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How to delay your period – This question is often asked by women planning a trip or other important circumstance (such as a wedding) where menstruation may be a problem or an obstacle. Delaying your period is also important for women who are actively involved in sports, including professional sportswomen, whose period may make it difficult to compete and affect athletic performance, especially if monthly bleeding is associated with pain and other ailments. Fortunately, there are methods that can help you delay your period by a few days (you can also use these methods to make it faster).
Pharmacological methods for delaying the period
The timing of menstrual bleeding is easiest to delay with the help of hormonal pills, popularly known as birth control pills. The hormones contained in these drugs inhibit the processes that occur naturally in the woman’s reproductive tract and cause the lack of ovulation as well as the growth and exfoliation of the uterine mucosa, which in the natural cycle is excreted from the body every month (if it fails to fertilize) in the form of menstruation. Taking hormonal pills means that monthly bleeding is minimal or completely absent.
If a woman is using contraception and taking monophasic pills, the method of delaying the period is that there is no pause between consecutive cycles and after finishing the tablets for one cycle, the tablets for the next cycle are immediately started. After taking the last tablet from the strip, the next day, at the same time, take a tablet from the next strip. In this way, bleeding is prevented (if there is a break between blisters of several days, bleeding will occur despite the lack of ovulation).
Depending on how long you want to delay your period, you should take hormonal (single-phase) pills without taking a break. In this way, the occurrence of menstruation can be completely eliminated, even for several months. Then you should take a week break in taking medication – then bleeding will occur. However, hormonal tablets can not be dosed on their own – before any situation in which it is desired to delay the period, consult a gynecologist. In the blister pack of 28 contraceptive pills, some of the pills do not contain hormones and these should be omitted – the doctor will indicate exactly the dosage. Bleeding can also occur in spite of the constant use of hormones, but will be minimal in this case.
In the case of two- and three-phase hormone pills, delaying the period with them is a bit more complicated and also requires consulting a doctor.
You can also delay the period by using contraceptive patches – then you also do not make a break between applying the patches.
If a woman does not use hormonal contraception and wants to delay her period, she should visit a gynecologist at least 2-3 months before the event that prompts her to make this decision. The doctor will then select the appropriate hormonal drugs.
Natural methods to delay your period
The period cannot be delayed by natural methods, it is only possible pharmacologically, through the use of hormone pills, which must always be under the supervision of a doctor.
Some ladies argue that your period can be delayed by taking large amounts of vitamin C and by drinking lime. Unfortunately, this method is not very effective and can seriously harm yourself – taking too high doses of vitamin C can lead to acidification of the body and, for example, difficulty urinating. Stress and exhaustion, recommended as a natural method for delaying the period, are also not XNUMX% effective, and although stress may delay or even stop the period, due to its general harmfulness (stress), it is not recommended as a method to delay menstruation .
Also, drinking infusions from plants such as parsley or horse chestnut has a low effectiveness in delaying the period. Drinking parsley extract has a beneficial effect on the body, because the folic acid it contains has a hematopoietic effect, but it does not delay the period.
In the case of distant trips, climate change itself can contribute to period delays. However, if we want to be sure that menstruation will not occur exactly when we are least comfortable, the only proven method is taking hormonal pills under the supervision of a doctor.