Stop Being Scared to Go ALL IN to Get Your Periods Back

This one is for you. The one that is lurking or slowly making changes and afraid to GO ALL In to get your periods back. If you are scared to recover and keep coming up with all the reasons why you can’t go ALL IN yet read on or watch my video. Below are some major roadblocks to taking the leap and committing to recovery.

Reason #1 : You don’t want to admit you have HA.

This is the person who has gone to the doctor or knows that deep down inside there is some underlying reason that you don’t have a period. IT could be that you have had recent weight loss, you are extremely stressed out or that you have been chronically dieting and overexercising. You may even be at a healthy BMI so you think that you can’t have HA or that you don’t fit the stereo typical women but deep down you know that most likely you have it.

I have been there. I kept waiting for it to come back that I couldn’t have this. I recall reading stories of other women and I told myself that I wasn’t a runner so there is no way I could have HA. I made small changes in hopes that I would recover but it didn’t work for me. I allowed myself to gain a few pounds but still nothing.

Reason #2 You are afraid to lose control.

It feels good to be in control of your food, calories and exercise. You are mistaking being in control but the fact is that maybe your habits are actually controlling you. You have to exercise almost every day, you have anxiety if you have to take a rest day or maybe you are one to freak out because you have a family event where you know that there is going to be food you consider bad or off your plan. You are afraid by starting recovery that you will lose that control. What if you can’t do what you love anymore? Lifting, running, HIIT training are all amazing types of exercise but not when you’re not getting a period. You may have heard that you need to gain weight or stop exercising and that scares the shit out of you.
First of all, not being in control is scary. If you are someone who likes numbers, tracking calories or your weight it is it can be scary to let it all go. If have been dieting your entire life and doing things to get to certain size or maintain your current weight it can be difficult to break this. You also don’t know how long it will take, what you have to do, how much you will have to gain, if you will have to make massive changes and what others will think of you.

Reason #3 You’re afraid of the changes.

Another reason you haven’t decided to take the plunge and start recovery is because you are afraid of change. Change is scary. You like your body. You are comfortable at your weight or you are at least OK with it but if you were to gain weight it would probably send you for a loop. This lifestyle is all you know. Trying to look a certain way is all you have known. Dieting is something you have done for years. Lifting or running is all you pastime. It’s now a habit. Well if this is you then ask yourself is it worth it? Is osteoporosis worth it? Feeling rundown and obsessive worth it? Is having foods you are scared to be around and being soo strict with every little thing you do worth it? What about the link with Alzheimer’s? Or what about the baby you have dreamed of?

Reason #4 You love your current lifestyle.

You love exercise and can’t picture your life without it. You may feel like it’s a way for you to relieve stress. What would you even do with yourself? OR it’s part of your job and maybe change means that your passions are taken away or your way of earning money. Starting recovery directly affects your identity. If you stop exercising or gain weight what are other people going to think?

Remember this is just a season of your life. IT doesn’t have to last forever. You can recover and get back to where you were in regards to exercise within reason. After recovery you can find balance and after you start listening to your body your body will gift you with the ability to exercise and maintain cycles. You can stop being the slave to food and exercise and start living your life again without that awful guilty feeling in your stomach.

It’s Not Binge Eating Disorder – Extreme Hunger in HA Recovery after Years of Dieting and Food Restriction

A scary piece of healing your body from years of under eating is how your relationship with food changes. It usually get worse before it gets better. You may come from a place where you didn’t have many hunger queues, you have an intense fear of foods or just felt ambivalent about it. Many women experienced binge eating eating episodes in the past because they were restricting or dieting for long periods of time or cutting out certain foods or food groups.

There is a really interesting study called Minnesota starvation Study where they restricted caloric intake in young, healthy males and what they saw was very similar to what you see in people in recovery from eating disorders and recovery diets that are too low in calories. I think it’s important to reference this study because what they found is that the men became obsessed with food. Their days revolved around food and they were so preoccupied by it they didn’t have the energy to focus on anything else. A very interesting study and obviously we can’t repeat this study because it is inhumane but once they were allowed to eat many had extreme hunger and their weight went way above what their weight was before they ever started restricting.

Two Types of Extreme Hunger

There are two different types of hunger that you may are trying to recover your periods. You may be physically hungry or it could be a mental hunger.
The physical hunger is where your digesting food so quickly and your body needs a lot of calories to repair itself that you are experiencing normal signs of hungry including: your stomach is growling, your not satiated, you may get dizzy or light headed and you are thinking about food.

Mental hunger is where you can’t stop thinking about food. You may be full but you still feel the need to eat. This one feels much more like binging then physical hunger. I’ve had a few episodes myself of these. I felt frantic and compelled to eat. I felt out of control. It feels like binging so understand where all the panic comes in. Your appetite feels so damn uncontrollable and you may feel embarrassed and then this leads to guilt. Do not feel guilty and do not resist this. It’s your bodies way of regulating and if you want to get to the other side where you can eat intuitively and stop revolving your day around food then lean into it.

This extreme hunger is usually caused by hunger hormones that are thrown off, past feelings of restriction that are resurfacing and it’s the our body’s way of getting the calories it needs after months or years of restriction.

