Any experiences with byrophyllum?

Hi atomic!

Last cycle my LP was 8 days, the cycle before 9 days.
Now it looks like AF has arrived (it was our first ttc cycle with 1 attempt at pos opk :-( .. ) and again it was only 9 days.
Although - I obviously ovulated 3 days earlier than the month before. At least something.

I know that you said that 9 days was enough to get/stay pregnant, but I‘m still worried though that it could cut my chances a lot :-/

Do you know anything about byrophyllum? It’s told to act similar to progesterone which would lengthen the LP and help with implantation. Many women I know in the forums I‘m at took it in order to get pregnant. Either as powder or homeopathic pills.

I’ve already added 4-6 eggs a week and one serve of ff dairy into my diet since the last month.

Thanks for answering!


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Short LP (longer than 7 days, anyway) is NOT caused by low progesterone. That is a misconception. What really causes short LP when LP is longer than 7 days, is actually low estrogen. At 7 DPO, your corpus luteum starts to break down and your body releases a surge of estrogen that maintains the uterine lining long enough for a fertilized egg to implant and send a signal to your body to keep the corpus luteum alive and making progesterone. If your estrogen is too low (due to too few raw materials like the fats found in eggs and full fat dairy!) and low weight/low fat/low cal intake, then that surge of estrogen cannot happen and your lining starts to break down and any implanting egg will not have the time to send the signal to the corpus luteum not to break down.

to sum up - CL makes progesterone for 7 days after O
Then CL begins to break down at 7 DPO unless it receives signal that baby is present
Baby implants at 6-7 DPO
estrogen surge happens at 7 DPO, maintains lining for days/a week to be sure fertilized egg has enough time to send that signal

So between 7 DPO and 9 DPO the implanting fertilized egg will send that signal to maintain the CL and it will make progesterone but the lining (maintained by estrogen) has to be good enough to allow that to occur, which is why low estrogen is actually what causes a short LP as long as it's longer than 7 days.

The corpus luteum is by far and away better at making progesterone than any herb is. Your short LP is not being caused by progesterone anyway, it's being caused by low estrogen. So it's not a solution to raise progesterone (if a plant could even do that, which it really can't, at least not compared to how your body makes its own progesterone, which is much better quality and quantity than anything a plant can do)

I don't like you guys taking herbs unless i have seen gobs of people taking them and have a good feel for how they sway and if they are safe. So I have not seen that with bryophillium and since I haven't, I don't recommend taking it, particularly since it is not going to fix the problem anyway.

I know it's super annoying and would be easier to just pop a pill or a powder but the cure for short LP is giving your body the raw materials it needs to make its own progesterone and estrogen. A serving of full fat dairy every day, 4-6 eggs a week, and if the problem is severe or really worrying you, a serving of salmon if you like it and red meat if you don't per week. Drop fiber, eat more fat and calories if you've really been restricting them, and cut back on exercise by 1-2 days per week as well if the problem isn't improving. You may even need to gain a small amount of weight if your BMI was below 21 and for sure if it's below 18.5.

But this process takes TIME. It doesn't happen in a month usually, it often takes 2-3 before your body feels "safe" in getting pregnant again and starts making enough hormones to enable that to happen.

Thank you atomic for responding so fast!

I‘m maintaining my weight with 2200(+) cals a day and my BMI is 20.7.

I‘m not feeling hungry anymore after a meal, only between. So I assume the cal intake is okay for me, when I start losing a few ounces I always try to increase it a bit to prevent that. I don’t excercise per se but try to walk a lot with the stroller. I‘m also weaning DS2 currently.

I was at the doctor‘s last week, approx. at 2 dpo.
She saw a good lining and what she told to be a „well estrogenized cervix“. Never heard of that before, but she saw that.
And she told me to seem very fertile because of the many present waiting eggs in the ovaries. So she was very confident that ttc would be successful soon. So far, so good.

What I also found that cycle is an estrogen dip (do you call that like this?) in my temp chart at 6 dpo. I sometimes have had this before and I read it comes from the estrogen surge which occurs at 6-7 dpo and causes the temp to drop a little bit (not under the cover line though because of the present progesterone).

So this actually means I have enough estrogen, what do you think??

I have never been so strict with the LE diet either. Always aim for 60+g of fat and protein and 2200 cals. Often have whole cheat days...


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And for interest: How do vegans maintain their healthy hormone levels? By taking enough plant based fats?

As a vegan I never had problems (was already tracking my temp then).


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Oh. And I always produce very much EWCM, wouldn’t that be a sign for much/ enough estrogen?


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No, it doesn't mean you have enough estrogen, because your LP would not be short in this way if you did. It's totally possible for everything to be going just right and then your body either just sort of "runs out of fuel" or else it actually "chooses" to have your period come a little sooner because it is "nervous" and wants to save up for the next cycle and lower chances of conception.

