Hi!

Per Anita’s reminder I’ve returned to this thread! It’s been a while but of course I’m still facing the same issues I’ve mentioned as I have.. forever lol.

@Anita, you are so right. All the anxiety and stresses my body processes is more than likely a factor, if not the leading one in why my body doesn’t function properly. I am working to make peace with my body and mind and am in high hopes that one day I am functioning a lot better 🙂 Figuring out why I feel the way I feel is definitely hard though.

@nycartist I’m sorry to hear about the struggles you’ve also had relating to menstruation. Almost everything you mentioned I have had checked, I’ll have to double check if I have had all of those labs run for sure though. I have considered seeing someone more holistic but I’m not sure what exactly I should look for when seeking someone like that. An auto-immune disease has crossed my mind as well. Researching all my symptoms has been a blessing and a curse because now I’m more knowledgeable but I also have a huge list of things that MIGHT be wrong with me but I don’t know how to totally advocate for myself so it’s been a journey. I’m confident that I will get answers in time or that my body really will find it’s happy place. I have a lot of life left so I need it to get it together lol.

Thank you guys so much, sending my best

Thank you Anita, you are always appreciated, your dedication to helping/educate others shines through!

Hi Anita & Zeeza

I’d like to acknowledge that you both replied, thank you for your support 🙂 I suppose I’ll break down my feminine health history for you.

I first started my period when I was 12. This first period lasted maybe 5 days at the most, after that I did not have another for several months. Between the time I was 12-20 I never had a regular/consistent period. Around the time I turned 20, I had been having the longest, heaviest, most painful period I had ever had to experience. It was April 2018 when I went to get checked out while having this terrible experience with my period. I received inconclusive lab and vaginal examination results. The only thing that was concluded after that visit was that I am very anemic. I was then put on a birth control pill to cause me to have a regular flow. Immediately after starting the pill I began having a regulated period (actually just withdrawal bleeding but let’s just continue referring to it as a period lol). My periods were lasting a good 3 days a month for 1 whole year, until I stopped using due to my prescription running out. I did not go back to renew the prescription because I don’t mind not having a period, which is how it essentially always is if I am not taking BC and because I was no longer very sexually active. Between April/May 2019 when I stopped taking BC and December 2020, I had very few natural menses. This past December I decided to start taking BC again due to being very sexually active again and to ensure that pregnancy is prevented. During that month I ended up getting my period and it lasted about 2 weeks, for me it wasn’t what I expected but also wasn’t too bad. Come the beginning of January I began having really bad abdominal/pelvic pain. I am usually a trooper because I didn’t have a primary doctor for the longest time so I would avoid going to be seen, however at this time I ended up making a trip to the ER because the pain and discomfort was so intense. After having tests done, hours later I leave with no answers but at least medicated so I felt better for the night. About a day later I started my period once again, and it would last for about two weeks again, this made me start to think my pain was definitely related to my period problems. So come February I’m still taking this BC pill, hoping that my period starts to regulate itself now that this is the third month that I have been taking the same pill that made me flow normally in the past. The bleeding started right at the beginning of the month and lasted until March 1st. I was so fed up with the irregularity at this point I decided I would stop taking the BC. So here I am nearly 5 months later and I have all the symptoms but no period and obviously not pregnant and I take tests routinely. With it having been on my mind heavily anyways and a couple of really close ladies in my life opening my eyes with their all of a sudden feminine issues, I decided to find myself a primary doctor who is an OBGYN, and get myself checked up. So I had an appointment this month on the 8th, where my doctor and I spoke about what’s been going on and she decided to order more labs to have done along with an ultrasound. I got the labs done within that week, and had my ultrasound done last week. I was viewing the results on my chart online, and saw that my doctor had left notes saying that everything looks essentially normal and we will go over this when I go to see her again which will be August 4th, where I will have my first pap smear done as well. I want my body to work the way it’s supposed to, or at least know why it isn’t working how it should. I would like to know if I’m totally infertile, if I’ve got some random disease or whatever any other case could be.

Thanks for reading if you did

xoxo D

Anita,

It’s unfortunate to hear you have suffered from an ED yourself, I hope you had a good road to recovery and have a much healthier relationship with food.

I’m not sure lack of nurturance would be the root of my problem, perhaps in a way? To answer you though, it would have benefited me to have healthier food options, less fried, processed, greasy, carb heavy, fatty, sugary foods available. Of course my parents did not feed me absolute garbage or anything they provided well. As far as eating when expected to, skipping dinner or any meal shared with the family wasn’t really an option, I couldn’t just say I wasn’t going to eat, and on few occasions through my life I experienced the typical “you can’t leave until you finish your food”. This wasn’t necessarily traumatizing or anything, it’s just choices I would make differently if I had been able to.

I’m just about positive the reason for my poor relationship with food is because I was made to feel bad about the way my body looked from almost the beginning of my life at this point. As far back as my memories go there has always been someone to say something about me being overweight, telling me I probably shouldn’t eat something so I don’t gain more/ turn out like my grandmother who was a very obese woman. I don’t know, I think even  if that’s not what did it for me, it’s still pretty messed up to tell a small child there’s something wrong with them like that. This had definitely made me feel the need to sneak food. I have had almost a whole lifetime of feeling guilty for being hungry when hunger strikes. I eventually started convincing myself that hunger actually really felt good. But here I am indulging in everything that sounds good to me lately.

D

Cont.

I have had a significant history with binging and purging through my middle school and high school days, a little bit into my adult life. I often feel the urge to purge when I eat a lot even now, however I ended up stopping completely as an adult since I realized how much of a toll it took on my teeth, along with the fact that it never made me thinner, just let me feel better physically and mentally about eating so much.

I always figured after I turned 18 things would get better for me as far as meeting my fitness goals because I would no longer have to eat what my parents provided, or when they expected me to but I was wrong there. Not eating in general (to an extent ya know) became easier since I had more freedom but then I’d find myself returning to the binge life. It’s hasn’t been until this past year and a half that I felt more in control of my body and felt like I was on a path to a positive body image with an actual healthy lifestyle incorporated.

For whatever reason I can’t help myself lately and have been feeling incredibly unmotivated, no desire to workout not even the slightest of exercises sound doable, especially during the summer and with this recent unusual heat here I’m struggling badly. Food and bed are calling my name, and an easy walk around the neighborhood is not. I want to convince myself that it’s okay not to meal prep every week and workout daily, but then by the end of the week I feel bad about myself and feel like the way I look and physically feel has drastically changed. But I step on a scale and nothing has changed, my clothes don’t necessarily fit different unless  I have just had something significant enough to eat to make me bloated, but I still feel this awful wave of disappointment in my body.

As always, not sure what else I have to say about this at the moment but I will gladly read anyone’s advice or personal experiences with ED/negative body image.

D

Anita,

Good morning/afternoon! I think we barely missed each other when we both last posted. My last reply was finishing the message I had started while I was at work. I’m sure I will have more to say once I get another insightful response from you 🙂

D

Anita,

Good afternoon! Tiny Buddha hasn’t being cooperating and didn’t post my reply the last 2 times I tried. I think we barely missed each other last night when you last replied I don’t think you saw my reply I had just summited! I will await your next response before I have anything else to spill out. Hope you’re having a great sunny day 🙂

D