Causes of extreme hunger can be:

• Restriction of food and calories
• Eating the same foods with no variety
• Physical Exhaustion/Fatigue
• Labeling good or bad foods
• Low calorie diets
• Hormones are off
• Too low of body weight

During an episode you may feel stuffed and sick but still can’t stop. You may have an uncontrollable urge to eat and inability to stop eating. Fear and anxiety may also be experienced during this time. You may eat thousands of calories in one sitting. All of this is normal and part of your body’s healing process.

After an episode you may experience:

• Bloating
• Weight Gain
• Nausea
• Embarrassment
• Sense of guilt
• Water Retention
• Exhaustion
• Grief
• Fear
• Digestive distress
• Anxious
• Edema

Please don’t freak out when this happens. It is absolutely normal. Your body is trying to get to a safe place.

How I Got My Period BACK! My Hypothalamic Amenorrhea Recovery Story

I am so excited to tell you that I finally got my period back!!! I have been waiting so long to say that. I started the recovery journey over a year ago but was “half in” the first 5 months and the last 7.5 months I went all in. Today I finally get to tell you what I did to get my period back!

This is my new healhy body!

My History

I have always been self conscious of my body and weight especially the weight I carried in my stomach. I recall wishing every birthday from a very young age that I would get skinny that year. I believed that would lead to happiness. My entire life I have always been on that journey to get to lean and ripped. I was obsessed with my weight from a young age and was always trying to lose that last 5 or 10 pounds. I owned Shape, Muscle and Fitness Hers and Oxygen magazine and those women were the ideal body types I always dreamed of having. I never wanted to be super skinny but I wanted to be muscular and lean and then I thought I would be beautiful.

My relationship with food and exercise started changing in high school. I tried a vegetarian diet because I thought that was the way I could drop a few pounds because I didn’t know much about nutrition. I also started doing cardio to get in better shape and I was happy with the progress and loved working out but it just wasn’t enough.

Exercise was a part of my life since I was young. I fell in love with lifting before lifting was cool. It was back in the day when I was told I would turn masculine if I lifted weights. Throughout college my weight went up and down and I went through bursts of exercising a lot to not caring about it and drinking and partying like most college students.

I never could quite maintain that ideal weight that I wanted to be. My body would usually not let me get below a certain weight before I rebounded an my weight would go back up. That was years ago and I really haven’t dealt with the restrict-binge cycle in about a decade. Even though I was past that, I still wasn’t listening to my body’s needs and would do all the wrong things.

Healthy Intentions that Turn Unhealthy

Fast forward to 2011 and I lost a ton of weight for my wedding. This is the first time I actually got to that low weight I had always dreamed of. I had abs but I could only achieve it by being on a very low calorie diet. There was no way my body could maintain it. I never once lost my period through any of the years but I was also on birth control and I remember the withdrawal bleed got lighter and lighter. Once I got married I got off BCPs and we started trying to have a baby. I was cycling normally after I came off Birth Control but had a short luteal phase. We both knew something was up and we saw a fertility Doctor 6 months into trying and we found out we had to go straight to IVF due to low sperm count. I did 5 IVFs to get my son and throughout these I was exercising a lot to counter all the weight I gained on the hormones.

Wedding Week Photo

I did a lot of cardio and lifting during the two years I was trying to conceive to keep the weight gain to a minimum and to keep me sane. I hate to admit it but this could be why it took so long for the embryos to stick. I finally did get pregnant and I had a fit pregnancy but quickly lost the pregnancy weight soon after our son was born. I breastfed for a year so my period never came back before we started our next IVF for our daughter. I do think my body was in a better place because I was fueling it more and eating a lot of carbs. I wasn’t doing the endless cardio and long sessions anymore because I didn’t have the time and I realized more was not always better. I was exercising smarter not harder.

I got pregnant on the first round but I was also at that same higher weight I was when I got pregnant with my son. After my daughter was born I was really stressed. More stressed than I have ever been in my life. My husband went to work second shift and I was home at night with both kids, exhausted, waking solely in the middle of the night to breastfeed, working full time and exercising daily. Needless to say even after weaning from breastfeeding my period never arrived. The doctors kept saying to give it longer. Finally almost 3 years after having my daughter and about 1.5 year after weaning I decided I needed to make a change.

If I was to pinpoint all the causes of Hypothalamic Amenorrhea they would be:

• BCPs and IVF Hormones
• Pregnancies Close Together
• Pregnancy/Breastfeeding
• Constant Caloric Deficit
• Too Much Exercise
• Stress
• Intermittent Fasting
• Lack of Sleep
• Postpartum Anxiety
• Low Fat
• Low Body Weight

My Recovery Journey

August 2018 I decided to start cutting back exercise and only lifted 4 days per week. I put on 3-5 lbs but my period did not come and had blood work taken. My Luteinizing Hormone was 0.5 and Estrogen was about 5. It was like I already was in menopause.

January 2019 I decided I had enough and I went “All In” since I didn’t have any significant changes. I started really gaining weight and focusing on decreasing stress. I did yoga and very light walking on occasion. I was at BMI of 18 to 19 when I started and I knew I needed to get to at least 22 which was damn scary. I would punch in that number in those online calculators and prayed I didn’t have to gain so much.

My current healthy and recovered body 🙂

February 2019 I started working with a coach in February and then boosted up calories to at least 2500 but some day it would range from 2200 to over 3K depending on appetite. The more you eat the faster you recover. This is something I learned throughout this journey. I gained a significant amount of weight for my size. I am a shortie. I didn’t record how much I ate but I ate enough where I was probably putting on about lb a week in the beginning. I know some people don’t like to give numbers but I think it’s good to hear others experiences as long as you know that yours could be more or less. I gained 20 lbs so I went up 20% in body weight which is a pretty decent amount to feel damn uncomfortable.

