Michael Roesslein: Hey. Here we are recording. I am here today with my friend Jaclyn Downs. Hey, Jaclyn. How you doing?

Jaclyn Downs:

Hey, Michael. I’m great. Thanks for having me.

Michael Roesslein:

Yeah. This is going to be fun. I always enjoy whenever we get to connect. So we are going to talk about functional fertility today, and unresolved and unexplained infertility, and things that people might not realize are going on when they’re having trouble conceiving or having hormonal issues that are leading to infertility.

Before we get started though, I want to introduce Jaclyn. She works with clients and practitioners to determine root causes of hormone imbalance, and create personalized plans of action based on genetics, health history, diet, lifestyle, and biochemistry. And she is also the author of the soon to be released book Solving Unexplained Infertility, Your 12-Week Functional Fertility Plan, which I’ve been kind of behind the scenes watching that come to fruition, so I’m excited to see the new steps going along and can’t wait for it to be out.

Jaclyn Downs:

Me too. Me too. It’s been a long process.

Michael Roesslein:

I’m sure. I know it goes into writing a book and a lot of people have tried to convince me to do it and I haven’t been brave enough yet, so kudos to you.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yeah. Thank you. I’m super-

Michael Roesslein:

[inaudible 00:01:20] ask for it.

Jaclyn Downs:

… excited because [crosstalk 00:01:21]. I’ve gotten really good feedback from all the beta readers so I have high hopes for it.

Michael Roesslein:

I’m sure it’s going to be awesome and judging by how much infertility we’re seeing today, we can use all the resources out there we can get. So, I guess we’re going to start off with pretty simple question. In your business, in your Facebook, in your Instagram, your website is Functional Fertility Solutions, and the name of your book involves the term functional fertility. I’m curious, how would you define functional fertility?

Jaclyn Downs:

I define-

Michael Roesslein:

And what does that mean?

Jaclyn Downs:

… functional fertility as identifying and addressing root causes of reproductive imbalances through improving nutrition, detoxification ability, lifestyle, and emotional wellness, all of which support optimal genetic expression and cellular function.

Most fertility treatments and protocols these days just involve forcing hormones into certain levels to achieve pregnancy. But they’re not getting to the root cause of why the hormones are out of balance in the first place. And so my book describes a lot of different reasons or root causes for hormone imbalances. And really it comes down to cellular health because the eggs and the sperm are cells, and they are the most vulnerable to oxidative stress, especially the mitochondria.

And the mitochondria, just a little science lesson, they’re the little powerhouses of the cells that generate ATP. And it is only the mother that passes on the mitochondrial DNA to her baby, and so we want to make sure that the mom has optimal functioning mitochondria. And if the body is not producing energy well enough for her own needs, it’s going to know that now is not a good time to… We don’t have enough energy to make and grow a baby. So protecting the mitochondria is super important.

Michael Roesslein:

That makes sense. And I was fascinated when I learned that mitochondrial DNA only comes from the mother. A lot of things are shared in the genetics, and that is one that is not. So that’s a huge important point for mom. And yeah, when I first started learning all this stuff around functional medicine and natural health and hormones and such, I realized that infertility both with women and men is kind of the body’s response to them living in an unsafe or unfit for a child kind of environment or way, right?

This is not a good place for a baby so we’re going to turn off your ability to do that. Because that’s oversimplified, but that’s kind of nature’s way of saying, “This is not a place for a child or a time for a child or an environment for a child,” or anything like that.

And then I thought, they do tons of these infertility treatments that are like in vitro, the IVF stuff, or said forced hormones, and all these kinds of things. I was like, “Is it really a good idea to be overriding nature’s warnings? It’s like turning off the light on the car that says your oil is not going to work and then you just keep driving and drive faster?”

Are there consequences to that? I don’t know any statistics or anything, but are the pregnancies that are achieved via these IVF and the hormones and all these kind of forced medical ways, are there more issues there than with pregnancies that are not done that way?

Jaclyn Downs:

Yes. I actually have references to PubMed articles on this with assisted reproductive technologies, that’s kind of the whole field of it. You can call it ART.

Michael Roesslein:

That’s the term for all of those things.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yeah.

