Dr. Tamsin Lewis: Regaining Menstruation, Breastfeeding for Athlete Moms, Postpartum Performance and More

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On this episode with Dr. Tamsin Lewis of Curoseven, we dive deeper into female issues, how to be a healthy fertile female athlete and Q&A:

• Tawnee shares personal details about regaining her menstruation once she made the decision to stop being such a hard-hitting athlete, and the time it took for her periods to normalize.
  • The value of tracking your female health and cycles.
• Tamsin shares more of her story from pro triathlete to regaining health and her pregnancy.
• Depending on the situation, normalizing one’s period after years of amenorrhea can take time, even years.
• A crucial variable in proper HPA axis function and healthy hormones for a normal cycle is energy availability (how much you have once you subtract energy expenditure from energy intake).
• Questions from female athletes:
• Competitive female endurance athlete wants to start a family with her husband. She recently stopped taking the pill and hasn’t gotten a period back yet. Is it normal for a woman’s body to take time to readjust after being on the pill for so long or is there potentially a deeper issue to address?
  • Are there certain tests to determine if there are underlying problems?
  • Scale back on exercise (and if so to what extent)?
  • Supplementing? Thorne Basic Prenatal and what else to be healthy before baby?
• Breastfeeding while training and racing an Ironman – are there special considerations? Was very active during pregnancy, so this is not too much of a new extreme.
• Bouncing back to great fitness postpartum – faster than before! But what can female athlete moms expect as far as performance after weaning and hormones regulating?
• Does breastfeeding or not breastfeeding (i.e. the hormones) influence performance?