A Break in Your Cycle , livre ebook

A Break in Your Cycle
A Break in Your Cycle: The Medical and Emotional Causes and Effects of Amenorrhea 1998 by Theresa Francis-Cheung, MA
All rights reserved. Except for brief passages for review purposes, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of Chronimed Publishing.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Francis-Cheung, Theresa A break in your cycle / by Theresa Francis-Cheung
p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN 0-471-34663-2
Acquiring Editor: Cheryl Kimball
Copy Editor: Ren e M. Nicholls
Art/Production Manager: Claire Lewis
Text Design Production: David Enyeart
Cover Design Illustration: Pat Rouse
Published by
Chronimed Publishing
P.O. Box 59032
Minneapolis, MN 55459-0032
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Notice: Consult a Health Care Professional. Because individual cases and needs vary, readers are advised to seek the guidance of a licensed physician, registered dietitian, or other health care professional before making changes in their health care regimen. This book is intended for informational purposes only and is not for use as an alternative to appropriate medical care. While every effort has been made to ensure that the information is the most current available, new research findings, being released with increasing frequency, may invalidate some data.
A Break in Your Cycle
The Medical and Emotional Causes and Effects of Amenorrhea
Theresa Francis-Cheung, MA
CHRONIMED PUBLISHING
Theresa Francis-Cheung, BA King s College, Cambridge University, and MA King s College, London University, is no stranger to the world of women s health. She trained and performed as a professional dancer, became a fitness teacher and consultant, taught in schools and colleges, and has also worked in health publishing.
A sufferer from menstrual dysfunction herself, she has been treated by doctors both in the United Kingdom and the United States. Currently a freelance writer, she lives in Texas with her husband, Ray.
contents
Preface