Michael Roesslein:

Okay.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yeah. That statistics show that there is a higher incidence of learning disorders, and autism, and childhood allergies, and that kind of stuff because you didn’t address the health of the mother and you can’t pour from an empty cup, too. So you can achieve the pregnancy, but statistics show that ART results in children with higher needs. Not all of them. I guess I didn’t word that correct but-

Michael Roesslein:

[crosstalk 00:06:05] Yeah.

Jaclyn Downs:

But- [crosstalk 00:06:06].

Michael Roesslein:

A higher percentage versus non ART pregnancies are going to have some sort of higher need or health issue and you named a few there. I would guess if they studied more of them and find more correlations, too. I’m not going to put words in anybody’s mouth, but I’m sure that not every different type of condition or disability or thing has been studied.

But I always wonder then, like man, because it’s like turning off the warning light and then putting a baby in there and then like, “Okay, go keep doing the same things you were doing and then carry this baby the whole time, that you’re doing the same things you were doing.” And so, once I learned this stuff, it just didn’t sit well. I was like, “That probably isn’t the best idea.” But a lot of women, and I’m not trying to blame anybody out there, so if anybody hears this, it’s not my intention at all because a lot of people don’t even know that there’s another way. Most women or couples, if they go to the doctor and they’re having trouble with conceiving a child that’s going to be what’s put in front of them, right?

Jaclyn Downs:

Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yep. Just like birth control is the first and only step for irregular periods and period problems. Yep.

Michael Roesslein:

Yeah. It’s not your fault. Like everybody does the best they can do with what they know and what they have. What we’re trying to do today is let them know that there are other ways to resolve these things. Functional fertility is like you define kind of a functional medicine approach geared specifically towards fertility. And I heard you mention oxidative stress and that this is what is kind of the leading factor when it comes to poor cellular health and infertility on that level.

People have probably heard of antioxidants. They’ve probably heard of oxidation to some degree, maybe if they work with metal. What is oxidative stress in the body and how is it relevant to fertility?

Jaclyn Downs:

So, oxidative stress, and I state this in my book that my aim is to make it a very commonly recognized and understood term because it’s at the heart of all inflammation and chronic disease. So it’s not just for fertility that that oxidative stress is relative to. But oxidative stress is essentially not having enough antioxidants to neutralize the free radicals and so that creates inflammation, which creates oxidative stress, and inflammation and oxidative stress feed each other. So oxidative stress damages, not only the structural integrity of the cell but also the information contained within the cell.

Michael Roesslein:

Interesting. How does it affect information?

Jaclyn Downs:

It affects mitochondrial DNA and the DNA of the nucleus in the cell and it can damage DNA-

Michael Roesslein:

And short circuit then how it starts reproducing and functioning and working.

Jaclyn Downs:

Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yep.

Michael Roesslein:

That’s interesting because the DNA’s kind of a blueprint or an instruction manual for a cell, like what it’s supposed to be doing. So if that gets damaged then what it’s doing can change.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yes. Yeah.

Michael Roesslein:

Right. Yeah.

Jaclyn Downs:

So, I go into details in my book about the science of it, about unpaired electrons but I’ll save your listeners that nerdiness right now.

Michael Roesslein:

Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We can skip the hardcore science lesson. So this oxidative stress, what are the main sources of it? I mean, I’m sure that’s different for everybody, but there’s probably some top few that when you really analyze our way of living in our modern life and our culture I’m sure it’s not to find them. But what would be some of the top of the list of things that contribute to this high level of oxidative stress?

Jaclyn Downs:

The ones that I see primarily like just over and over repeatedly in my practice would be poor liver detoxification. That could be phase one or especially phase two. And especially with the toxic soup of a planet that we live in, we really need to be able to have effective detoxification because if you can’t detoxify then you’re not going to be able to have hormonal balance because you need to detoxify your hormones as well as the environmental toxins that we have.

I’m also seeing iron dysregulation as a big factor. A lot of women are told they’re anemic, but they’re eating meat and they’re taking vitamins. So it’s not necessarily an iron acquisition issue. It’s an iron utilization issue. There’s a lot of genetics that can come into play, but also measuring a complete iron panel, as opposed to just your serum iron can give you a more complete picture of what’s going on and how the iron is being used or where the wrench in the system is.

Another one that is huge, which so many people seem to have, is poor fat utilization. You need fats to make hormones. You need to them to make all of your sex hormones and all your stress hormones as well as to protect your brain and a lot of other functions in the body. And so if you are not properly using your fats, you’re not going to be able to make those hormones. You won’t have the raw materials to make the hormones.

