Dear ladies, let’s talk. Have you recently been worried about your menstrual cycle and how it usually comes late? Do you always think you are pregnant a few weeks or days before it finally comes just because it comes a bit late?
Have you been asking yourself questions like “why is my period late when I’m not pregnant”? There are so many other reasons why your menstrual period can be late asides from pregnancy. Don’t get me wrong.
If you are pregnant, you will not see your monthly menstrual blood flow. However, why then is the problem when you aren’t pregnant?
Here are some reasons why you might be experiencing your menstrual flow a little bit later than usual:
1. Massive weight loss
Losing a little bit of body weight is good especially when you need to keep being healthy and having or maintaining a good body shape. However, when you begin to lose weight excessively, it can become a problem.
If you have lost a massive amount of weight, it begins to affect your body functions, and that includes your menstrual cycle as a woman. When your body mass index also known as BMI drops below 19, it may begin to affect your normal body functions.
If this drop happens quite suddenly as well, your body will suddenly start to fret and panic, and that may cause you to have a delayed menstrual cycle. Are you wondering how this works?
Well, in order for you to have a menstrual flow, you need lots of estrogen build up so that the lining of the uterus can be appropriately formed for possible implantation. When you lose weight extremely, have a severe reduction in your calorie intake, or you are severely underweight, you are stressing out your hypothalamus.
Your hypothalamus is the part of the brain that is in charge of controlling the hormones that regulate your general body system as well as your menstrual cycle. This means that once your hypothalamus is over stressed, most glands that are regulated by this part of the brain to release hormones will not be signaled to release the hormones.
One of such glands is your uterus. Your uterus will therefore not be able to produce adequate estrogen that is needed for your menstrual period to take place. In some very extreme cases, there are women who don’t ovulate at all just because they are severely underweight.
If this is the reason why you are not ovulating regularly or your menstrual period takes longer to occur, then you probably need to visit your doctor and have yourself checked out.
2. Weight gain
The first point says excessive weight loss. However, if you are excessively overweight, it can also affect your hormonal balance as well as your menstrual cycle.
When you gain a lot of weight in a short amount of time, it can cause your body to begin to produce estrogen excessively. This can also cause your body to go into overdrive. It causes the lining of the uterine wall to grow so much in such a little time causing an overgrowth.
This overgrowth can cause heavy bleeding and irregular periods. If this is the reason why your period takes longer than usual, then all you might require might be to lose a few pounds of weight.
This will help your period to return to normal. However, if you are not so sure about the reason why you might be experiencing delayed menstrual cycles, then you need to visit your doctor for a check-up.
3. Do you have an eating disorder?
When you probably have an eating disorder which causes you to eat too much, it produces a change in your menstrual cycle as well as cause a delayed menstrual flow. Having disorders such as Anorexia Nervosa or Bulimia Nervosa, it can cause your estrogen levels to drop too low.
Once this occurs, you probably will have little or no hormonal strength to cause your ovulation cycle as well as your menstrual cycle to happen hence no ovulation as well as no menstruation.
4. Malnutrition and Crappy Diets
If you have malnutrition or a Crappy diet plan, then you probably will have a very reduced hormonal level. There is a fact that must be known which is “your diet says everything about you”.
If you have a bad diet plan, for example, no breakfast, no lunch and probably for dinner, you have a can of beer and some chips; you are aiming for a hormonal imbalance as well as delayed periods and an irregular menstrual cycle.
For healthy ovulation and menstrual cycle, you need to be healthy, and that includes taking in healthy and nutritious meals. You must make sure that your diet contains a healthy dose of vegetables, fruits, proteins, fibres, as well as healthy transcellular fat in the right proportions.
5. Too much exercise
Could the problem with your menstrual cycle be because you are sweating it out and maybe going way overboard at the gym? Yes, we know and understand that you want those curves in the right places as well as getting and maintaining that sexy body you want. But then you don’t need to overdo it at the detriment of your health.
Exercising is right for you but overdoing it is bad for your health. If you are over stressing your body at the gym or on the tracks, you are in danger of amenorrhea which means the absence of a menstrual cycle or in simple terms, no flow.
Most people who are at risk of this kind of condition are marathon runners, ballet dancers, wrestlers, endurance trainers, gymnasts and other professional athletes who go overboard. What we are merely saying that if you train hard, complement your body with the right kind of nutrients and rest and all will be fine.
However, if you are training way too hard without giving your body the proper amount of calories and rest needed for your body to recover from the amount of work and stress you take it through, your body will break down and will start experiencing hormonal imbalance.
This just means that if you are forcing yourself above the limit, your body’s production of estrogen will reduce and this implies no period, late period or a very light menstrual flow.
If you fall into this category and you are starting to get worried about your menstrual flow, then all you need to do is slow down for a while, take your exercises easy, eat healthy meals more and train less. Your body will recover and revert to its normal state in no time.
6. Sickness
If you probably are down with a kind of disease that affects the production of hormones in your body, then you will most likely have delayed ovulation as well as menstrual cycle. If you have any sickness such as the flu, cold, and so on, you may have a delayed or no menstrual cycle.
What you may need to do is to treat yourself, get better and stronger. Your period will more than likely return to the normal cycle next month.
7. Stress
Stress is a significant factor that can seriously affect your menstrual cycle. Your hypothalamus which is your regulating centre for the production of most of the hormones in the body can be very much influenced by the stress hormones known as cortisol and adrenaline.
So many things can induce stress hence there are different types of stress. There is the physical stress which is influenced by physical factors, the emotional stress caused by psychological factors, mental stress and so on.
Stress can be caused by the death of a loved one, a recent change of environment, a new job, you trying to meet up with a deadline, a breakup or any other life instances. This could cause a release of so much cortisol and adrenaline which will end up stressing your hypothalamus hence causing your period to be delayed or probably not come at all.
Your body can only return to its normal body functions and cycles when your brain detects that the cause of the stress on your body as well as your mental state has been removed. If you are also there stressing about your lack of period, your menstrual cycle might also be a no-show.
8. A sudden change in schedule
Asides stress, one thing our bodies don’t exactly appreciate is a change. A little change from your regular schedule can alter your body routine.
Things that may be considered as small changes such as the time you wake up, your eating routine, your work shifts or even your body clock can affect your hormonal production which will, in turn, affect your menstrual flow.
9. Miscalculation
One reason most women don’t think about is a miscalculation. Some women don’t know how to calculate their ovulation period. How do you calculate your ovulation period and your menstrual cycle?
Do you start calculating from the last day of your period or the first day of your period? Do you count 28 days from the first day of your menstrual cycle? Or do you count just three weeks? Have you considered the possibility that you probably only miscalculated?
If you don’t know how to calculate your period, you can always figure it using an app called the period calculator. What you always need to remember is that you may have a 28-day cycle which is the normal cycle, a 27-day cycle or a 31-day cycle which are the less common ones.
Also, you must know that there are times this cycle changes all on its own without reason. Once this happens, don’t be scared. It is a regular occurrence, and you merely need to re-calculate. Get to know the length of your cycle in order for you to accurately track your menstrual cycle.
10. Just new to puberty?
If you are just approaching puberty, there is every tendency that your period will be irregular. It is a regular occurrence for your period to be irregular at first. This is your body trying to adjust to being a mature woman.
It can take some years for your body to regularise your menstrual cycle so don’t sweat it. It will all come into place in its time.
