Cycle lengthening / missing periods from exercising and strength training
Looking for advice!!!
I’m wondering if anyone has had a similar experience, because this is stressing me out a lot.
A bit of background: as a child I was overweight and never really exercised. In high school I started working out (mostly Pilates and home strength workouts) and paying more attention to my diet.
After about 3–4 years, I decided to focus more seriously on body recomposition / toning rather than just losing weight, so I joined a gym. At first I was training 4x/week for around 45 minutes, and everything seemed fine.
But once I started lifting heavier and doing longer, more intense sessions (around 3x/week for 90 minutes), my cycle started getting longer and longer, until eventually I lost my period completely for 6 months.
That scared me, so I stopped training. My period came back about 9 months later.
After that, I returned to home workouts. When I only did yoga, everything was fine. But every time I introduce strength training again, my cycle gets longer.
For the past 2 years I’ve been consistently doing home strength workouts (3x/week, around 45 min) and things seemed stable.
But in the last 2 months I started boxing — only once a week for 1 hour — and now my cycles have suddenly become much longer again (34 days and now 40 days).
For context:
- I’m 160 cm / 55 kg
- My weight is stable (I’m not losing weight)
- I eat well and sleep well
- I generally feel GREAT mentally and physically when training harder
- I’m not underweight (most of my fat is stored around my stomach)
- My cycles have never been perfectly regular, usually anywhere between 23–30 days
What confuses me is that my body seems to react badly to increased training intensity even though:
- I’m eating enough
- I’m sleeping well
- I feel physically good
- my weight stays stable
This is really stressing me out because I’m scared of losing my cycle again, and I absolutely do not want that to happen.
Has anyone experienced this? Did you figure out why your body reacted this way? And most importantly: should I stop boxing? It’s hard to imagine “reducing it” because I literally only do it once a week for an hour, and I really enjoy it.
I’d really appreciate hearing if anyone has gone through something similar or has any advice.