I’ve done some videos and posts on Instagram about this as far as like if your poop floats, that’s a huge sign that you’re not digesting your fats well because the fats are coming out undigested and causing your stool to float. Just like when you make a salad dressing and the oil floats on top. So poor fat utilization, digestion, and utilization, iron dysregulation, poor liver detoxification.

And another one that I am seeing so much more of since we can now test for it oftentimes, but really I go by symptoms oftentimes and confirm with a urine organic acid test is oxalate issues. They are way more common than I ever would’ve even thought until they got on my radar. And oxalates are compounds in plants. They’re in some of the healthiest foods like spinach and Swiss chard and beets, but these compounds bind to minerals in the body and they create tiny little jagged crystals. They can be nano-particle size. They don’t have to be actually visible to the eye and they can irritate tissue and cause a lot of inflammation, but they also rob the body of sulfur, which you need all your hormones to be sulfated, and we need sulfation for a lot of things as well.

We need to have the sulfate molecule to take the sun’s rays that touch our skin. We need sulfate in order to turn that into vitamin D. So a lot of people could have vitamin D deficiency because they actually have a sulfate deficiency and that may or may not be because over hyperoxaluria is the medical term.

Michael Roesslein:

Interesting. And sulfates in foods come from where?

Jaclyn Downs:

Wines-

Michael Roesslein:

[inaudible 00:13:27] I think.

Jaclyn Downs:

… dried food. Yeah. Wines and dried fruit are the two primary sources, but we have, you can get… Well, those are sulfites and your sulfite turns into sulfate, which is the molecule that we need. Stephanie [inaudible 00:13:43] she’s like a triple PhD-

Michael Roesslein:

Yeah. I’ve. [crosstalk 00:13:48]

Jaclyn Downs:

She calls-

Michael Roesslein:

I chat with her once and was jaw on the table most of the time.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yeah. She calls sulfate the most important molecule you’ve never heard of. It is used for so many important things and oxalates compete and hijack the sulfate in the cell.

Michael Roesslein:

Interesting. Sulfate sulfur in some form.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yes. Yeah. So sulfation is one of your phase two liver detox pathways. So, you want to make sure that you have enough sulfate to keep that pathway open, but sulfite uses the SUOX gene and molybdenum and some B vitamins to convert sulfite which is the not good form into sulfate, which is the critical form that we need.

Michael Roesslein:

Okay. So, I know that there’s a lot of other on the rise chronic health issues that probably start to… I mean, everything affects everything. What I’ve noticed in interviewing a lot of people on a lot of topics related to health over the last however many years, is that regardless of what niche we’re talking about, like today, we’re talking about fertility, the last recording I did was with Dr. Jolene Brighten, actually talking about perimenopause. And then there was one on psychoneuroimmunology and mental, emotional health related to inflammation in the body.

On the broad level, most of the things that “cause” the problem that we’re talking about on the interview or the podcast are relatively similar. And most of the things that “solve” the problem are relatively similar with some specifics that might change for specific problems. So something like mold comes up in every webinar we do now, that somebody in the audience is asking questions about mold and mycotoxicity, and honestly like 10 years ago when I got in this field, I don’t remember hearing about mold very much.

And over the last 10 years, it’s gone from like this fringy topic of really chronically ill people on the edge of the functional medicine world that kind of nobody knew how to deal with them or help them. They would’ve all these wild symptoms too, it’s probably the thing that we get asked about the most now on the webinars is mold and mycotoxicity. So that’d be a touch of a whole nother interview as to what the hell’s going on and why is there so much more of it now, but how does something like mold or mycotoxins affect one’s fertility?

Jaclyn Downs:

I have a whole entire chapter in my book on that. And I just want to rewind real quick. I love. I want to listen to that interview you on psychoneuroimmunology because I actually mentioned that in my book. Once I learned about that field, it just put the science to “the woo woo” kind of and I was really intrigued by it. I discussed that a little bit.

Michael Roesslein:

And it’s a plus one for the longest word in the health industry.

Jaclyn Downs:

Right. Yeah.

Michael Roesslein:

It’s like a five million point word on Scrabble.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yeah. But it definitely encompasses a lot, too. So my book definitely talks about the limbic system and the nervous system and how that interplays into fertility and fertility challenges. But mold and mycotoxins, there’re numerous ways that can affect the body. So first off you have this unwelcome guest that’s just in abundance in your body and that stresses out your body and puts it in an alarm state.

