I am hardly the one to give anyone advice, since I am still suffering like crazy. That stop smoking binge I went on totally whacked my hormones up! Bye-bye normal periods, hello low hemoglobin! It's at 8.9 as of last week, and after Provera it's probably dropping as we speak. Dr's!! Ugh, what can I say?

With me I developed really early, I remember wearing a B cup in 5th grade. I also remember all my girlfriends getting their "friend" and mine never coming. Finally, when I was almost 14, I got it. It was normal, so to speak. It came on a regular basis and went away after 7 days. It was really painful and heavy though, right from the beginning.

Then, at 15 or so, it began to last longer and longer, and get heavier and heavier. I thought it was supposed to, what did I know? My mom and I never discussed it so I just lived with it. The people I worked with noticed I was turning this beige color and I was really dizzy all the time. Then, I had a car accident with a minor head injury. But my hemoglobin was so low they gave me 2 units of blood. The doctor never could figure out why until I mentioned my period. He almost fell over!! I was put on BCP immediately and stayed on it for 5 years. The weight I put on was blamed on the pill, although I was never skinny to begin with.

When my husband and I decided to try to have a baby, I stopped taking the pill. Boy, why did I do that?? Back to bleeding to death, and my gyno told me "You have PCOS and you'll never have kids without fertility drugs." No explanation of why or what it was, how to treat it, anything. I was crushed. So, I went back on the pill. After all, who could afford fertility drugs? I was 20 years old.

One day I forgot to get the pills refilled, and since I couldn't have kids anyway, I thought it was safe. One month later I found out about my dear daughter! Shock is a minor term! So, I thought everything was straight. Wrong, back to the same pattern. I could go 8 months or more with no sign of it, then it would hit me like a ton of bricks, and last for 6 months or more.

Last year I had a D&C. He wanted to do a hysterectomy but I wouldn't let him. I had heard that a low-carb diet could help, and I wanted to try that. He relented but told me to call him the minute it got out of control again. The good news is, I had a great year. I lost a few pounds, gained a few, etc. But the cycles and the acne and the hair (loss and overgrowth!) were all under control.

So now I'm in the same boat again, and trying to convince my PCP that glucophage could help me. He, of course, wants to put me back on BCP. I've had enough of that!! So, it's an ongoing battle. I wish you all luck, just as I need some too!

Wow, what stories! Thanks for telling them.

Like both of you, I always had painful periods. I had my first period at 11. I'd had the talk with Mom, and also one at school, but I expected red blood. I had black streaks in my underwear. It scared me and embarrassed me, so I hid my underwear in the washer and covered them up with dirty clothes. It happened again. After the third pair, I showed them to Mom because I didn't know what was happening to me. Mom kinda laughed and acted like it was a milestone, but I was just sick about it. I eventually had painful, screaming, gut wrenching periods for years. I begged for a hysterectomy at times. My doctor gave me Motrin and told me to get used to it, it would probably be that way until I had my first child. Not much of a consolation to a girl that age.

I got on birth control pills at 18-19. Periods were finally regular and light! What a relief...but I started getting hairs here and there on my neck. I assumed it was a side effect of the pills. Weight gain...ditto.

I got off the pill at 24 and got pregnant about 6 months later. No signs of infertility, but throughout the pregnancy I gained much more weight than I thought I should have. I increased my food only a bit, but mostly starchy food. The first 3 months I ate a lot of bananas, crackers and brown rice, trying to relieve morning sickness. I gained 15 pounds in that time. No way! By the end of my pregnancy, I was eating a lot of starchy foods and had gained 72 pounds. I also developed brown patches in my armpits and in my groin, and a small one on the back of my neck. I had a few skin tags pop up, one of which was on my lower eyelid. It bothered me so bad I picked it off. Oooh, yuck!

