First of all, thank you for the awesome posts and great work you do!
I've been actively trying to recover my missing period for 13 months, by eating more and trying to relax.
However, during that time I kept exercising 4x / week (which yields to a maximum of 90 minutes moderate intensity and 30 minutes low-intensity exercise per week), sometimes taking breaks for a few weeks though.
Now I've cut down on exercise, limiting exercise to 2x 30 minutes light bodyweight legs workouts.
I'm convinced I've been eating 2400-2700 (some days ~3000 calories, but rarely there were days when I had ~2000 calories, once in 2-3 weeks I think) calories each day for the past 7 months, including daily and generous carbs (Italian pasta, rice, potatoes, yums, desserts and jam, wheat porridges and bread), a lot of red meat such as lamb and beef, fish, seafood, dairy (which I love A LOT!).
However, after getting my recent labs results for the bloodwork I did, I see that my LH is still 2 iu/l, whereas my FSH is 6 iu/l.
My estradiol is very low (24 pg/ml), and my progesterone is also low (0.3 ng/ml).
Do you think I should just keep eating more and relax, or there is something else missing in this puzzle of my menstrual struggles?
I'm not allergic to dairy nor gluten.
Sometimes I feel like I have drops in blood sugar, e.g. after longer periods with no food (for instance, 4.5 hours after breakfast), my hands are shaking and I feel slight lightheadedness too.
Please help me by letting me know whether you have seen cases when your clients had to keep eating even more and really limiting exercise, otherwise their periods didn't come back?
I think I've been eating 100-400g of carbohydrates per day, 120-170 grams of protein (mostly of animal origin), and a DECENT amount of fat.
I drink tea with sugar.
I've also been taking vitex since August, the Now foods vitex + dong quai combination, 2 capsules each morning before breakfast.
I also supplement with Magnesium Glycinate, Glycine, Taurine, L-Tyrosine, collagen and take selenium 100mcg + 600mcg of Solgar kelp iodine every morning.
My testosterone is 0.23 ng/ml.
My cortisol was quite high as well: 23 ug/dl.
Though my prolactin is good: 9 ng/ml.
Also, could the reason for my hypothalamic amenorrhea be exercising in the evening, i.e. when the cyrcadian rythm dictates rather relaxation?