What can I do to get back my periods and lose that abdominal fat layer?

Hi,

I really don't understand, I'm having a secondary amenorrhea right now due to my recent weight loss ( I was trying to shrink my abdominal fat/reduce my body fat percentage : now my body fat is between 10-16% (varies on different websites) ) but I still have a thick layer of abdominal fat (apple shape) that really doesn't fit with the rest of my very lean body.

Thanks

[ EDIT : I'm 16 years old, my height is 5 feet 1 and I weight 86-88 lbs... ( depends on water weight, what I ate the day before etc. ) ]

Are you female? 10-15% fat sounds very low for a woman? What are your stats (height, weight, age) and we can help more.

Also, please read this thread on amenorrhea for information - there are only very few reasons one experiences this and none of them are very healthy.

COMMON CAUSES OF SECONDARY AMENORRHOEA:

• An eating disorder. Anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, ED-NOS, and yes, even binge-eating, COE and other forms of overeating related eating disorders; all of these can result in you losing your period. This is less due to the very disorder itself and more the behaviours associated with it, which I will list below.
• Overeating or frequent binge eating. If you overeat on a regular basis you can affect your weight and your hormone levels - and the stress can ultimately lead to cessation of regular cycles.
• Purging behaviours of any type. This includes compulsive overexercise, which I detail more below, but other forms of purging can also lose you to lose your period as it's too much stress on your body.
• Being underweight. Anorexia nervosa being so commonly associated with being underweight, but you don't have to be starving just for your period to go away: a BMI sub-20 can result in losing your period, even if you eat enough.
• Being overweight. In the same way being underweight can stress out your body so can being too heavy.
• Eating too little for your needs, too great a deficit, and starvation dieting. Starvation, and even just excessive restriction (even if you eat to the minimum sedentary levels for your age and gender) can lead to cessation of your period. And you do NOT have to be underweight to fall into this category!
• Deficiencies and restriction of food groups - especially fats. You might think "low-fat" is the in thing but, actually, too little fat in your diet can cause your period to stop. It's an essential food group and is responsible for the absorption of vital vitamins A, D, E and K. Furthermore a deficiency like an anemia can result in your period stopping.
• Too low a body fat percentage. Women are supposed to have a certain amount of fat on their bodies! Too little and your body no longer thinks you capable of cushioning a possible pregnancy.
• Too much exercise. Yes, there is such a thing. Doing too much of a workout can stress your body out.
• Too much stress. Work long hours? Bad sleeping patterns? Generally chomping your pencil down to a nub and tearing your hair out? General stress, when there's too much of it, can actually make your periods stop. And this can include:
• Losing weight too fast. Sudden rapid weight loss can lead to losing your period!
• The menopause. Women 40 and over usually suffer amenorrhoea as they enter the menopause.
• Hormonal treatments and various medications. While birth control is the most commonly associated medication with amenorrhoea, many other meds also have this side-effect.
• Hormonal issues and underlying causes, like polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS). Underlying causes are best left to be looked into by a doctor.

Thanks, I've edited my post

According to this site, http://www.diethealthclub.com/do-you-know-if- you-are-fat-for-your-height.html, it sounds like you are about 20 lbs. underweight. I read your edit saying you only weigh 88lbs. for your height, 5 foor, 1inch?

According to this site and most BMI charts, for your height, you should weigh anywhere from 100 to 130 lbs.

I think your problem is related to being underweight.

You are underweight and are at risk for all the bad things that come with being underweight. Your loss of period is a big red flag for you to take the time to get healthy.

With such a low body fat percentage and such a low weight it is impossible that you have a "thick layer of abdominal fat". I worry that you have a distorted body image and that could lead to further problems if you don't nip it in the bid now.

I do understand the feeling of being unhappy with your body or feeling their may be areas that you think could be better, but at the age of 16 I must strongly advise you not to lose anymore weight and take the fact that you lost your period quite seriously.

Do you exercise, take walks, swim? Now it's summer time, and doing some light toning exercise can make wonders in helping you feel better about yourself. Have you talked to your doctor, either GP or Gyn?

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Deleted other duplicate thread, and out of courtesy, copied the reply for you from that thread.

Original Post by mel_e_mel:

You already posted this. No one here will help you with a starvation diet.Unless you are a pro athlete, your body fat should not drop below 18%

You have a round belly because you are starving. Have you ever seen photos of Somalian or Ethiopian children during times of famine? That is what is happening to you. Your stomach is swelling out because your organs are bigger then the rest of your body.