May 2019 I tried Clomid one time to see if it would kickstart my own cycles. I did ovulate and I had a period but it did not start my cycles the next month. After that my body seemed stuck trying to ovulate.

June 2019 I had all the signs of ovulation but nothing was happening. My body was stuck trying for almost a month straight of signs. I was having a follicular wave that didn’t end. I decided to go on Provera again which I had tried twice throughout the past year but never had a period. This time it worked which meant I was closer then ever before. I went on Soy Isoflavones (the natural Clomid) after Provera and 30 days later I had a period!

Changes that brought my period back:

• Reducing Stress – Journaling, Asking for Help, Being lazy!
• Stopped Stressing Over Food and My Body and Exercise
• Exercising Less – No Lifting or Cardio
• Sleeping More
• Yoga
• Meditation
• Time (this one was difficult because it’s out of our control)
• Extra Weight
• Extra Calories
• Possibly Soy Isoflavones
• Stopped Intermittent Fasting
• More Fats

If was to pinpoint what happened over the last month before I got it back it was that I completely let go. I stopped trying to control my hunger and suppressing it. I let go of what I thought my body should look like and learned to love it the way it was. I accepted that this is where my body needed to be. I do think my body wanted to get to my postpartum weight. That was the weight I got to before my periods were restored and it was the weight I was before I dropped nearly 20 pounds in 12 weeks right after my daughter was born. Your body knows and it remembers.

I’ve seen girls seriously recover in 3 weeks which to me seems mind blowing. Especially since it took me almost 8 months of going all in and another 5 months prior to that half in. I think my mind needed this time to heal. I wanted to give up many times but I never did. This process works. Try not to compare and be patient with yourself. Your body will recover when it’s ready.

This journey has completed changed the trajectory of my life and given me the energy to take my life back into my hands. I believe in the process so much I am going to start coaching other women on how to recover their periods and heal their relationship with food, exercise and themselves. If you are interested send me an email or DM me on Instagram!

Birth Controls to Get Your Period Back?

Were you told to go on birth control pills to get your period back? Are you wondering if you should go on birth control pills to bring you periods back and to “kickstart” your body to start having monthly menstrual cycles?

For me, it was a personal choice not to go on them. I knew that I am not a big fan of Birth Control Pills because I am sensitive to hormones. I was on a million hormones when we went through IVF so it was not something I wanted to reintroduce into my body. If my body was not ovulating on it’s own, I knew that something was wrong and “bandaiding” the problem was not something I was willing to do. I told my gynecologist about this and although she wanted me to go on them she was willing to give me time if i was actively trying to get my periods back. Many doctors may tell you that it birth control pills can kickstart cycles but that usually doesn’t happen. In fact many women temporarily have amenorrhea after coming off the pill.

I decided I would give myself one year to try to recover my period before going on any medication. If I did go on medication, I am not sure it would even be Birth Control Pills. There has been some recent research that the Estrogen in the pill may not be as effective on bone health as once thought.

Before making the decision to recover, there are many things to way out: How willing you are to recover? If you aren’t willing to try and get your period back on your own then some medication may be better than having low levels of hormones.

Birth Control Pills will not give you your cycles back. They suppress your natural hormones so that you don’t ovulate and in turn can’t get pregnant. The “period” you experience is a withdrawal bleed from the hormones in the pills you are taking. This is why you can take the active pills for months in a row and skip your period.

In natural periods, the reason you get your period is because your lining is built up from Estrogen. If you don’t become pregnant during that cycle your lining is shed as progesterone drops and a new cycle begins. So it’s not your period that is so important that you are missing but the Estrogen and ovulation that allows you to have a period. Estrogen protects your bones and is a vital hormone in the normal monthly cycles.

Things to consider is before starting Birth Control Pills

• Do you truly have Hypothalamic Amenorrhea or something else that is causing Amenorrhea?
• Do you have osteoporosis?
• Are you willing to give it everything to recover?
• Will you accept the weight gain that could come?
• Are you willing to give it up to 6 months or a year?
• Do you need professional help?
• Do you need a coach to guide you?

To sum it all up, birth control is not as good as your own natural hormones to protect your bones and your health. Your period is a sign of health and if you don’t have it this is a sign there is something wrong. I hope this helped!

Let me know in the comments if you were told to go on Birth Control when diagnosed with HA.

ACCEPTING WEIGHT GAIN – How to Improve Your Body Image at Any Size

How is your relationship with yourself? Do you look in the mirror and say positive things? Or are you one to beat yourself up when it comes to how you look?

Me soon after the Baby was born

Today I wan to talk to you about accepting your body where it’s currently at. Not where you want it to be. Not 5 lbs ago. There are lots of lessons I have learned in recovery while deliberately putting on weight. No matter what your goals are it’s important to accept your body at every stage because there will always be things you can’t control about the way you look. If you are always hating your body because it’s not skinny enough, you don’t have enough muscle or for any other then I’m talking to you and I bet you are sick of always worrying and stressing about it.

