Pregnancy or Stress

I am a 20 year old female. Healthy except I have occasionally had UTI's and two and a half years ago I had a ruptured appendix. I am not on medication or drugs. I don't smoke. I do drink alcohol. Sometimes I drink excessively on a Friday or Saturday once a week but the rest of the week none. Lately I have been physically experiencing slight nausea, small headaches, light-headed (especially after standing up from sitting or laying), a weird feeling in my stomach- sometimes to do with nausea and sometimes just a flipping/ butterfly feeling. This past week I've had trouble sleeping at night (tossing and turning until about 5am). I've also been burping a lot (mostly after meals) and my appetite has also been going crazy- sometimes I'm starving and meals don't satisfy the hunger, sometimes I'm not interested in food at all. I usually work out about 5 days a week and this week my usual work out felt exhausting. My period is about a week late now. I've had my usual monthly acne break out but no sign of my period. I've been having hints of cramps but they're nothing like my usual period cramps. Emotionally I've been off- At the beginning of the week I was feeling extremely down/ negative and I was even crying a bit but then by the end of the day I would feel inexplicably positive and upbeat. Yesterday, I spent the entire day laughing uncontrollably and sometimes it was over things that weren't that funny. I am always easily entertained but this was abnormal. I took a pregnancy test a few days ago and it was negative. I found out some negative news about my family about 6 days ago and I'm wondering if stress could be causing all this? I've also heard that I should take another pregnancy test in a few days as the hormone levels may not have been strong enough to come back positive when I took the test. I am so confused by all of this and just want an answer. I am travelling and cannot afford to see a doctor. I don't get home for a month so I would love advice or an opinion.

Multiple Symptoms

Gosh, your emotions are clearly all over the place! There are so many reasons how you can have these multiple symptoms, but the two most likely are pregnancy and emotions. Pregnancy would nicely tie up your symptoms of nausea, light headedness, fluctuating mood, loss of periods etc and you could be right that you may have had a falsely negative test. I would agree with you that you should repeat your test.

Emotion in the form of stress can also give symptoms similar to yours and you mention the negative family news that you have had recently which may encompass this as well as the fact you have been away from your family for a while. Not having a period can lead to mental turmoil in a women as well with symptoms of premenstrual syndrome.

There are also other medical causes for your symptoms, too numerous to discuss in detail. Conditions such as hormonal conditions (examples would include diabetes, Cushing’s disease, Addison’s disease) and metabolic conditions such as hypercalcaemia (high calcium) are to name just a few. You can learn more about these conditions by using the search facility on the site.

You may well find an easy answer, perhaps with a second pregnancy test coming back positive or maybe your period starting and the inevitable tension being relieved. Maybe going home will unlock this, but if none of the above happens you should seek medical attention when you get home. Good luck.




My name is Dr Peter Thatcher MBBS, MRCPI and I am a consultant physician and gastroenterologist in the UK. I have an interest in internet based medicine and administer this site in my spare time. I hope you find this site useful and informative. If you have any suggestions, please Contact Me or if you would like to comment on my site, please do so by Clicking Here. If you like the site and would like to make a donation to support what I am doing please do so by Clicking Here. Thank you for visiting and please drop by again!