Red Light Therapy, Fertility and Melatonin
Melatonin and Fertility: Your Body’s Natural Superpower
If you’re exploring fertility supplements, you’ve probably heard about melatonin, but here’s what most women TTC don’t know, melatonin is more than a sleep aid: Your ovaries naturally produce melatonin at levels three times higher than your blood (from supplements)! Melatonin is also produced during the day from your brilliant little cellular engines - your mitochondria. In fact most of your melatonin is NOT produced in the brain but in the body (but that changes during dark months of Winter).*
Your Ovaries Are The Ultimate Melatonin Factory
Imagine your ovaries as a tiny 24/7 pharmacy making melatonin just for your eggs. Here’s why this matters:
Natural Melatonin Levels
Your ovaries produce three times more melatonin than what’s found in your bloodstream. They are packed with mitochondria.
This isn’t from supplements, it’s your body’s built-in protection system.
What It Does To Support Your Fertility
It acts like a bodyguard for your eggs, shielding them from cellular damage (oxidative stress).
It balances hormones and reduces inflammation in your reproductive tissues.
Your ovaries are like a skilled chef cooking a fresh meal (natural melatonin), while supplements are like delivery food - helpful but not as personalized and may include extra ‘ingredients’ your body doesn’t need.
Healthy Ovary
Do Melatonin Supplements Help?
Yes - kinda
The Good
Supplements (3 mg/day) may boost follicular melatonin by four times during IVF, improving egg quality (the studies on supplements and fertility aren’t brilliant, but it may help.
The Limits
They can’t match your ovaries’ precision.
High doses (over 5 mg) might disrupt ovulation timing.
Just like Vitamin D supplements are limited to how it impacts your health when compared to Vitamin D from full spectrum sunlight. You can’t beat natural sunlight for health no matter how hard the scientists try.
Boost Your Body’s Natural Melatonin
Want to supercharge your ovarian melatonin?
Morning Sunlight
Spend 10 - 30 minutes outside within one hour of waking, even on cloudy days. This sets your circadian rhythm and your body’s mitochondria get a lovely boost of NIR.
Sunset Light
Spend five minutes in evening twilight. This harnesses near-infrared rays that stimulate melatonin production.
PBM (Red Light Therapy)
This is particularly helpful if the weather, your schedule, or your location prevents you from getting outside daily to mimic the benefits of sunlight.
A device that is in skin contact will give your mitochondria more energy than non skin contact devices. Another option to consider is the Fringe wand to deliver NIR of 830 nm close to the ovaries.
Keep in Mind
Don’t overdo supplements. More isn’t better. Stick to 3 mg/day max unless your provider advises otherwise.
Track your cycle. Notice changes in cervical mucus or ovulation?
Your ovaries are already melatonin experts, trust your body first. Use sunlight or PBM to enhance your natural production, and consider supplements as a “sidekick” during IVF or PCOS management.
"Your body isn’t broken - it’s wise. Work with it, not against it."
Follicular Melatonin Increases in Winter - When Sunshine is Limited - WHAT?
This particular 1990 research took me a few minutes to wrap my head around. This is one of the most under-discussed findings in fertility research, especially if you’re someone trying to support healthy eggs and hormones.
Researchers looked at the fluid surrounding eggs (follicular fluid) in women going through IVF and in those with natural cycles. What they found was fascinating: melatonin levels in the follicular fluid were way higher than the melatonin levels in the bloodstream. This was especially true in the morning and during the darker months of the year.
Now, back when this study was done, scientists believed most of that melatonin was coming from the pineal gland, that little part of your brain that produces melatonin at night to help regulate sleep. But here’s what we know now that changes everything: your cells (and more specifically, your mitochondria) also make melatonin, during the daytime. And your ovaries? They’re full of mitochondria.
So this isn’t just leftover nighttime melatonin floating around. It’s likely your ovaries are producing their own melatonin right where it’s needed most, right where your eggs are developing.
And even more interesting? These higher melatonin levels weren’t tied to follicle size, hormone levels, or whether an egg was retrieved. In other words, melatonin is doing its own thing, quietly supporting your egg health in the background, on its own schedule.
Your body’s natural rhythm, your light exposure, and your mitochondrial health all matter when it comes to fertility. Melatonin isn’t just about sleep and supplements it’s showing up as a key player in ovarian health, and the more we understand it, the more we can work with our biology, not against it.
Additional Reading
Brzezinski et al., 1987 - Melatonin in Human Preovulatory Follicular Fluid
Tamura et al., 2012 - The role of melatonin as an antioxidant in the follicle
Olcese, 2020 - Melatonin and Female Reproduction: An Expanding Universe