I’ve made drastic improvements on how I talk to myself and I am much more neutral and accepting about my body now but this stuff takes work. It’s so sad but I recall that every birthday as a little girl I wished I was skinny. Every time I threw a coin into a wishing well I wished I was skinny. I envied my friends and their flat stomachs. I lived my life around getting that ideal body and wanted to hide the body I was in. If you had asked me what is the worse thing that can happen in life I would tell you it was to gain weight.

I remember being so angry at my body and wished I could just cut my fat off my stomach. Then I would be so much happier. I finally got to that place where I was super thin and guess what? It was too much for my body to handle. I lost my period. I found out I had osteoporosis Is that worth it? Definitely Not! I had to spend every moment fixated on working out and eating right. I made fitness my priority. My quality of life sucked.

Photo by Public Domain Pictures from Pexels

I understand weight loss can feel addictive. It’s a high when you step on that scale and see a lower weight but your weight does not define who you are or does not dictate how happy you can be. The one person that gets to make that choice is you.

Mindset Shifts Take Time

The number one thing that you need to do for yourself is to be kind and be patient. This stuff takes time. During this process you need to do the work. This is going to be something you do on a daily basis. As you improve your relationship with your self and the way you view the way you look then it will start to get easier and you will need to focus less on it. Just like working out doesn’t get you muscle overnight changing your body image and your confidence about your body doesn’t change overnight.

If you truly want to find a place of food freedom, freedom from the scale and endless hours in the gym to restore your health and period you need to get to a place of acceptance If you feel good about yourself you are going to be confident and you won’t be worrying about that damn scale being an extra few or 5 or ten pounds higher and you can start living your life.

My Top 5 Tips to Gain Confidence in Your Body and Accept Weight Gain

Tip #1 Is to surround yourself with other people that are positive.

If it is triggering for you to be around friends that only talk about how they are fat or need to lose weight or even the new diet they are on then avoid them. I know it may be hard but it’s not forever. This also means the people you follow on social media. If you are following people that are really lean or extremely muscular and don’t portray a body type you could have without going to extremes then you need to stop following them. They are going to make you feel worse about yourself and make you think that being that lean is attainable and healthy. Yes, some woman can be naturally very thin but that is not the case with most women.

Tip #2 Wear Clothes That Fit and Flatter You

There is nothing worse than trying to squeeze your body into pants or clothes that don’t fit or are unflattering for your body. You will never be confident and accepting of your body if your clothes are too snug or you feel depressed after you try and put your clothes on. Stop wearing the baggy shirts and leggings. Try to find clothes that flatter your new body. Follow body friendly fashion models to come up with ideas.

Photo by Mariana Kurnyk from Pexels

Tip #3 Stop Body Checking

Don’t hone in on one area of your body especially the areas you like the least. If you are body checking and looking in a mirror see yourself as a whole person not that one area. Speaking of body checking just stop doing it. Don’t let those moments set you off and ruin your entire day by focusing in on areas that you wish to change or that have recently changed. It doesn’t feel good to pick yourself apart in the mirror

Tip #4 Changing Your Thoughts

Recognize your thoughts and how they are making you feel. Those negative thoughts aren’t going to go away overnight but it’s all in how you react to them. It’s about learning to hear them and move past them without letting them affect you. If you really want to take this a step further going through the process of changing your thoughts is super helpful.
If you can’t jump to I have a beautiful body go through the process of getting to a neutral place first. This is where I started. I would see myself in the mirror gaining weight and I would think I’m getting so big and I would start to replace it with:

• This is my body.
• This is my recovering body.
• This is what a body looks like that is trying to restore hormones.
• This extra weight is exactly what I need.
• This is exactly what I am trying to do.
• This is what a healthy body looks like.
• It’s possible I could I could love my body.

Tip #5
Let go of judgement.

Stop judging yourself and others. Most of the time if you are having thoughts about others and their weight gain or body composition it is because you are insecure about yourself. Ask yourself, do you honestly think you will have people’s approval if you are thinner? If the answer is yes then you either have a distorted sense of truth or you are correct and these people are not worth your time. If we are picking apart other people we don’t feel good about it later on. If you say good things about others and appreciate them for other aspects besides their bodies its easier to find good things about ourselves as well.

Remember this stuff doesn’t happen overnight. Be patient with yourself .

Afraid to Stop Exercising?Amenorrhea, RED-S and Weight Gain Fears

Healthy Habits That Turn Bad

A healthy habit of working out can easily slip into being too much for your body. There is a thin line between over exercising and Exercise Addiction just like there is a thin line between Disordered Eating and Eating Disorders. There is no secret recipe for how much one’s body can handle. Some people can handle two a days and some people get burnt out from 5 days a week.

My Story

I have always loved exercise so for me it wasn’t a big deal to exercise everyday until I took it too far. I began to cling to exercise and became so fearful of gaining weight and becoming deconditioned if I took rest days or time off from the gym. I used exercise as an outlet for me to get away and relieve stress.

So a bit of my backstory in regards to exercise. I have been lifting and doing cardio for as long as I can remember. Initially it was always to change the size of my body but I found that I loved it once I started. I wasn’t into organized sports but loved Taebo (that was a thing!), kickboxing and lifting weights when I was in middle and high school. Fast forward to when it became too much. It started when I was dropping weight for my wedding. I was barely eating and lifting moderately. Ironically, I never lost my period at that time but my body didn’t stay long at such a low weight. I bounced up in weight not matter how hard I fought it. Years later I fell into overtraining again when I was trying to have a baby. I was on a ton of fertility meds, doing a lot of cardio and weight lifting in between IVFs to loose the weight I put on during the IVF cycles. I was doing Jamie Eason’s Livefit program and I was always keeping calories low and it would send me into binges.