But second, certain mycotoxins, especially like Aspergillus niger produce oxalates in the body. So if you have an overabundance of certain forms of mycotoxins, they’re going to actually produce oxalate, and then, like we just talked about that’s going to create inflammation and oxidative stress and hijack your sulfate. And also that affects your estrogen and can lead to things like endometriosis and fibroids and all the other fun things that estrogen dominance comes with.

But also mold stimulates the mast cells to release histamine and histamine and estrogen feed each other and so that causes estrogen dominance and all of the other symptoms I just mentioned. So it’s like a three or fourfold “whammy,” I guess I should say when it comes to mold and mycotoxins affecting your fertility.

Michael Roesslein:

And then there’s some obvious things like sleep and circadian rhythm. How many women that have come to you with infertility issues. What percentage of them do you think had a high-stress life with poor sleep?

Jaclyn Downs:

With the sleep, definitely is affected by a lot of things. I’m trying to think maybe… Yeah. I would say majority of my clients do not sleep as well as they would like for sure. A large percentage. And I think the ones that do say they sleep relatively well are still probably pretty young in their 20s. Well, that’s good. I’m glad that we’re addressing these things now before you would have that factor to add in and compound the situation.

Michael Roesslein:

I remember sleeping in my teens and 20s when you could like sleep and like a marching band could come through the room and then you would remain sleeping. And now if somebody like three buildings away from me turns on their water at 3:00 in the morning I’m awake. And I’m kind of jealous. I remember people could just walk in the room and walk out and whatever, and yeah. So anybody out there listening that’s young, enjoy your sleep and your pain-free days of not having random, strange soreness.

Jaclyn Downs:

It could be [crosstalk 00:19:49] by the way.

Michael Roesslein:

Interesting. Okay. I’ll talk to you about that after we’re done.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yeah. Because I actually have an Instagram post that I’m going to post at some point in time and I say it in my book, that pain that is not structural. As with your bones, you want to consider oxalates. Especially if you have painful sex or vulvodynia which is burning in the vulva area or endometriosis or any kind of bladder or urinary tract issues you-

Michael Roesslein:

Why so much now? Like why are oxalates so much of an issue now or what’s most contributing to that?

Jaclyn Downs:

I think leaky gut probably, and not having the good gut bacteria to degrade the oxalic acid-

Michael Roesslein:

There are certain organisms that do that, right?

Jaclyn Downs:

The what?

Michael Roesslein:

There’s certain organisms that are responsible for that, right?

Jaclyn Downs:

Yeah. There’s an actual strain called Oxalobacter formigenes, I believe. And they get wiped out with antibiotics and babies are on antibiotics and then antibiotics, antibiotics, antibiotics. They’re in our animal feed and everything. That’s a pretty big contributing factor, but also just spinach, green drinks, spinach in your smoothies, spinach salads. I say spinach because spinach is the single highest oxalate food, but I don’t believe that our bodies were designed to have two handfuls of spinach every day, 365 days a year, regardless of where you live on the planet. On top of other, a lot of nuts, almonds are really the highest oxalate nut, but they’re still only about half as highest spinach in oxalate content. So that combined with-

Michael Roesslein:

If somebody’s lacking these bugs and they’re eating tons of foods that are pretty high in oxalate, that’s going to be a problem?

Jaclyn Downs:

That’s going to be like a double problem.

Michael Roesslein:

For a lot of people.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yeah.

Michael Roesslein:

Yeah. So what are other than spinach? Can you throw out a few more that are pretty high up there on the list?

Jaclyn Downs:

The top five, I would say are spinach, Swiss chard, beets that’s with the beet greens as well. So never in a million years as a nutritionist, did I think I would tell somebody to stay away from spring mix, but the more you know… Because that’s primarily what’s in spring mix.

And then rhubarb is really high, but I usually only say rhubarb to the plain community that does actually eat a lot of rhubarb. I know that in England they eat more rhubarb than in the United States, but rhubarb’s pretty high and then sesame seeds. So a lot of people that eat hummus. Hummus is really healthy for you, but it’s made with tahini which is sesame seed paste. So sesame seeds are pretty high in oxalates. But-

Michael Roesslein:

Interesting.

