women/ladies - is this serious?
i've been hesitant to post about this, but this is really a last resort..
ok, so i haven't had my period in quite a while, maybe like 6 months.
i went to the gyno and she put me on 10 days of pills to get my period back, but that was about two months ago and i still haven't had one. I'm really really scared and worried that i won't be able to have children.. which is something i've always looked forward to in my life. I was wondering if anyone had any advice or explanation about this.. My doctor even did blood work and everything came back completely normal, i'm full of energy, thick hair, etc. etc.
-i do not have an eating disorder, i eat a really varied diet with tons of different fruits, vegs, and lean protein(beans and nuts mostly)
-i'm a runner, but not excessive, maybe 15 miles a week on average
-i'm not underweight. i'm 5'3 110-112 lbs. and my weight is stable
I feel like i'm running out of options. One thing in the back of my mind is soy consumption. I don't go all out or anything, but i do use about a gallon of soymilk a week. Maybe I should cut back? Does soy even affect periods?
i haven't had my period in over a year...and the 10 day hormone pack didn't work for me either
i'm a runner too...about 50 miles a week
and i'm average weight 5'4 and 114
nothing to worry about..my bro is an ob/gyn...completely fixable with birthcontrol..
you'll be able to have kids
its very common for runners to "lose" their period
you really only need 3 a year anyway. nonetheless, if you want it back, for comfort...go on the pill
I also have PCOS... hence my current 20 pound excess load. Predisposition + stress eating thanks to fertility treatments = one plumped up girl.
I am inclined to think, though, with such a low weight (and as I said 110 IS low for 5'3, though it may not be tube-feeding low) that PCOS is not the culprit... exercise, keeping the weight at normal, etc, tend to keep PCOS in check. It is not impossible for a women to be normal or even low weight with PCOS (I have been, for the most part) but in this case, even if PCOS were present, I would think the low weight + exercise could be to blame.
Thyroid is another idea.
I would consider going to an endocrinologist about this. The first place a woman tends to go when her periods go screwy is to the ob/gyn, but the fact is, even though the period ultimately flows out of the ob/gyn's territory, it has its origins in the endocrine system.
Not having periods is not "fixable" with birth control pills. If you are not having your period, you are not ovulating. Taking the BCP will create the illusion of a normal cycle, but you hormones are under an artifically imposed state of normal. You will not be ovulating, you will not be healthy. The only thing BCPs will solve is the wondering if you ARE pregnant due to lack of period, and the possibility that no periods = uterine lining build-up = increased risk of uterine/endometrial cancer.
There is nothing wrong with using BCP as contraception, but too many women accept it as a quick fix when the cycle has gone awry. I spent YEARS on BCP thinking they were "fixing" my problem. My son was a fluke conception on BCPs - but he is 3 1/2 and all my attempts to give him a sibling have resulted in nothing but 3 miscarriages, so clearly my infertility hasn't been fixed.
I would really try to get to the route of this while you are young. I wish I had taken things more seriously when I was young. But there is a lot of bad advice out there about periods and so forth and no one knew much about PCOS back in the early 90s so... I relied on doctors who didn't have much to give me.
eta - people who have had problems with depo - depo can have nasty and lingering effects and it is not uncommon for it to take a long time for cycles to come back after stopping it. There is even some speculation that depo can be a trigger for PCOS in some women.
wow, thanks everybody!
it's good to know that this won't affect fertility
and today when i got home from school she said she got me an appointment with the best ob/gyn in our area, so i guess i wait and see what happens!