My very pregnant self still working out.

Finally, I took it down a notch let my body gain and I finally got pregnant on my 5th IVF cycle (a FET). I lifted throughout pregnancy ans was very fearful of the weight gain after the baby. The overtraining began again postpartum. I was lifting 5-7 days a week despite not sleeping with a newborn, breastfeeding and exhausted and definitely not getting enough energy through the calories I was eating. I was scared to cut back in exercise. I got back to my prebaby weight but I kept going. I loved eating so I didn’t want to have to cut back on exercise and was just so fearful of gaining weight if I did. I kept pushing myself harder and harder. I would do lots of active rests where I would be doing jump squats, jumping jacks, box jumps whatever I could do to burn more calories. I would do more than what was on my planned program to get better results or what I thought was better results. I felt like I just couldn’t really control it for all the fears I was feeling if I would stop. Obviously, I never got my period back after my daughter because my body was in shock.

RED-S and Overtraining Syndrome

What is over training syndrome? It is when you can’t recover appropriately and in impairs performance. There is a lot of controversial information on this so I am going to stick with RED-S which is more in line with amenorrhea. RED-S is Relative Energy Deficiency in Sport. You don’t have to be an athlete to have this. You can be someone that is just heavily involved in working out like runners, cardio bunnies and lifters and not eating enough to withstand the amount of energy that you are burning .

The cause of this syndrome is an energy deficiency created from the amount of energy that is burned from exercise and daily activities in relation to what one is eating. Psychological consequences can happen either before or after you have RED-S. By the way RED-S has basically replaced the female athlete triad because you don’t need to have all three to have it.

There are multiple signs of RED-S very similar to Hypothalamic Amenorrhea

• Fatigue
• Hormone Issues
• Injuries and acute inflammation
• Insomnia/Sleep Disturbances or Wake up unrefreshed
• Moodiness or Depression and Anxiety
• Loss of appetite

The psychological impact can be thoughts around exercise, food and weight gain which tend to lead into the unhealthy obsession. Fears if you do stop that you will gain or lose your strength. In the back of your mind you may want to stop. You may feel an uncontrollable urge to train. You may have disordered thoughts about earning your food. Fears because it’s your way to decompress or manage stress so you don’t want to stop.

I remember in the past researching over training and exercise addiction. That right there should have been a clue that there was something. I didn’t think I had it because I still had energy to workout.

Are you exercising too much?

If you are teetering if you are doing too much or you are trying to recover your period you most likely need to cut back, cut it out or at least ask yourself on a daily basis “Is my body rested enough to exercise today?” Many people fall into the trap that more is better with exercise. Remember, more isn’t always better. This is the exact opposite of the what you have always been told. It’s all in the audience. If you are that person that pushes the limits and is an overachiever you may be doing too much. I recall Bret Contreras, the “Glute Guy,” saying one of the biggest mistakes he sees most of his female clients make is exercising too much. Imagine if you could actually exercise less and get better results? If you are unsure if you are exercising too much start asking yourself the following questions:

Do I have any of these symptoms?

Am I scared to stop training?

Am I exercising despite being exhausted or not sleeping enough?

Do I enjoy it?

Would I feel a sense of relief if I were forced to stop?

Am I taking rest days?

Am I seeing improvements in my performance?

So after answering all those questions you probably know the answer whether or not you need to stop or slow it down. If you are thinking HELL NO I am not stopping start to ask yourself why?

Are you worried about weight gain? Are you using it to earn your food? Are you wanting to eat more but fearing that you will gain weight? Are you fearful that it’s your way to let go of stress or that maybe you will lose friends?

Just take a deep look at yourself only you can answer this.

How to Stop?

The best way to stop is to try cold turkey if you are completely depleted and exhausted. You should at least try to take a week off. If I mention try to take a week off and you just got anxiety then you probably need to reevaluate what is going on with you. If anything cutting back on intensity, start taking deload weeks and take at least a week off every quarter.

Prevention for RED-S

It’s important that you learn to exercise mindfully and find a healthy balance. There are so many stressors in life like being a mom or if you have a high stress job or there are a lot of things happening in your life. It’s easy to use exercise as a crutch and say you can’t cut back or a way of controlling something in a world that feels so uncontrollable. I am by no means saying not to exercise for stress reduction but if you lost your period or have RED-S you may need to stop and then find your sweet spot once you recover by doing the following:

• Balanced Training
• Deloads and Periodization
• Rest Weeks
• Fueling Properly
• Timing of Foods around exercise
• Sleeping Enough

Click to access 83e2e89d257b3e62b6f0e6bb6fe0584eba42.pdf

Recovery Weight Gain: Stop Caring What Other People Think

I spoke about body image in my last post and dealing with weight gain. Today I want to address why you need to stop caring what other people think and how to deal with people that may make comments about you. I think this was one of my biggest concerns when I started gaining weight for Hypothalamic Amenorrhea recovery. I was concerned with what other people would think about me as my body and habits changed.

First off, I can tell you making the decision to recover is the best decision I could make and I am damn proud of it. It will also be the best decision that you can make. Here’s the thing at the end of the day it’s you that has to deal deal with the repercussions and other people are far more interested in themselves than you. Think about when you go to the gym. Look around. Everyone is looking in the mirror at themselves too worried about what others think of them.