Jaclyn Downs:

… if somebody’s on a gluten-free diet, I use the caveat with almonds because you’re cutting out the wheat and you’re using the almond flour for cookies, and muffins, and breads, and pancakes and all kinds of stuff. So you definitely want to keep that in mind if you’re gluten-free to just kind of dial it back a little bit.

Michael Roesslein:

[inaudible 00:23:00] alternative flours to almond. Yeah. What would be since this seems like a thing that a lot of people would need to know, not just people with infertility. But you mentioned, I said like random soreness or pain. Are there any other non-fertility-related symptoms of like issues with oxalates? Is it just pain or stiffness?

Jaclyn Downs:

No, it can be skin issues, rashes, vertigo, because the oxalate crystals can get in the ear canal and kind of throw off and cause vertigo. They can get sequestered in your thyroid. There were actually a bunch of autopsies or studies done of autopsies in maybe the ’80s or something, and the older the person was the more oxalate crystals they had sequestered in their thyroid. So you can have hypothyroid issues, not really having anything to do with the thyroid hormones, which probably is if you have oxalates, then you’re going to have hormone imbalances but it could be because the oxalates are getting sequestered there and affecting the functioning of your thyroid.

But sometimes you can’t just get a scan and see them because like I said, oxalate crystals can be nano-sized and it’s not until they’re super big that you can see them that it’s a really big problem. They can get behind the eyes, which is often why children with autism might poke their eyes or feel eye pressure because oxalate crystals can build up around there and you can even get really gnarly sleepy seeds, too.

They can get in the joints and cause joint pain. They can get in the connective tissue and cause fibromyalgia type pain and they can get in muscles and cause muscle pain. So it’s wherever the sulfur sulfate molecule can go, the oxalates can catch a ride and compete and so that’s why oxalates are so pervasive and there’s so many different places in the body that they can affect.

Michael Roesslein:

Interesting. I know of oxalates and oxalate issues, but they kind of became well known after I stopped working with clients. So it’s not something I dove into fully. We’ve talked about a lot of things that are wrong and bad, and go sideways, and cause problems. Regarding the oxidative… Oh, go ahead. I’m sorry.

Jaclyn Downs:

One other thing. The most documented cause of hyperoxaluria is poor fat utilization. So not only is it going to poor fat utilization going to affect your hormones, but it can increase the predisposition for oxalates aside from genetic predisposition. Because if you are not properly digesting your fats, then the fats are going to bind to the minerals instead of the oxalates binding to the minerals and that’s going to let the oxalates run amuck in the body.

Michael Roesslein:

Okay. And that’s probably liver gallbladder, bio-related, along with microbiome and the integrity of the gut lining, I would guess. Yeah.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yep. I have information [crosstalk 00:26:03].

Michael Roesslein:

I’ve done enough webinars with Kiran that I can recite that one.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yep.

Michael Roesslein:

Cool. So, where would somebody start? I mean, oxidative stress is a pretty broad thing. What are some easy if somebody’s just wanting to do a few things that might kind of shift the needle a little bit in regards to oxidative stress? What would be your first starting points that you might recommend to people? And this is not medical advice. We’re just giving general tips.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yes. I would say avoiding the insults so that your body doesn’t have to deal with them. So that upgrade your body care products, upgrade your house cleaning products, that way your liver doesn’t have-

Michael Roesslein:

What do you mean by that, stuff that doesn’t have chemicals? Like toxic chemicals in it?

Jaclyn Downs:

Yeah. The phthalates and the sulfates and the BPA and just every other VOC and all kinds of other toxins that we have in our environment today because if our liver’s trying to deal with that stuff, then it’s going to put its own endogenously produced hormones on the back burner because it wants to get rid of the more foreign toxic stuff, toxins. So avoiding the toxin, getting the client away from the toxin is number one.

So we talk all about what sort of water are you drinking and what are you drinking out of? What percentage of your food is organic and what are your cleaning products like? What are your body care products like? All that kind of environment and lifestyle stuff because clients could come to me and I could give them a hormone test. I love the Dutch test, but I don’t do that right off the bat because there’s so many other factors that affect hormone balance that I’m not going to get… Of course they’re going to have a Dutch test that shows in balanced hormones. So if we can get rid of some of the “low-hanging fruit” with just cleaning up your diet, your environment, that kind of stuff, then we can get a true baseline of what’s going on with the hormones. So it’s generally-

Michael Roesslein:

[crosstalk 00:28:15] few months in a cleaner environment.

