Lactational Amenorrhea

[laurenvi]

It took around 6 months to become pregnant with our daughter, which is not long at all but was longer than we expected (partner is extremely fertile, but I had doubts about my fertility due to lack of conception prior). Our daughter is now 17 months old, she is breastfed and I am experiencing lactational amenhorrea. I have not had a period or any sign of one, since before I became pregnant with our daughter. Before, my periods were very irregular and extremely heavy. I am worried that I may have PCOS, as there were cysts present on several scans during my pregnancy (although it was never investigated further) and I seem to have experienced most of the symptoms of PCOS. Despite this, I don’t think any doctor will take me seriously if I raise my concerns. I’m an otherwise healthy 20 year old, and every time I’ve mentioned anything before I’ve been told “see how things are once you stop breastfeeding”. But I’m concerned that it might be too late to do anything about it, by then. I’m desperate to try for another baby, as I ideally wanted a 2 year age gap (which isn’t possible now, and at this rate it’ll be atleast double that by the time I become fertile again IF I do). I really don’t know what to do, and I can’t help but feel selfish and ungrateful for being so worried, when I have a healthy child already. As much as I adore my daughter, our family will not be complete until we’ve had more children and I’m terrified that we’ll never get chance to make that happen.

[nutritionnat]

Hi Laurenvi, your story really resonates with me. I had very irregular cycles prior to conceiving my first son (via IVF) and I breastfed him for 12 months. When our son was 15 months old I started thinking about getting my body ready to TTC again and hoping for a natural conception this time. There will be a hormonal reason why you have symptoms of PCOS and amenhorrea but not having any bleeding doesn't mean you're not ovulating, which as we know is most important when TTC. Do you track your cycles and other signs of ovulation? I bought a Femometer which automatically uploads my BBT (basal body temperature) so I was able to start gathering a picture of my cycles (however long or short they were, and they did vary). What it gave me was control in understanding my cycle and could therefore pinpoint roughly my fertile days even within irregular cycles. It took us 6 months to conceive our second baby and I was over the moon that this was without any medication this time around. I am due in 5 weeks with our second. Happy to chat further x

[Lynnr54]

How often does your daughter feed? If she is still feeding a lot, particularly overnight then it’s isn’t surprising or uncommon for your periods not to have returned. With my first born, my periods returned at 10 months, which is when he stopped feeding at night and started sleeping through. I don’t believe it was a coincidence. My second born is now 8.5 months and my periods still haven’t returned, but he still feeds a lot at night.

From what you describe of your periods pre-pregnancy, it does sound like you have some hormonal issues causing irregular periods. However, not everyone with PCOS has issues conceiving. You conceived your first in a relatively quick time scale, even for someone without fertility issues so there’s no reason you shouldn’t do it again once your periods return. In fact my consultant told me that if you’ve been pregnant once you have a better chance of conceiving again as your body knows what it’s doing. 20 is still really young from a fertility perspective so I don’t think you should worry just yet. You may have a longer timescale than you would have liked, but I’m sure you’ll get there. Good luck.