I’m sure if you are in recovery you have had these concerns or are afraid to start recovery and change your habits because you are fearful of making changes because of what others will think. It seems to be a trend that those suffering from HA or eating disorders may be a bit of a perfectionist, an overachiever or set very high expectations for themselves. You may always beat yourself up or maybe you don’t feel good enough or thin enough or pretty enough as others. Maybe you hear the words self love and wonder what that means and how can anyone feel that way about themselves. I am here to tell you that the relationship with yourself is your most important relationship. If you have a poor relationship with yourself then you need to make it a priority to change it.

The Perfectionist and Overachiever

From my perspective, there seems to be this relationship with women that overexercise, are always on diets and restrict calories who develop disordered eating patterns all because we are trying to put ourselves in this box of what we think others want us to be or what is acceptable or what we think we should be.

This ties into being concerned with what other people think because if you are going through HA recovery you are most likely going to have people make comments at some point. It could be compliments, it could be insults or it could just be observations. It’s all in how you take it. I know for me there are certain people that can make comments that really trigger me. Mom, that’s you!

You Won’t Recover or Get What You Want in Life

One of the main reasons not to care what others think is you won’t get what you want in life and you will not recover. You will be too worried about pleasing others or what other people think of you so you won’t take action and won’t get to the place you need to be.

The number one reason to not worry what others think is that it will hold you back. You won’t get what you want in life and you won’t get to a place where you are recovered. You may not give in to what your body is asking for because you are scared that people may comment on your food choices and your body changes. Think about on your death bed are you going to be caring what that girl at work thinks about you or are you going to be content because you made decisions for yourself and not others. You are going to be happy you made the decision to recover for your health and didn’t stay in that place of disordered habits because you were concerned that other people think you let yourself go. At the end of the day, you are making this choice to recover. Own it. Be proud of it. This isn’t some sort of victim situation. You are choosing to recover.

You Will Never Get To Know Yourself

Another reason to stop caring is you will never get to know yourself and what you want. I am a recovering people pleaser so I fully know that I chose not to do things because I was worried about what other people think and it really held me back. In regards to your body you may abuse it and you won’t love yourself. It’s really hard to get to a place of self love if every time you look in the mirror you say nasty things because your body isn’t what you think the ideal body should look like.

You may feel that others look one way and it’s different than what you look like so you do things to put a lot of strain on your body because of the stress you cause it by under eating or overexercising. Your body will never be what you want it to be if you want it to be someone else ideal. You don’t want to punish yourself for not being the way you think other’s think you should look like. Remember you are only given one body. Take care of it. Be compassionate with it. It’s the one thing that is going to stand by you through all of this.

Stop Feeling Not Good Enough

What goes hand in hand with doing things other people want is never feeling good enough. What you need to learn is that you are good enough and being good enough has nothing to do with other people it has to do with being enough for you. I hear often Brooke Castillo on The Life Coach podcast say “you can be the sweetest peach but you will always have someone that doesn’t like peaches.” Another way you may not feel good enough is when people start making comments and I guarantee through recovery you will have at least one person say something to you. It could be compliments, it could be insults or it could just be observations. First off you are good enough and what you look like is no one else’s concern and what they think about you has nothing to do with you and all about them.

Worrying about others and comparing is only going to make you feel inadequate. I know it is difficult to let things roll off of you but find something that works for you. Have that one support person you can go and cry to or the person who can be that voice of reason. If not, you are going to get really resentful of others and yourself or you may start playing victim and start blaming someone else for things. Lastly, if you worry what others think you are going to feel unfulfilled in life in general. Are you living someone else’s dream and not living your own purpose because you are too worried about what other’s think? Are you too concerned about what your body looks like that you don’t have the energy to do what you want in life? You lose your chance to be self aware because you are suppressing your feelings. If you take anything away from this realize one of the main reasons not to care what others think is you won’t get what you want in life and you will not fully recover.

Remember you are one step close to getting the life you dreamed of. Take Care.

Weight Gain In HA Recovery

Don’t Have Recovery Weight Expectations

Recently I posted on my IG stories how I was having a such a tough time with weight gain. I went out to buy clothes and it was awful. Nothing fit. So why was it bothering me so much? I am not meeting expectations that I should have never set with myself. I keep setting myself up for failure because I was setting an expectation to be recovered at a certain weight. This weight was a number that I had gotten pregnant at a number I had cycled at with no issues. At first it was a certain number on the scale. Once I got there I got panicked and I then set another number to try to not bypass which was a BMI of 22 the fertile BMI which is recommended in recovery. I got there and then I kept gaining and I was like “No, I can’t gain anymore!” but I could still fit in a certain size jeans so I was OK with it. And then guess what? I gained even more weight and I no longer fit in that size and this is what really pushed me over the edge. I am now over the 22 BMI and I am no longer fitting in the size I wore after I had a damn baby.

Your Body Decides Your Recovery Weight

All this goes back to my body either doesn’t feel comfortable yet or still has more repairing to do. This takes time. The more days that pass the stronger I get. So I keep going. Even if you feel like giving up on where you are on your journey don’t give up. Weight gain is tough. This is all about perseverance. In a blink of an eye it will be another year and you will be restored and it will all be a distant memory. Think back to something you regret. You don’t want this to be that. Be strong and keep going.