Jaclyn Downs:

Excuse me.

Michael Roesslein:

So give it like a few months in a cleaner environment before running the test.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yep. And then as far as detoxification goes, going from a bottoms-up approach. So you want to make sure that you are having at least one bowel movement every single day, because a lot of people just decide, especially in January, I’m going to do a liver cleanse and then they go and they get all these herbs for their liver. But if they’re not eliminating every day, then the liver’s going to push out all those toxins and they’re just going to recirculated back into the body and that’s not solving anything.

So step one is to make sure that channels of elimination are open, which you can even do with a drainage kit or detox kit. I like the Pekana one. Make sure you’re pooping. And then you can move on to what is called phase 2.5 and that’s the whole liver or gallbladder bio flow to make sure that the toxins are going to be escorted out of the liver and into the gut so that they can be excreted.

And then you can work on knowing which toxin you’re dealing with, whether it’s a specific mycotoxin or an environmental toxin. It’s really helpful because then you can know which phase two liver detox pathway you really want to support. A lot of functional medicine doctors are saying, “Oh, you have mycotoxins, let’s just give you some glutathione and you’ll be good,” but actually glutathione…

There’s two mycotoxins, ochratoxin A and aflatoxin B1 are primarily cleared through the glutathione pathway, glutathione conjugation pathway, but so many more mycotoxins are cleared through the glucuronidation pathway. So knowing which toxin you’re dealing of can really help you to get precise in the method of detoxification that you want a nuts. I’m going to give that credit to Dr. Neil Nathan, Beth O’Hara and my colleague, Emily Gibbler, because they really did a deep dive into the research and brought to life-

Michael Roesslein:

[inaudible 00:30:20] to a show and Emily first put that info, I saw that posted. I don’t actually listen to it in a podcast to be honest or shows because I’m really, really busy. And when I saw them post that that was like last year or the year before, I don’t remember, but it was a little while back. I remember seeing her post like, “Hey. We are doing this talk on different types of detox support and different types of binders for different types of mycotoxins.” And they were the first ones that I’d seen talking about that, and I’m sure there was-

Jaclyn Downs:

Super effective.

Michael Roesslein:

… no small pile of studies to go through to figure that out.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yeah, for sure. So then you can use that with genetics too, because maybe you have [crosstalk 00:31:01] genetic predispositions and your glutathione conjugation pathway or your [inaudible 00:31:05] pathway that might need a little extra support. So that’s where knowing the genetics can really give the practitioner a one-up advantage. And so I that’s one thing that I do is I don’t just work with clients, but I also work with practitioners and if they want to come to me to help interpret their clients genetics I offer that as well to practitioners.

Michael Roesslein:

Very cool. And okay, so there was a lot though removing. It’s basically removing the things that are causing the harm as much as it is adding anything out or adding anything in or doing more. That was one thing I was really caught off guard when I moved over here to Italy, everything is really highly scented. Like I had to…

It was very difficult to find any sort of soap or shampoo or laundry detergent or cleaning products or dish soap or anything that does not sound like a Glade plug-in bomb went off or smell like Glade plug on went off in my house and like everything everywhere is really highly scented. And we use unscented anything and don’t use any of that stuff. So I was like… It was a week period where I felt I was just immersed in tide pods or something. So that was like, “Get this crap out of here.” So all of the lovely scented things, there’s stuff that makes it smell that your body doesn’t like. So-

Jaclyn Downs:

Endocrine-disrupting chemicals, for sure.

Michael Roesslein:

Yeah. It’s super offensive when you haven’t been around it for like years to be dropped into it. It was just like, “Oh, all this stuff needs to go in the trash and get out of my house immediately.”

Jaclyn Downs:

Well, there’s people that physically get sick from it with multiple chemical sensitivities, like they can’t physically handle it.

Michael Roesslein:

Like Canarians for everybody else. Just because I didn’t get sick doesn’t mean my body likes it either.

Jaclyn Downs:

Right.

Michael Roesslein:

I was just shocked by it. I’ve been so far removed from that for so long, so okay. That sounds like a lot where people could start to do so I know you’ve been writing this book for quite a while and judging by your responses in this interview, it’s pretty thorough because almost everything we brought up is in the book.

So what’s the status? We’re recording this in January 2022, but it’ll probably air in March or April. What’s the status? How long are we looking? And when could people expect to maybe see it?