My periods packed up and left sometime mid-eating disorder, which surprised me really, because my body weight wasn't very low at that point. (It may have been more stress-induced, looking back on it. My parents very recent divorce had been what induced my E.D, so there's a possibility my amenhorrea was a result of the distress.) Anyway, it's been... a bit over two years since I've had one, so I finally worked up the nerve to go to an OB and get it checked out. She asked me how long I've been in re-feeding for AN, and how long I'd been maintaining adequate calorie intake, that sort of thing. I told her I'd been eating well for about a year. After getting all my background she essentially said, "Enjoy it while it lasts, because it could take up to another 6 months for your hormone levels to stabilize and get your body back into the swing of things. So, if they're not back in a few months, come back, and we'll do some tests." In other words, she was FAR from concerned. So, don't get me wrong, I find it a little off-putting that I don't have a period, and it's gotten to the point that I kind of miss it (though I certainly don't miss the awful cramps), but apparently, providing it does indeed come back EVENTUALLY, my Gyno wasn't worried. Though, I think I'll drop in and give her a call again soon, because it's been two months since I went the first time.
I was anorexic and then bulimic for a long time, starting at age 12... and my lack of periods was blamed on that for a long time. It was only after a few years of being normal food wise and STILL not having periods (and having other signs of PCOS ie excess hair on my body, shedding hair on my head) that I looked into what other explanation it could be and it was PCOS.
You don't need to be severely underweight for your periods to stop. You simply need to be off enough, in whatever way, be it too much exercise, caloric deficit, nutrient deficit, for your body to sense that now is not a good time to get pregnant because you are not living a lifestyle that would nurture a pregnancy. You can be overweight and they can stop. You can be normal weight but eating too many of the wrong foods. The body is smart. These things will *usually* correct when the negative behavior is stopped.
But there are also hormonal imbalances, be it too little thyroid, too much insulin, etc etc etc that can cause the lack of periods. There are adrenal problems, growths or tumors or high cortisol levels. These things generally require medical intervention (although PCOS can be self-treated to a degree once you understand the problem)
I spent years listening to doctors tell me there was no explanation for my lack of periods, that irregular cycles are "normal" for young women, that there was no need to worry, or nothing to be done. As a result I am now 30 and my fertility is shot. I wish I had pressed for real answers earlier on, but I didn't know any better.
Again, I suggest an endocrinologist for this problem. Ob/gyns as a rule really don't know as much about periods as you'd think they would. They know to check for pregnancy if they're absent, and they know to give BCPs to create the illusion of normal. But an endocrinologist will test your thyroid, insulin levels, LH levels, FSH levels, free and total testosterone levels, adrenal function, etc etc etc.
It's your body, it's your right to believe what you want to believe. But I wish someone had told me to take this stuff more seriously when I was 18. I'd be a lot better off now. (Of course, that's only if I had listened... who knows if I would have listened? :D)
now don't quote me on this because i don't have any specific research to back this up, but i do suspect there may be a grain of truth to the "soy affecting your periods" urban myths. i had periods like clockwork until i became vegetarian when i was 15 and then all of a sudden they only started to come every two or three months. there was no change to my exercise habits, weight, stress etc. the only difference is a started drinking soy milk and eating tofu with practically every meal (as most inexperienced vegetarians & vegans do). it's really hard to know the truth tho because most of the info on the net about the evils of soy seem to be sponsored by meat and dairy companies! however i do think most vegans and vegetarians consume waaaaaaay more soy than they should. i'm now trying to limit my soy intake, i've switch to rice milk, use a soy-free vegan margerine and eat things like beans, lentils, mushrooms & quinoa for my protein (saving tofu for special treats). i'll be interested to see if it helps at all because even though i seem healthy, it makes me uncomfortable that i don't have regular periods.
Well here is one thing I know about soy. Again, I am dealing with infertility - so I read a number of infertility forums. There is a medication you take to make you ovulate called Clomid. You take it days 5-9 of your cycle. It basically works by blocking estrogen receptors in the body which tricks the body into making more estrogen and in turn more of other hormones which leads to ovulation. Some women have found that taking soy isoflavens in a caplet form has the same effect of causing ovulation. Soy has been touted as having estrogen blocking effects. You need to take ~100mg of the isoflavens or more and again only on days 5-9 of your cycle.
So soy can make a woman who doesn't normally ovulate ovulate - which means heck yeah it can affect cycles. And if you are eating it every day and not just a few days of your cycle, it could send your body really weird messages.
I have taken soy (pills) and it worked for me the first time I did it, but never again.
