An apparatus and a method for sender-initiated credit recovery in a closed-loop credit based flow control system, includes assigning a number of credits to a sender unit in the credit based flow control system. The method also includes decrementing a credit count in the sender unit in response to the sender sending data to the receiver and incrementing the credit count in the sender unit in response to receiving returned credits from the receiver unit. The method also includes determining if a loss or gain in the number of credits in the credit based flow control system has occurred and adjusting the credit count based on the determined loss or gain.