And IF it is because you are apple shaped naturally, no amount of dieting will ever change your shape. I am a pear shape. I have a big butt. Even when I weighed the same are you, my butt was bigger then the rest of me. I will always look that way because that is the way I am shaped. There is no changing this. One of my best friends has saddle bags / big thighs. When she was anorexic, she just looked like a skeleton with big thighs. NO AMOUNT OF DIETING WILL CHANGE YOUR NATURAL SHAPE.

So please talk to your parents, or someone, about your grand plan to starve yourself to death in search of 0% body fat, because you very much need help.

Here's some pictures of my belly :

http://img134.imageshack.us/i/85782701.jpg/

http://img193.imageshack.us/i/33461729.jpg/

http://img134.imageshack.us/i/76349329.jpg/

And my body :

http://img5.imageshack.us/i/39667821.jpg/

And.. no i'm not pregnant

Garlic, your tummy looks distended - and not from what you think. It is not fat, and you do not look pregnant. I can see the bones in your ass, dude. That is not what asses are supposed to look like. People's stomachs become distended after prolonged periods of starvation. You fix it by eating normally for a long time.

If you think there is something wrong with you, please talk to your parents about making an appointment with your pediatrician or a nutritionist. They can help you more than the Internet.

I'm going to be brutal because I'm alarmed at your condition.

A normal percentage of body fat for young women is 20%.  You have so little body fat that your body and organs are breaking down.  You need medical attention right away.

Please don't kid yourself that your tummy has any fat on it at all.  We can see the red marks where you pinched it so hard that the skin stretched.  Distended abdomen is called ascites and is caused by malnutrition and liver damage.

Please get help.

Oh my god please see a doctor. That's a malnutritioned belly, not a fat belly.

What you are pulling from you distended abdomen is called skin -not fat.  Please seek medical attention immediately, your symptoms could be life threatening.

I advise you to seek medical attention as soon as you can; the fact that you think you're stomach is fat [when clearly it isn't] is not good at all.

I'm the same height as you, and I gained from 79lbs to 104lbs and I just got my period today. I haven't had it since August last year, and the time before that was January last year. You really need to gain weight and increase your body fat percentage.

That's skin, not fat, and your stomach is distended from malnourishment. Have you ever seen footage of starving children in Africa? Their bellies are distended in a similar (even more dramatic) way. Yet the rest of them is skin and bone. Your 'lean' body and distended stomach are symptomatic of starvation diet and low body fat. Not much else I can say.

Original Post by mel_e_mel:

Garlic, your tummy looks distended - and not from what you think. It is not fat, and you do not look pregnant. I can see the bones in your ass, dude. That is not what asses are supposed to look like. People's stomachs become distended after prolonged periods of starvation. You fix it by eating normally for a long time.

 Speaking from personal experience:

Mel is right - it is from starvation/malnutrition.  I looked almost exactly like you at the height of my ED. I'm 5'3" and weighed between 85-90.  I was bones everywhere... my ass, , legs, chest, arms... when I look at pictures I can see that I was completely and utterly disgusting and its embarrassing to know that I walked around like that.

I'm at a normal, healthy BMI now and my stomach is way flatter than it was then.  Who would have thought that I would gain 30 pounds and have a flatter stomach and waaaaaayyyyy better , healthier body.

And now I get hit on all the time and get tons of second glances - not that it really matters since I'm married - but its still nice to have that positive reinforcement.  When I got down into lower weights i completely stopped getting hit on and the only second looks I got were from people that looked like they had just seen something grotesque... which they had.

Thanks a lot for your answers and support , I took an appointment to see my doctor ( I'll see her in one month ), I'll do some research about distended bellies and eat to gain some weight.

I see pictures taken from distinctly unflattering angles...why do you do this to yourself? 

Fat is not the word I would use to describe the pictures that you've posted.  The stats that you have posted are worrisome and do warrant a visit to your doctor along with the lack of menstrual cycle. You may be bloated from something you ate or drank or from not eating or drinking enough.  My stomach would certainly object to the pulling and pinching that you've done to yours.  I wouldn't call you muscular because I don't see muscles.  If I didn't know about the stats that you did post I would tell you to take up weight lifting...instead I'd work on getting your menstrual cycle back first.

What happened to embracing or at least suffering through the normal growth stages from childhood to awkward adolescence to the various forms of adulthood?  What is with the perception that it is wrong to be yourself at whatever stage of growth you're in?  Part of the charm of being 16 is that so many of us remember our own teen years when we see someone at that age...while most of us are glad to be done with them there are some fond memories and commiseration to be had.