Jaclyn Downs:

I am just about finished with my side of things, and I am starting to look for a publishing company or I may entertain self-publishing so, really however long that process takes. So I would hope by the end of summer, this will be out, but you can follow me on Instagram @functionalfertilitysolutions or you can sign up for any presale info or info about the book at my website at functionalfertilitysolutions.com.

I do just want to say that the book is for two demographics actually, which I know is a big no, no in the marketing world, but it’s got a lot of appendices. So it’s written for the person that wants to understand why they may have fertility challenges. But the how’s and the why’s and the genetics and the biochemical pathways are all like, “Hey, if you want to learn more about this reference appendix X and you can really get into the practitioner side or the real nerdy side of things to understand it much more comprehensively.”

Michael Roesslein:

That’s pretty clever. I wondered how you were going to do that because that’s like a big… And not only just writing books, but when I put out any sort of content or do any sort of thing, I get reprimanded immediately. If it’s not honed in on like one exact, super honed in like avatar of a person where what practitioners might be looking for in the book and what a woman who’s struggling with fertility and is not a health practitioner looking for, it would be completely different. So that’s a really clever way to do that without writing two books.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yeah. It [crosstalk 00:35:31] was going to be two books.

Michael Roesslein:

Would be exhausting.

Jaclyn Downs:

Yeah. But Dr. Steven Sinatra was one of my beta readers, world-renowned cardiologist, author of like 25 books. And we talked about this and he said he did that with, I think his like metabolic cardiology book or something. And he said it went over really well.

But this day and age, the line between the patient and the practitioner, what they know is really getting smaller [crosstalk 00:35:57] because of the people are advocating for themselves and then educating themselves. And I know we get a lot of clients who want to understand their genetics and want to know why and want to know what they can do and the science behind it. And so that’s there. So it’s for the average person that just wants to educate themselves.

And even if they don’t have to turn to the appendices either, but it’s also a guidebook for practitioners to be able to reference if they have a challenging client or they’re kind of stuck. It will provide practitioners with more and sharper tools for their toolbox as well.

Michael Roesslein:

So whether you are a woman or a couple having fertility issues, or you’re a practitioner, a doctor, or coach or anybody that works with women having fertility issues, this is going to be a must add to your bookshelf. When I read and hear the statistics around infertility, it’s mind-blowing and the same goes for a lot of things, neurodegenerative disease and autism. And there’s a lot of things that if you want to get really freaked out, you can go look up the statistics on these things and the arc at which they are increasing. And they all lead to a point, in the near future, where things are going to be unmanageable for some of the chronic diseases and not having enough humans for their fertility issues.

And so it’s really, really important that content like yours in the guidebook, you’re going to be putting out get published and get in people’s hands. Because like we mentioned back at the beginning, women aren’t given choices. Nobody’s going to talk to them when they go to their OB-GYN and tell them, “Oh, you might be having issues with this or this or this. No, here’s your solution. Here’s your IVF, here’s your hormones, here’s this.” And we need to shift the conversation on that. And it starts with people like you doing this work and putting it out there and more women hearing about it. And social media’s been huge for this. I’ve heard that I don’t… I’m too old to TikTok, but I’ve heard TikTok’s killing it with women’s health stuff and also a whole bunch of other topics.

And then your Instagram is a good place to go for content. I see your videos on there and kudos to you for making them. I know we had chatted about your love or not so love for making videos. And now I see a bunch of videos coming out, so that’s exciting to see. So it’s @functionalfertilitysolutions on Instagram\Functional Fertility Solutions on Facebook and functionalfertilitysolutions.com on the web. We’ll have all of those down below the video or the audio that you’re listening to in the show notes. So you can click right over and check all that right out. I would get on Jaclyn’s mailing list to get updates on the book. And if they have questions they can reach out. Yeah?

Jaclyn Downs:

Absolutely. Yeah, for sure. I would love it.

Michael Roesslein:

Okay, cool. Yeah. Awesome. Thank you. And thank you for being so accessible. I know that you’re really generous with your time and your knowledge, and so don’t hesitate to reach out and see if Jaclyn can help you with your issues.

Jaclyn Downs:

Thank you. Thanks, Michael. I always enjoy speaking with you.

Michael Roesslein:

Thank you. You too. It’s always fun. Good luck on the book launch. Let me know how I can help.

Jaclyn Downs:

Thank you.