Acknowledgments

Chapter One A Body in Crisis

Chapter Two Women with Amenorrhea

Chapter Three The Causes of Amenorrhea

Chapter Four Stress-Induced Amenorrhea

Chapter Five Contraceptives and Amenorrhea

Chapter Six Exercise-Induced Amenorrhea

Chapter Seven Eating Disorders

Chapter Eight Psychological and Emotional Causes

Chapter Nine Problems with the Pituitary, Thyroid, Adrenal, and Ovarian Glands

Chapter Ten The Medical Effects of Amenorrhea

Chapter Eleven The Emotional Effects of Amenorrhea

Chapter Twelve Conventional Treatments

Chapter Thirteen Alternative Treatments

Chapter Fourteen How You Can Help Yourself

Chapter Fifteen Breaking the Cycle

Bibliography/Suggested Reading

Index
preface
The time limit for use of the health club treadmill is thirty minutes. Mary has been running for eighty minutes now.
Lisa wears baggy clothes to conceal her body. She feels fat even though her bones are sticking out.
It is nine in the evening and Rachel is still working at the office. She arrived that morning at seven.
Linda really wants to have a baby, but she is still not pregnant a year after she stopped taking the pill.
Ninety pounds is the weight Caroline wants to drop to before she auditions for the ballet company.
Martha feels that she ll never get over the death of her parents last year.
Constantly craving food and constantly dieting, Sarah can t remember what real hunger is like anymore.
Samantha is confused and uncertain. She questions the very meaning of her life. The antidepressants that have been prescribed don t seem to be helping.
These women have very different problems, BUT there is one thing they all have in common. They are all suffering from amenorrhea.
Amenorrhea is the medical term for the absence or suppression of menstruation in a woman in her reproductive years who is not pregnant. Statistics reveal that the condition is on the increase as women lead increasingly stressful, complicated, and regulated lives. It is highly likely that in the twenty-first century more and more women will experience some form of amenorrhea in varying degrees of severity, from the mild (periods are absent for a few months), to the serious (periods disappear for several years or cease altogether).
Now think about your periods. Are they regular? Have you been skipping periods?
When I trained to be a dancer, when I went to study at Cambridge University, when I became a full-time fitness and exercise instructor, when I grieved for the death of my mother, and when I finally stopped taking the pill, I did not have periods. By the age of thirty, I had probably only had about twenty menstrual periods in my adult life. Because many of the professions I worked in have a high incidence of menstrual dysfunction, and I never felt unwell, it never really bothered me. But then in my early thirties I began to feel constantly despondent, weary, and irritable. To others it was obvious that my frantic lifestyle, low body weight, and terrible eating habits were probably to blame, but I was convinced that this was not the case. Being slim, working hard, proving myself, and barely resting was how I lived my life. Eventually the fatigue began to affect my work, so I reluctantly decided to make a rare visit to the doctor. One of the first questions the doctor asked was, When did you have your last period? It was when I told the doctor about my meager menstrual history that I first heard the word amenorrhea.
If you are amenorrheaic, it s likely that you also took a long time to seek out medical advice. This is easy to understand. Menstruation is still a taboo subject in our culture. It s something we all know exists, but it s also something we would rather not talk about. Even before our periods started, we were probably anxious about menstruation-convinced that it was unpleasant, that it hurt and that it was embarrassing and uncomfortable. Many of our mothers called it the curse. So not having periods must be a blessing, right?
Menstruation as a female affliction, or a symbol of sin and evil, is the legacy that we have inherited today. The ancient idea that menstruation is a curse or a punishment for Eve s dalliance with the serpent in the garden of Eden is embedded in our history and culture.
The blood women shed every month was for centuries thought to be a sign of women s weakness and inherently demonic in nature. In some religions, a menstruating woman was considered to be unclean and to be avoided at all costs during her flow. Such beliefs continued as late as the early seventeenth century, when medical authorities still promoted the idea that menstrual blood had dark, degenerate powers.
Although much has been done, and is still being done, to change deep-seated prejudices about menstruation, the stigma still lingers. Yet our history shows that the female reproductive cycle was not always denied or suppressed. A study of the first methods of marking time illustrates this. The earliest calendars were lunar calendars, based on the twenty-eight day cycle of the moon and the thirteen moons in the year. Since menstrual cycles follow lunar cycles, and still do today when women live away from artificial light, the strong connection between the two was emphasized. A careful study of the fragmented pieces of information that have been gathered from cultures around the world reveals that the most intimate female experiences-ovulation, menstruation, gestation, and birth-and the documenting and measuring of these events formed our ancestors concept of time. The way a people measure time determines the timing and nature of important social functions and activities and becomes the foundation for civilization. For that reason some scholars believe that women, and not men, were the significant force behind the foundation of culture and civilization in prehistoric times.
The consequent denial of the significance and power of the menstrual cycle has created an imbalance and a distortion in our culture that is still in the process of being corrected. By contrast, in some indigenous cultures, like those of the Native American Indian, a menstruating woman is believed to have an expanded connection with universal energy at the time of her flow. This link is thought to be so powerful that it can enable a woman to bring healing to herself and the community she lives in. In other cultures, however, we have lost the basic reverence for and connection to the feminine life cycle that we once had all those centuries ago. Now we tolerate and endure menstruation rather than celebrate it for the miracle of life that it is.
Today, if we miss our periods for a while, we think, Why complain? No more bloating, cramping, foggy thinking! Why suffer every month if we don t have to? If we don t want to have a baby right now, what possible motivation could we have for seeing a doctor?
A Break in Your Cycle will show that although amenorrhea is not life threatening in the short term for women with normal reproductive function, it can have very serious health consequences if left untreated. If you are amenorrheaic, there is cause for concern. Until now there has been little information available that is exclusively devoted to the subject and is in terms the lay person can understand. General books on women s health and on the menstrual cycle do sometimes have short sections on amenorrhea, but the condition, because it is so complex and has so many causes-physical, psychological, and emotional-deserves far greater attention than it has previously been given.
This study will outline what amenorrhea is, what the likely causes are, and the treatments and procedures that are available from both conventional and alternative medicine. Alongside the medical causes and effects, attention will also be paid to the em