THIS Is Why You Can’t Get Pregnant

You’ve had all the tests. Your ovaries look fine. Your tubes are open. Your hormones look normal. Your partner’s sperm is fine. The doctors call it ‘unexplained infertility.’ But here’s what they’re not telling you about why you can’t get pregnant: the problem might not be in your reproductive organs at all. It might be in your brain – specifically, in your hypothalamus. And when you understand this, you understand why you haven’t been able to conceive.

I’m Deborah Maragopoulos, an integrative nurse practitioner, and I’ve spent over 30 years helping women with fertility challenges. Today I’m going to share something that could change everything for you – how your hypothalamus controls every aspect of fertility, and why supporting it might be the missing piece you need.

Your Hypothalamus Tells Your Ovaries to Ovulate

Most people don’t know that it’s your hypothalamus that tells your ovaries to ovulate.

Here’s the process: your hypothalamus releases gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) in pulses. These pulses need to happen at the right frequency and amplitude. GnRH travels to the pituitary and tells it to release follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) and luteinizing hormone (LH). FSH tells your ovaries to mature follicles and produce estrogen. When estrogen reaches a certain level, a surge of LH triggers ovulation. After ovulation, one follicle becomes the corpus luteum, which produces progesterone for about two weeks.

If an ovum is fertilized, embryonic HCG keeps your corpus luteum alive to produce progesterone for fourteen weeks until the fetal placenta can take over. If your hypothalamus isn’t functioning properly and those GnRH pulses are off, the whole cascade doesn’t work right. So you might not ovulate at all, or ovulate but with poor egg quality, or ovulate but not produce enough progesterone afterward to sustain a pregnancy.

Women with Hypothalamus Dysfunction Often Have ‘Unexplained Infertility’

Their reproductive organs are physically fine, their hormones seem fine, but the hypothalamus-pituitary-ovarian axis isn’t working properly.

Remember, your hypothalamus doesn’t only control your reproductive function but also your other hormones, including adrenal function. And high stress hormones can block fertility. Your hypothalamus controls your stress response through the HPA Axis.

When under stress (emotional stress, physical stress, lack of sleep, chronic illness), your hypothalamus releases cortico-releasing hormone. CRH tells your pituitary to release adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH), which tells your adrenals to make cortisol.

Here’s the Problem:

High CRH and high cortisol directly suppress reproductive function. It’s your body’s way of saying, “This is not a good time to get pregnant – we’re in survival mode“.

Specifically, high stress hormones suppress GnRH pulses (so you don’t ovulate properly), reduce progesterone production (so even if you conceive, pregnancy may not stick). Affect egg quality and can prevent implantation. This is why women often get pregnant on vacation or when they stop trying so hard. When stress drops, it’s safe, and your hypothalamus can send proper signals again.

The Prolactin Problem

Then there’s the Prolactin Problem.

Prolactin is a hormone produced by the pituitary gland, yet controlled by the hypothalamus. Its most famous role is to support milk production after childbirth. But prolactin has an important role in pregnancy, too. Prolactin blocks the mother’s cell receptors to prevent her from growing tumors under the high hormone levels of pregnancy. And prolactin induces the immune system to attack foreign invaders.

Everyone produces prolactin at fairly high levels at night. In the morning, when dawn suppresses further melatonin production, your hypothalamus wakes up and produces dopamine. Dopamine shuts down nocturnal prolactin. If your prolactin level is high in the daytime, your hypothalamus is not producing enough dopamine.

When prolactin is elevated, it blocks fertility. High prolactin suppresses GnRH release, prevents ovulation, can cause irregular or absent periods, blocks progesterone production, and interferes with cell receptors’ ability to respond effectively to even normal hormone levels. 

What Causes High Prolactin?

Usually hypothalamus dysfunction.

When the hypothalamus isn’t producing enough dopamine, prolactin levels rise. This can happen from chronic stress, certain medications, central hypothyroidism, or pituitary microadenomas (small benign tumors). It’s critical to test prolactin when evaluating fertility. Elevated prolactin is a clear sign of hypothalamus dysfunction and directly blocks fertility.

Your hypothalamus produces hormones that affect cellular aging and mitochondrial function throughout your body, including in your eggs. When your hypothalamus is functioning optimally, it helps maintain good mitochondrial function (eggs need lots of energy), proper antioxidant levels (to protect eggs from oxidative damage), good blood flow to the ovaries (eggs need nutrients and oxygen), and proper insulin and glucose regulation (eggs are very sensitive to blood sugar issues).

When the hypothalamus is dysfunctional, egg quality suffers. This is why women with PCOS, thyroid issues, or chronic stress often have poor egg quality, even if they’re ovulating. Supporting your hypothalamus can actually improve egg quality over time. Because you’re improving the cellular environment in which those eggs are maturing.

Let Me Share a Quick Story

I had a patient in her early 40s who was essentially infertile due to panhypopituitarism (pituitary gland wasn’t making hormones). She was on hormone replacement therapy for years. Then she started taking my hypothalamus support formula. After about 18 months, she started having natural periods (without any exogenous hormones).

We talked about contraception because I knew her hypothalamus was starting to function again. She laughed – she’d been told her whole life she was infertile. At the age of 43, she gave birth to a healthy baby boy. When you support the hypothalamus – even when the problem seems severe, the body has an incredible capacity to heal and restore function.

If you’ve been struggling with fertility – especially unexplained infertility – I want you to know there is hope. Your reproductive organs might be perfectly fine. The problem might be in the signaling system – your hypothalamus.

Genesis Gold®

I created Genesis Gold® specifically to support hypothalamus function. It contains: amino acids to help produce GnRH and other reproductive hormones, nutrients to support egg quality, adaptogens to help regulate stress hormones, and natural compounds that support healthy prolactin levels.

I’ve seen so many women conceive naturally after they start supporting their hypothalamus – women who had been trying for years, who had failed IVF cycles, who were told it was impossible.

If you want to learn more about Genesis Gold®, click here.

Don’t give up. Support the root cause, and your body may surprise you.