Keeping Your Feet Warm for Fertility and Trying to Conceive

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After two years of infertility, miscarriage, and stress, I decided I was going to do ALL THE THINGS and give getting pregnant my best shot.  One of the many things I did was decide to always keep my feet warm.  This meant even though it was summer I never wore flip-flops, I always wore socks to bed, and my husband would tuck a heating pad around my feet at night.  I also did nightly foot soaks. Although I don’t really know which of the 79 things I did to get pregnant worked, I had been keeping my feet warm for about two and half months when I got pregnant!  

In this post I’m going to talk about why it’s important to keep your feet warm when trying to conceive, and then give you the 4 easy ways I did it!

 

Why is it important to keep your feet warm?

The short answer is, it is important because they are connected to your womb and if your womb is cold you ain’t getting pregnant.  This comes from Eastern Medicine, aka, Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM).  It is important for everyone trying to get pregnant, but most important for those of us diagnosed with “cold uterus.”  This is usually thought of as a combination of kidney yang deficiency and blood stasis (both of which I had).

Some symptoms of having “cold uterus” are a slow rising or early declining basal body temperature, indicating that the warming hormone- progesterone, isn’t doing exactly what it should.  You might also have cold hands and feet, clots during your period, and need to go pee at night.

You want your womb to be a lush warm jungle of nourishment for your baby.  It isn’t just that you need it warm for an embryo to implant and grow, but you need warmth for proper blood circulation in the uterus. So you want to legitimately keep the temperature of your uterus warm in order to make sure your uterine lining is lush for implantation and that a newly snuggled-in embryo will be properly nourished.

 

What does this have to do with my FEET?

Oh, right. So, here’s the thing- in Chinese Medicine the temperature of your feet is related to the temperature of your womb.  Keeping your feet warm keeps all of the energy meridians in your legs warm.  These meridians bring energy up to your uterus and entire pelvis area.  If your feet are cold, your uterus is cold.  If your feet are warm, your uterus is warm.  So, let’s warm up those feet!

 

How I keep my feet warm when trying to conceive- and what I did the month I conceived my miracle baby!

1. Never, ever, ever wear flip-flops as a shoe.  I always keep my tootsies covered, even in the summer.  I can’t tell you how many times I used to wear flip flops or open toe sandals during the summer.  Then, I would drive in an air conditioned car or go to an air conditioned building and my feet would become ICE.  I was freezing my uterus.  Now, I either wear socks and shoes or, if I have to dress up, I wear a closed toe shoe with a small hidden footie sock (like these ones on Amazon).
2. In the evenings I would do a hot foot soak for about 15 minutes.  This was recommended by my acupuncturist.  She suggested I sit with my feet soaking in the hot water, and imagine all the cold leaving the bottom half of my body and going up to cool off my head and my heart (which were “hot” from anxiety).  She also suggested I imagine the heat from my head and heart coming down to my womb, legs, and feet.  I didn’t use a plastic foot tub as I worry about the toxins in the plastic leaching out into the hot water and into me.  So I either used my actual tub, or had my husband haul a big glass bowl we had down to the couch.  There are some nice non-toxic options on Amazon if you are looking to invest: a lovely Cedar Wood Foot Basin Tub (I’m putting this on my wish list RIGHT NOW), and a much cheaper porcelain bowl that will make you feel like you’re in the 1800s.  You can make the foot soak fancy with ginger, essential oils, or salts, but I just did plain hot water. Do make sure you are filtering your water of fertility-harming toxins- see my full post on this topic here!
3. I wore crazy warm socks to bed. You know, the really unattractive fuzzy, fleece kinds. If it was winter I wore these ones called Heat Holders that claim to be “The Warmest Thermal Socks.” My mother had given us each a pair one Christmas and I stole my husband’s and alternated between ours. For good fertility juju I recommend a pink or green variety :-). 
4. Kept a heat pack on my feet at night. Every night at bedtime, my wonderful husband would microwave a heat pack for me and tuck it around my tootsies.  I can’t find the one we use online, but here is one like it on Amazon. I also use mine on my womb during my period.

 

Well, there you have it!  What do you do to keep your tootsies warm while trying to conceive?