Royal jelly...if you’ve not heard of it before, the name might sound strange - is a food or a foot cream? Actually, royal jelly is the substance that is fed to the Queen Bee of a beehive to sustain her throughout her life, helping her to give birth to millions of baby bees. Royal Jelly creates the Queen Bee ovaries and sets her up to reach maturation in a rapid 5 days, when she is ready to start laying those millions of future generations, up to 2,000 eggs per day! This is why Royal Jelly has been investigated as a fertility-boosting supplement.
A Queen Bee is double the size and weight of your regular worker bee and lives for 5 to 6 years, rather than just one month like the rest of her hive. So, if you are what you eat - royal jelly is clearly some seriously nutritionally-dense stuff! If it can do that for a Queen Bee, then what might it do for a woman?
Royal jelly as a fertility-booster
A study conducted in 2007 out of Japan discovered the royal jelly is similar to a phyto-estrogen and that it contains properties that might support healthy uterine muscles and uterus lining. There have been multiple studies with royal jelly on fertility in animals that suggest it has the potential to increase rates of pregnancy and support fertility overall.
Royal jelly is rich in amino acids, medium chain fatty acids (like those found in coconut oil), proteins, along with vitamin D, E, all of the vitamin Bs, plus iron and calcium. It also contains a range of probiotics.
Our bodies need nutrients and minerals to have healthy hormones, healthy cycles and regular, healthy ovulation if we are to be fertile and able to get pregnant. Royal jelly packs a hugely powerful nutritional punch, containing nearly all of the vitamins and minerals a woman’s body needs to conceive successfully. Royal jelly as a supplement is incredibly potent - in taking a small amount daily you are getting a good dose of all the necessary nutrients. I have long preached the gospel of feeding your body the right foods for strong fertility, and royal jelly fits right in as containing high levels of many key nutrients.
(It’s important to note here that if you are allergic to bees/bee venom or if you have estrogen-sensitive reproductive cancers in your family history, you should avoid royal jelly.)
The benefits of royal jelly
The benefits of royal jelly make sense to me, from the perspective of someone who has helped many women conceive naturally partly through dietary changes. In order to be fertile and conceive women need:
- Vitamin D for strong immunity
- A healthy gut and absence of harmful bacteria anywhere in the body (maintained by probiotic foods)
- Vitamin B6 for boosted progesterone levels
- Amino acids for hormone production
- Fatty acids for egg growth
- Proteins for hormonal balance
...and royal jelly contains all of these elements in high doses. That’s not to say that royal jelly is the only place you can find these nutrients, definitely not, but it is a simple and easy way to boost your vitamin and mineral levels, along with your intake of probiotics, fatty acids and protein, when you’re trying to conceive.
Royal jelly vs. honey
Although both royal jelly and honey are strengthening to the immune system, good for your skin, and anti-inflammatory - honey does not have the fertility boosting properties of royal jelly. Honey is an ancient remedy for low libido, because it contains boron, which is certainly handy when it comes to getting pregnant, however if you’re looking for those fertility benefits, royal jelly is for you.
My royal jelly smoothie recipe to boost your fertility
So, how to take royal jelly? I find the best way to incorporate this into your diet is via a weekly smoothie. Alone it can taste kind of bitter. Try my “Queen Bee Smoothie.” Just add these ingredients to a food blender or smoothie maker, whizz, and you’re ready for a fertility boosting, tasty treat. You’ll also be getting a big boost of folic acid from the spinach, a whole host of vitamins and minerals from the fruit, plus zinc from the sesame seeds.
1 cup fresh Spinach
1/3 cup fresh or frozen Mango
1/4 cup fresh or frozen Blueberries
1 Teaspoon Royal Jelly
3 Tablespoons Coconut Yogurt
Pinch of Cardamom and Ginger
1⁄4 cup of Coconut water
1 Teaspoon white or black Sesame seeds (bonus points for grinding them in a spice grinder first!)
1⁄2 Teaspoon Honey
Always remember, that once you have the right information about how your body really works, you can start making health choices that finally start to work for you! You can do this - the science of your body is on your side!
To your FLO,
Alisa
