone cream during the luteal phase, which helped a little. After a particularly stressful interval I didn't menstruate for 60 days. I was feeling rather discouraged but it was working so well for my asthma and my general energy level that I didn't stop going. I also knew, from past experience, that I react very badly to stress and it takes a lot to reverse the poor effects it has on my health. Oh, and throughout this period I lost 15 lbs, and I NEVER lose weight spontaneously.

But I was also having these weird pains in my lower left side, particularly right around the time of ovulation. At this point I was having fairly regular 40 day cycles and was definitely ovulating with the temps staying up, although the luteal phase was only 10-11 days and temps were still fluctuating; I was also seeing fertile mucus, but it wasn't coinciding with my apparent ovulation. It was January 1996 and I had yet another new insurance plan. I went to the gyn (this was the same gone I had paid out of pocket for previously; she was on my new health plan) because of intense pelvic area pain. They did an u/s and diagnosed PCO, saying the pain was because my ovary was enlarged with all the immature cysts and intestinal gas was causing everything to bump around, hence the pain. I didn't know much about PCO, except that it made it hard to lose weight (and I certainly fell into that category) and caused hirsutism, which I can't say I suffer from; in fact, I have very fine body hair which would be invisible if I were blonde and is very hard to detect even though I am dark. My legs are practically hairless, in fact. But I digress.

The gyn once again recommended clomid/iui, post-coital tests, etc. I was somewhat perturbed that she didn't first suggest an HSG, as I had given her my past medical records and one dr. had detected a possible hydrosalpinge (blocked fallopian tube). I asked her about that and she said that as long as I had one open tube the other wouldn't matter. She also said she didn't agree that my weight was a problem (at that time I weighed ~160). She prescribed 50 mgs. clomid to start and I went so far as to have the prescription filled. But I was afraid to take it.

Then I went to the acupuncturist and told her the diagnosis of PCO and she persuaded me to try it her way for 6 months using a different "soup" specifically for PCO plus a supplement (also in soup form--this combo was about $80 for 2 months worth) which was intended to dissolve the immature cysts encasing the ovaries. I wanted to try it because I was, frankly, scared of the other stuff and wasn't sure my husband would cooperate (it took him months to do the semen assay and he was very reluctant to have sex on schedule). So, starting in mid-February, I did the soups for about 5 months. My bbt's looked better and my cycles kept getting shorter, to consistently under 40 days (in the old days of my teens and 20s, before bcp, I had had a fairly regular 42 day cycle, so this seemed liked real progress to me).

Then in late June I went to England for a month and couldn't do the soup thing so she switched me to "cinnamon & rehmannia" mixture in tablet form. Sorry I don't have a bottle of that one, but that's basically all it contained. It was also from Seven Forests. My temps stayed good and I notice that the fertile mucus was coinciding more and more with the ovulation peak and there was only a few days gap between and I also no longer had a constant white vaginal discharge (ie, constant "creamy" mucus, no matter where I was in my cycle). In fact, my cervical mucus was almost exactly they was it should have been, according to Wechsler's book, at each point in the cycle, although my cycle was still longer than normal.

In Sept., she switched me to a new herbal formula, Epimedium 8 (Wen Yang Pian), also from Seven Forests, which contains: epimedium, rehmannia, dioscurea, psoralea, cuscuta, aconite, ophiopogon, citrus. The following cycle was 35 days, including a 14 day luteal phase, and I ovulated on day 21, about 10 days earlier than previous cycles. And the fertile "eggwhite" mucus was perfectly synched with the ovulatory peak. On the next cycle, I ovulated on day 23, with textbook eggwhite, and got pregnant.

Anyway, I feel that acupuncture has helped me a lot, obviously, but it did take a while, it required some faith at times, and it was not covered by insurance. I felt it was worth it for me, because I was going anyway for the asthma, it was low stress (and dealing with doctors would definitely have caused me a lot of stress and anxiety) and I was able to be productive and earn enough money to pay for it, whereas I felt the allopathic treament would have interfered with my ability to earn money and be productive ... in any case, my insurance didn't pay for that either. So it seemed six of one, a half dozen of the other, as it were, and I picked the treatment path that struck me as more appealing. Also, I have a deep, deep terror of injections and hypodermics and was terrified of even the idea of Metrodin or the other thing that's injected. I was already having so much trouble with headaches and mood swings that I wasn't thrilled with clomid either, plus I didn't need any more pain from enlarged ovaries (it was so bad it hurt when I walked).

YMMV. I was planning, if I hadn't seens any positive results, to use clomid starting early in '97 and do the whole supervised thing with the IUIs and all, since I now have insurance which would pay for the whole thing.