You're doing all the right things. Just stay the course and this will happen.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Linni

Oh. And I always produce very much EWCM, wouldn’t that be a sign for much/ enough estrogen?


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In my opinion this is an estrogen issue. Progesterone issues are not as common as people think, particularly when caused by sway diets, and typically manifest differently.

If you want to take the herb, take it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Linni

And for interest: How do vegans maintain their healthy hormone levels? By taking enough plant based fats?

As a vegan I never had problems (was already tracking my temp then).


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Well, they actually can and do and it happens a lot more than people think, but yes it's because they are typically eating more calories than we are on LE Diet and more vegetable fats. Soy may also have a boosting effect on estrogen for some people. And for those who have had a lot of fat and cholesterol stores built up and one can go on those for a while.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by atomic sagebrush

In my opinion this is an estrogen issue. Progesterone issues are not as common as people think, particularly when caused by sway diets, and typically manifest differently.

If you want to take the herb, take it.

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And setting all this aside, it's irrelevant anyway because the cures are the same. Estrogen and progesterone is made of the same stuff anyway - fat (particularly animal fat) and cholesterol. So the cure is to add that in (while correcting for any PCOS-type tendencies, but I as I mentioned in your achemillia thread, I don't think that's your problem) without undoing the good of the sway overall and what I've had success with, for many, many people, is the dairy/eggs combo + the salmon for some people. Ditch fiber, cut back on exercise a little if you want, eat a little more. And then WAIT because your body has natural ways of fixing the problem. The key is waiting. People think they need to do all this stuff to fix things but what is happening is normal and natural, the solution is normal and natural, and tossing herbs at it, for the vast majority of people, only makes matters worse. It takes a slightly short LP and then adds a delayed ovulation and an even shorter LP onto it! That's why I came up with the dairy/eggs idea was because the herbs made things sooo much worse.

So, all that having been said, of course you're always welcome to do whatever makes sense to you but that is my rationale in recommending the things that I do.

Thanks again. I wouldn’t have asked you if I didn’t think you are the right person to ask and if I wouldn’t trust your opinion/experience.

My gyn told me to wean, because she thought it would be due to the prolactin. But when my period started again 11 months after birth it was very regular from the 2nd cycle and I only had a 8 days LP the first cycle. After that always 12-13 days. And I was still nursing DS2 very much then!
So I don’t assume it’s the nursing which causes my short LP, because now I nurse only once a day and often the milk supply is very very low.

Of course I didn’t tell her about the LE diet...it would be embarrassing to me, and I don’t want to defend myself for that kind of diet when I already am skinny.
She wanted me to take vitex, but since you and so many women in the temp charting forum I‘m in have had negative experiences and finally have messed up their cycles I won’t!

But what she also said is that a short LP comes from a „bad egg quality“, or that the LP is always a problem of the first half of the cycle. So maybe she meant the same as you said.

Oh, okay...I thought much EWCM is a sign of much estrogen - it’s not??

I will continue eating enough and not starve and hunger at any time! And of course the eggs and dairy.. salmon I also could try, haven’t done that yet!


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Yes unfortunately docs will always seize upon nursing as the reason for cycle issues and while that can be true sometimes, more often than not it's completely unrelated and you could get pregnant while continuing to breastfeed just by having patience and allowing your body to sort things out at its own pace.

Many doctors are not that knowledgeable about what causes short LP to be honest and will say all kinds of things that really don't seem to add up with our experiences. I've seen it happen on every continent but Antarctica now, LOL. What we are doing online is amassing a much greater body of information than medicine ever has about the workings of our bodies and so I urge you guys to take what your docs say with some skepticism because too many people are getting information that is actively untrue for me to accept what anyone's doctor says about LP.

What happens with your LP is that your body operates as if everything is normal. You will ovulate, have EWCM, your cervix will act normally, and this goes on as long as your body can manage it. But when it runs out it will just pull the plug sooner to save up resources. Like I said, you can get pregnant with an LP of 9 days, so your body has given it a shot to conceive and if it doesn't happen and it either a) runs out of "fuel" totally or b) doesn't receive the right signal that a pregnancy has occurred and feels like it should "save up" resources for next month instead of blowing it all making estrogen for 5 more days for a pregnancy that hasn't occurred,

It is just like how your car runs totally normally till practically moment you run out of fuel. Now some women are SO low in estrogen that they'll have symptoms all thru the month but that is not always, or even usually the case. Most people have ~mostly~ enough estrogen to make it through ovulation and a few days beyond, but just not quite enough to make it all 14 days. So you can go right through ovulation and for 7-10 days after that with everything being perfectly normal, and then your body is just either not able or not willing to expend any more resources keeping the lining going for a pregnancy it doesn't think has happened.

I usually wait to see if the dairy and eggs work before we try the salmon, I think I hadn't advised you to do that yet but if you want to try it, that's fine!