The fact that I have gained this amount of weight and I still don’t have a period is telling me I am not recovered yet. I am close to the highest weight I have ever been at. I have probably overshot by now but that shouldn’t matter but let’s be honest it feels like it does. It doesn’t feel good to put on clothes and be spilling out of them but let’s talk about that.

What are You Making Weight Gain Mean?

Let’s talk really about what you are making it mean. What does it mean to you that you have gained weighted? Are you making it mean you let yourself go? Is the problem the weight or is it truly the thought around what you are making it mean? Are you making it mean you aren’t worthy anymore. That you aren’t beautiful? Are you worried about what others are thinking of you?

My guess there are two big things here. One you are worried about what others think which I will cover in a future blog post and the second thing is you are probably upset with what you are making this mean. So ask yourself what are you making it mean? Write down why it is bothering you and take a good look at these reasons.

You are Not the Number on the Scale

Remember you are not your weight. I guarantee if you were to describe yourself or someone else it would not be by what they looked like. You would say that they are a great friend and great listener. Or maybe you would mention their funny sense of humor. You would describe who they are as a person. Gaining weight does not change who you are. It only makes you better and stronger for wanting to better yourself. Even if you are not recovering and maybe you are just gaining weight who cares?

There is a saying that “What you resist persists.” What needs to happen is you need to let go of who you think you are supposed to be and look like. If you are resisting this weight gain it is going to resurface two fold. If you aren’t allowing your body to recover and you are still holding on to having that lean physique you won’t get out of this. These expectations will set you up for failure and disappointment. You yes you are all about what is on the inside not the outside.

During recovery, we have a distorted view of what we see as normal. I am not going to go into all the diet industry and that BS because I think we already know that. But normal is what is healthy for you and no one else. Others may be able to be at 15% body fat and cycle but that is not you or they may be able to be that low of body fat and feel good. It’s OK to gain weight. I am giving you approval to and it’s also OK not to feel great about it all of the time. This is about accepting your feelings about it and to try and make improvements. Body’s have seasons. You may have a fit season, you may have a postpartum season you may have a prenatal season. There are times in your life that you don’t have the time to exercise or worry about your weight and times you are super fit. This is your recovery body. Love it for all it does for you.

Thanks for reading and let me know you deal with weight gain in recovery.

What to Expect In HA Recovery

I shared my HA symptoms in a past blog and video and now that I am almost 7 months into recovery I am sharing what to expect in the recovery process. First off, recovery is uncomfortable. When you first begin recovery every symptom can be seen as normal with a caveat. If there is anything life threatening then obviously you should seek help. There are so many things that happen in recovery we feel like we need some validation or reassurance that we are on the right path. I am going to cover possible things that can happen. Whether or not you get them doesn’t make your recovery any more or less normal. You may experience additional symptoms or have a different experience and that is OK. Every day can be different too. There were days I was starving and there were days I was felt so full. There were days I had insomnia and days I slept really good.

Recovery time can be dependent on your genetic and how suppressed your body is and how quickly you can bounce back. How long you have restricted or overexercised may influence your recovery because your body may have a lot of healing to do. If you are still under a lot of stress this can also affect symptoms and of course recovery time. If you are in what they call Quasi-Recovery (Half In), this could also impact your recovery.

Recovery is TOUGH and everyone’s journey is different. Since everyone’s recovery length varies you may see the symptoms when you first start, when you are all in for a month or scattered throughout recovery. Remember just because you get your period back doesn’t make you 100% recovered. Your body OR mind may still have some other healing to do so don’t you get all crazy and go run 10 miles!

Symptoms and Experiences in Recovery

1. Obsessiveness about food

If you didn’t have this before you will most likely have it now. If you have restricted in the past you may start to see what they call extreme hunger. What you think you are doing in regards to binging may likely just be your body asking for the calories it needs. Don’t go into panic mode that you now have a binge eating disorder. I would see this as a good sign that your body is waking up. You may start allowing yourself certain foods and it will turn into eating a ton of that food or you may give yourself a little bit and it may feel like you just can’t stop. Don’t freak out! This can be normal! For me I kept craving a Dunkin Donuts blueberry muffin. I hadn’t had one in years and every time I had one I would need another one. I was scared because every time I thought about one I had to stop and get on. Every time I would see the sign I would panic and it felt uncontrollable. This will go away. It won’t last forever. It could last days, weeks or months. Once your body is nourished and comfortable you won’t be obsessed.

2. Weight Gain

As with eating a lot you can imagine weight gain will come. Weight gain looks different for everyone. You may gain rapidly then stop gaining, you may lose and then gain or you may have slow gradual weight gain. At times you may feel like if you keep eating the way you do that you will become huge or balloon up. Don’t worry your body will regulate even if you overshoot your weight set point.

3. GI Problems

Many people experience GI Issues. This can include nausea, extreme fullness, constipation and bloating. You GI tract is just waking up and adjusting to the increased amount of food, calories and carbs.

4. Bloating and Swelling

Along with bloating you may have swelling. This will look different for everyone. It could be your face, hand legs or stomach or anywhere else. It is your body retaining water and adjusting to the increase in calories and carbs. My face swelled for a few weeks and so did my stomach.

