My husband's sperm are not great and my acupuncturist has been trying to figure out why. She had him do a fancy urine test from Metametrix that showed he was under oxidative stress. What might that be, she thought. So she did a heavy metals test, and up popped mercury, level so elevated that it was touching the top of the chart. Yikes!
Turns out, mercury is terrible for sperm. Read about it here.
My husband has several mercury fillings. He had most of them removed last summer, and is going to get the last two removed soon. We will then need to have him do a detox. My acupuncturist thinks that it could take up to 6 months to get his sperm looking better.
Fortunately for our baby-making plans, we are going to try IVF. We had a consult yesterday with the head of the clinic, and he recommended using ICSI, which is where they put the sperm directly into the egg to make sure it fertilizes, so they don't need a huge number of good sperm. Evidently they sort through the sperm to find the best ones. But still...
Wow, this issue of mercury really should be more common knowledge. I had looked all over the web for things that were supposed to affect sperm motility, but somehow had missed this. Maybe people don't know about it. But indeed there was a study proving the link. Ugh, I wish I had known about this sooner....To be honest it makes me really angry, that two leading urologists and two other acupuncturists before this one did not think to look at this.
Please spread the word. If you know anyone trying to get pregnant and their husband's sperm doesn't seem to improve no matter what they do, tell them about this!!!
6 comments:
Hello,
Just to let you know that we have been preparing for IVF but the procedure was postponed because of the sizes of my fibroids. I have 6 fibroids..one fibroid measures 7.3 cm. followed by 3.9 cm, the rest(from 1 to 2 cm.) My IVF specialist postponed the IVF procedure since the 7.3cm and 3.9 cm fibroids might grow quickly during pregnancy so I will have surgery in end of May to get rid of them. I had laparascopic myomectomy in 2002 leaving 2 fibroids(measured 1-2cm.) since accdg. to my doctor who performed the surgery that he had to leave the two fibroids cos they are near the nerve of my uterus. My IVF specialist who will do the surgery as well said it's only an excuse, and it's ridiculous to leave those fibroids(now 7.3 and 3.9 cm.) should get rid of them all. So an abdominal myomectomy is necessary in my case. I wish you IVF success . I have been following your blog from time to time and I was like you before..trying to shrink my fibroids naturally but it's not that easy. I have purchased few years ago those books like Healing Fibroids and Infertility Cure and now I am curious about the book written by Ori Hofmekler his Anti-Estrogenic Diet. I just bought it.
take care & regards
Ysabel
Good luck with the surgery and the IVF!
In the meantime while you're waiting, if you aren't already you might want to do some acupuncture and herbs to help with your egg quality. Plus bee pollen with royal jelly is supposed to be good, I'll be starting that soon.
In my case the doctor said he thought I had shrunk my fibroids enought that although they are a factor, it's worth doing the IVF. But hoping to shrink them some more!
Hi thanks for the advice, my IVF specialist said to us that the quality of my egg is very good even I'm already 42 going 43 and my husband's sperms are very good as well...maybe because of being an organic freak ;-) and avoiding plastic, teflon, microwave etc.. but the problem is I live in a city so pollution is my enemy here and stressing me so much especially the smokers(sorry I really can't stand the smoke).. this reminded me when we first enter the room of our IVF specialist, his first question to my husband was"Do you smoke?" fortunately we're both non smokers.. I had mechanical problem to get pregnant naturally but he corrected it thru surgery last year but now the issue are the fibroids so he postponed the IVF. I haven't tried acupuncture but I apply acupressure for fertility by myself. Sad to say fibroids are very common to our family. ysabel
Glad to hear your eggs and sperm are in such good shape. Good luck with the surgery and the IVF!
Hi,
I am looking into removing my amalgam fillings but the dentists that perform this procedure (safely) do not take insurance (or I have to pay the difference). I am curious, how much do they charge for the procedure, if you could share the info. They would not tell me upfront. I have to get in there and be evaluated first ($160 - $200 out of pocket).
Thanks!
The one I used takes insurance but I have to pay the difference. (not sure what that will be yet)
In my case, I paid $800 for removal of 3 amalgams, x-rays, cleaning and then a new filling for a new cavity. I don't remember the breakdown for each of those. I would guess about $200 for each filling. I know that's a lot but I find the mercury so scary that I wanted to make the investment.
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