Now what this means in terms of diet, I don't know. To use another example, vegan arguments aside, drinking milk is not really harmful - lots of people do it without suffering any ill effets - but if you take calcium supplements in excess you can develop kidney stones. So to say that X is in food and X an do means you shouldn't eat that food is not QUITE true. It can have a different effect once it is taken out of the food.
I don't know that just eating normal whole soy, as opposed to pills where the isoflavens have been concentrated, is as big a deal. I personally do not avoid soy but it is not a huge part of my diet either. It freaks me out how there is something wrong with just about everything we eat... I suspect there may be some risks in eating soy, but there are benefits, too. As long as you are not eating tofu for every meal and washing it down with soy milk... you're probably not going to suffer, but who knows. The potential for problems is there, and that's really freaky.
I had this same problem in college (while not vegetarian). I didn't care at the time, because who wants periods? I considered myself lucky! Then when I grew up and it came time to conceive, I did have a few problems. I wasn't ovulating, and clomid did not work for me. We sort of gave up, but then ended up pregnant after a while with no drugs at all! I was mostly vegan by then.
I do remember wishing that I had taken care of the problem "way back when" instead of waiting until I was trying to conceive, so you are smart to be concerned now!
Ever since I had my son 6 years ago I have been vegan and flowing like a real woman! ;)
I don't avoid soy, and I am small framed and low body fat too (5'3, 100 lbs).
I have not been on the pill since because i think it can really mess one up~I am wondering if we will get pregnant right away if we ever try again.
Same here. I don't mind not getting my monthly. But I don't know the affects of it in the long run.
The long run effects are BAD.....like losing bone density!!!
Well, after I posted that, a day later, I got my monthly. Go figure.
Well, now I know how the surgery and my diet affected it. I had mild craps this morning. They used to be so bad that I would curl up in a little ball, and not move. I was pleasently suprised :) It wasn't really painfull at all. I mean, I knew I was having craps, but it wasn't like before the surgery. And the "flow" is really light (right now, that is). We'll see how the rest of it goes (length, how long, ect).
I asked my friend, a doctor, about this. She says it's not uncommon for her to get patients who say they haven't had their periods in like 6 months. Said these women are usually either athletes or anorexics, adding that diet change, stress and medications, or a combination of these, affect the hormone levels which result in missed periods. She usually puts these women on birth control pills to get them back to a regular menstrual cycle.
OMG!!! It was the best monthly I EVER had. Coming from me, that is really good news (after having cervical cancer 7 years ago, and Endo).
Anyways, an update. I had my monthly for 3 days! I used to have it for more than a week. This was great. The vegan diet DID work (on top of the surgery and treatment) :D I hope this happens more often ... I wouldn't complain about a 3 day period. Yay!
KarateKid, my twin was on the Depo shot for a while. When she got off it she didn't have her period again for over a year still. So I wouldn't worry yourself about it. It'll come back. The more you worry about it the more stress you're causing yourself and throwing it off. ;)
I was on Depo for a few years, but my skin started breaking out baldy and my hair was falling out, so I switched to the pill. I didn't have my period for MONTHS. Actually I didn't have my period until I stopped taking birth control all together. I quit because I turned vegan and didn't want to take something that was probably tested on animals.
I was on the depo for treatment for the Endo surgery (to stop my monthly until I healed). But it didn't come back until this month. I was never on birth control before that, so I didn't know what to expect. I actually didn't break out until my period started. Now I'm a "pimple-faced kid." For a 32 y/o, that's bad. My hair didn't fall out, though. Well, it's hard to tell. I've always had baby-fine thin hair.
I'm experiencing the same exact thing. I went over a year without it and than I got it I think twice, but now its gone again. I think I got it when I gained a good amount of weight going off to college and was doing fine. Now Im very stressed, going out a lot, I exercise an okay amount, my diet is kind of varied. I did go through a period of anorexia and that is probably why I lost it in the firts place. My doctor had put me on a pill too to get it back and that did nothing. I think it was the whol eatin gthing, but now its probably the stress, etc.
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