I GOT MY PERIOD FOR THE SECOND TIME THIS YEAR! Now, that is not news if you are a normal, healthy 20 year old women... like, you should be on number 6, but hear me out...
I've been dealing with anorexia nervosa (just getting to terms with calling it by it's name, and admitting that was what I had...) since I was 13. I had my first period when I was 12/13 and it as the awkward trauma that most girls have to deal with... "why is my uterus falling out?!" ect..
I was not coping well with puberty, or high school/life in general, and started to restrict my foods. I lost 30% of my body weight in 4 months and failed to establish a normal cycle (as in, I didn't have another period after that first one). I can now see that my eating disorder behaviour is linked with my anxiety disorder, but at the time, it was about being in control. At 13, losing my period wasn't a major problem, and according to the pro ana websites I frequented, that meant I was doing something right...
What I was actually doing, was giving myself secondary amenorrhea. Amenorrhea is the lack of a normal menstrual cycle, and secondary refers to the loss of menstruation after the first menstrual cycle.
Amenorrhea can be caused by;
- low body weight
- excessive exercise
- high levels of stress
Amenorrhea doesn't just make it more difficult to get pregnant, it can also cause pre-menopausal symptoms (night sweats, dizziness, all that fun stuff your Nan complains about) and eventually leads to osteopenia (loss of bone mass) due to chronically low oestrogen levels.
After my first encounter with anorexia, I recovered to a point, but still restricted food and had a very intense work out regime of judo and running. I was eating enough to maintain a normal body weight, so concerns about my health had subsided and I was generally left to my own devices for a couple of years. Even though my BMI was normal (if a bit low), I didn't recover my periods, which still didn't really bother me because I was 14-16 years old and had no intention of having kids anytime soon. I knew all my junk worked normally because I would get withdrawal bleeds when on the pill (not the same as a normal menstrual cycle... just the body reacting to the external hormones you are putting in).
My first relapse came when I was 17 and in the run up to AS and A-Level exams. I was also dating fuck boys and was just generally a stressed mess. So no surprise when my periods still hadn't made an appearance. I was just about surviving, and was in no fit state to nourish another human inside me. At this point I was getting mildly concerned...did this mean I was infertile and could never have my own kids?! I knew I wanted to be a mum at some point, and would be really pissed if I had fucked that up for myself because of my eating disorder.
That relapse was relatively mild, and I was generally ok-ish when it came to starting university at 18. Still no periods, but I was very stressed because university, and moving away from home. I started dating a guy, who suggested I lost a bit of weight.... (I loved me some fuck boys back in the day...). This, and the stress of uni and first year medicine, triggered a full blown relapse that brought me to my lowest weight/level of functioning. My heart rate was 50 and my blood pressure was almost undetectable, my nails were brittle, hair thin and skin looked sallow and ill. No chance of sustaining a pregnancy, so no periods.
By August 2015, I had decided enough is enough and made the decision to get better. That meant eating 2000+ calories a day, exercising less, and just fucking looking after myself. There has been some wobbles, but in general, I would consider myself to be on the way to a full recovery. My weight has been stable for 5 months now and I've been at a healthy BMI for 9 months.
Once my BMI normalised, I though my periods would just return, but alas, the body is too clever for that... It took almost a year after getting my shit together for some spotting to occur last month, and last week saw the first "proper period" I've had in 7 years. I hope this is the start of a normal-ish menstrual cycle and that I can have my own kids at some point in the future... far off future though, I got another 4 years of medical school yet..
This is a weird stage in my recovery at the moment... my weight is normalised, I've gotten my boobs back, and I am a (potentially) fertile woman... I couldn't see myself getting better last year, but now there is so much hope and stuff to look forward to... (that is as soppy as I will get, but I'm glad I got another shot at this living lark)
If by some strange miracle, you get to the end of this super long post, and have been dealing with some similar things, I'll leave some links to resources I have found useful;
- Here are the DSM definitions of different eating disorders http://www.eatingdisorders.org.au/eating-disorders/what-is-an-eating-disorder/classifying-eating-disorders/dsm-5
- This site is great at explaining the longer term effects of amenorrhea, and why its a good idea to get it sorted sooner rather then later http://www.eatingdisorderhope.com/information/anorexia/anorexia-and-amenorrhea-what-are-the-consequences
- I love this website, the stage of recovery really help to normalise the recovery process, especially when you feel very alone and scared about the shit that is happening to your body as you try to recover http://www.youreatopia.com/blog/2012/11/23/phases-of-recovery-from-a-restrictive-eating-disorder.html
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