5. Aches and Pains

Aches and pains is another symptom in recovery. Your body may ache like DOMs or delayed onset muscle It may feel like you just ran a marathon or were working out like crazy. You may feel old injuries resurface.

6. Sleep Changes

Sleep is can go to getting really good to being horrible. You may be awakened throughout the night due to hunger. You may have insomnia or you may sleep like a log. I personally have always had sleep problems so I am jealous of all of you that get a restful nights sleep!

7. Emotional

Emotions are another part of recovery that can be affected. You may become more depressed or anxious and this could be the fluctuating hormones, lack of control, You may cry about everything or you may be feeling anger. These feelings hit me pretty hard as I felt numb for quite some time prior to recovery.

8. Brain Fog

My mind became more fogged before it became clearer. I was drained mentally when I first started recovery. Not only was my body tired but so was my mind.

9. Comparison Thoughts and Comments from Others

You may find yourself comparing yourself to others. No longer feeling like the smallest person in the room. You may begin to hear comments from others about your weight, food choices, amount your eating or how you are different. I had some people as me why I wasn’t exercising, people talk about the size of my arms, people that tried to figure out what was going on with me or if I was possibly pregnant.

10. Full On Identity Crisis

Recovery takes you out of your norm. It changes you and leaves you without your stress reduction or old habits. I personally felt like I had an identity crisis. I was no longer the fit girl. I didn’t have exercise in my life. The weight gain made me not recognize myself. I was wondering who I was without out these things. I wanted to be at the gym and I became obsessed with other things including podcasts, researching and needed to put my energy into new hobbies like blogging, creating YouTube and going back to school. I wasn’t exercising so I felt I needed to do something to fill the emptiness.

Let me know if your relate at all to any of these and check out the video if you want to hear me speak about each one of these symptoms.

What is Hypothalamic Amenorrhea and why you NEED your period back

If you’re reading this post you most likely are experiencing a loss of period or you want to understand what Hypothalamic Amenorrhea is and why it is important to get your period back. You can check out my video below or read on to hear about HA.

What is Hypothalamic Amenorrhea?

Hypothalamic Amenorrhea or HA for short is a type of secondary amenorrhea. The definition of HA is 3 months absence of menstruation. This means at some point you had your period and have lost it. This looks different for everyone. You may have been on birth control pills and tried coming off and never got your period back or you may have just started having really light periods or maybe the duration between periods started to increase more and more until you no longer have a mentrual cycle. In actuality the absence of periods is merely the absence of ovulation in most situations although you can have annovulatory cycles. The bleeding is shedding your lining because pregnancy didn’t occur. I have a lot of experience with this and the science behind it because I went through multiple IVFs ( 5 for my son and 1 for my daughter).

Either way you are probably starting to get concerned with what is going on. Where the hell is my period? What’s going on? One month passes and it seems like no big deal, one less thing to worry about and then more and more time passes and you begin to get nervous. Or maybe your are thinking no big deal it’s so much easier not having a period. For some, it could be a few months, a few years or even for some decades. The good thing is you are looking into trying to recover and that is the first step.

How is it diagnosed and reasons you may have it.

From all the research I have done and the doctors that I spoke to, HA is diagnosed by way of elimination. What this means is that they need to rule out any other cause of hypothalamic amenorrhea. They need to rule out a pituitary tumor, thyroid issues, any scarring or obstruction or some other ailment that is stopping menstruation.

The typical protocol for doctors is they will do some blood work, they may do an ultrasound and some may do an MRI if you have higher Prolactin levels to rule out a tumor. I would recommend getting a full blood panel from your Dr. That would include a full thyroid panel, Estrogen, Progesterone, Lutenizing Hormone(LH) and Follicle Stimulating Hormone (FSH ). A lot of times they may only check Estrogen and FSH and without the key indicator of LH you may lose the opportunity to see improvements.

The doctor will probably try around of Provera. Provera will induce a period in woman that have a lining and some women may get a bleed which usually indicates a less severe case of HA. If you don’t get a bleed don’t stress yourself out. I didn’t either when I was first put on it. If you don’t get a bleed it’s also a good indication you have HA which if your blood work aligns with it and if you can relate to some of the trends below. This is a great thing because it means it is most likely reversible

If you have gone to the Dr, you may have suppressed LH, low estrogen but for some these are on the low to borderline normal..

Women with HA seem to have some of the following trends:

• Disordered eating patterns
• Have lost a significant amount of weight or been on diets
• Have history of restriction
• May be binge eating
• May have cut out certain food groups or macro nutrients-
• Fatigued
• Showing signs of overexercising or working out too much
• May be an athlete or dancer but not required
• May extremely active
• Low body fat
• High Stress Levels

If any of these sound like you and you haven’t gone to the Dr, I would go to get some blood work done but hear this you need to make sure you are your own advocate. Most likely the Dr. is going to put you on birth control which will actually suppress your hormones. If you go in there and you have done your research prior to the appointment you will feel equipped to ask for what you need.

Why should you recover?

OK so now you may know that you have HA. You’re thinking why do I need to recover? Periods are a pain. Maybe you aren’t trying to get pregnant right now so it’s not a big deal but HA can cause:

• Osteoporosis
• Cardiovascular disease
• No sex drive
• Infertility
• Mental Health Issues (anxiety/depression)
• Perception of poor quality of life-
• Exhaustion
• Skin or hair problems

Please feel free to reach out with any questions or concerns! Proud of you for taking the leap to start recovery!