I lost 35 pounds after having Cody, but I gained back about 20 over the next couple of years. I never got the opportunity to try for another child, so I don't know if I was affected by infertility after my pregnancy. I had large fibroid tumors and had a hysterectomy in 1998. That was the year of all of my anxiety problems as well, and between the medication for the tumor and the anxiety and the lack of exercise due to pain, I gained about 30-40 pounds. This put me into depression, and I felt so hopeless for years. I have unsuccessfully dieted for years. I wasn't on a strict diet every day...who could do that for so long at a time? I tried, I gave up, and tried again, etc. I knew something was wrong, but didn't know what. I could live with a few hairs and brown armpits, but something was wrong with the weight loss! It wasn't fair that I ate so much less than other people that were in much better shape than me. If I ate normal, I gained. In late 1999, I went through a divorce and my hair started falling out and I got acne. I thought it was stress. About a year later I found out that it was PCOS. I was so relieved to know what the problem was. I finally had an answer! I was so happy to discover I wasn't a diet failure, there was actually a medical cause and I would find the right way to do it. I would have never put the symptoms together if it weren't for the internet...and probably would have never talked to my gynocologist about all of my non-gyn symptoms.

I have since yo-yoed on a small scale, and finally am finding the real way to lose weight for my condition. Actually, I found the way a year ago, but resisted it. I had been taught for years and years all the low fat ways, and had even lost weight that way before. It took me a year of denial and about 15 extra pounds to realize that baked potatoes and pasta with low fat toppings wasn't doing the trick for me anymore. I've spent the last several months trying to do my own thing, and I sure have screwed up a lot. I combined the 'selling points' of a few diets, and wound up having my low carb cake and eating it, too. Needless to say, I actually gained on LC but now am doing a plan that works! Over the last year my symptoms have decreased a bit, all except for the ovary pain. I am hoping with the rest of my weight loss, I will have a more substantial decrease in symptoms.


Wake up, I'm done!

I started my period at age 11 and had problems from them. I've been on birth control pills since '92. I have some PCOS symptoms.

Last summer I went to an endocrinologist because of sweating around my hairline and was wondering if it has to do with my thyroid, I was already on medicine. Well, after two appointments and having to write him a letter I finally got a response. Many things were ruled out but I'm insulin resistant. He told me to go on a low carb diet and exercise and also take the thyroid he prescribed for me..Duh, I was already on thryroid medicine..so I gave up on him and went to my MD. My MD redid the thyroid test, I stayed on the same medicine and he recommened WW. Well, I didn't start WW until January after going to the ER with chest pains, which turned out fine.

I started reading stuff about PCOS and realized that I have many of the symptoms. In June I went to a new GYN. He needed me to do blood tests to see what my cholesterol and triglyceride levels were. Well, even those my triglycerides went down 156 pts. they are still over 200 so...he won't give me a new prescrip for birth control pills. We talked about going on Metformin but I decided to wait and see what happens since I'm losing weight and exercising. So, we'll see what happens next week when my "friend" is due.

Hya,

Well im new here and relitivley new to PCOS also...here is a little about me and my journey to and through the PCOS struggle...

I started my periods when i had just turned 12 years old and it was so very painful but i thought that everyone was the same so i just carried on with the pain killers and a couple of days of school here and there...after my first period i went 8 months without another but doctors reasured us that irregular periods were normal at that age and they should straighten out by the time i was 16.

Well 16 came and went and still no explaination of my painful and VERY irregular periods...the longest i have gone without having one is 12 months. I approached my doctor with my mum and explained that we were worried as my mother had to have an ovary removed due to cysts...the doctor did some blood tests and said that they were a little abnormal but nothing to worry about really.

I have battle with my weight every since i can remember and was always a 'chubby' child, I was always teased at school about my weight and my excessive hair growth on my arms etc My weight gets me down, i hate it!!

Then last year i started getting pains in my sides round about where my ovaries would be and i managed with it for a while, went for my regular smear tests etc and they always came back fine so i thought it was normal...i finally couldent stand it any longer and went to the doctor, who luckily was a gyno too and he told me what he thought it would be with my history and that was the start of my PCOS diagnosis.

I was finally officaly diagnosed in June this year and feel so much better for it, they recomended that i should start a new LOW CARB diet and excersize and carry on taking my pill (which i have been on for a long time anyway).

So now where is stand is that i have NO cysts at present becuase i have been on the pill for years and they have told me to come of the pill at least a year before TTC and that we may need 'help' with concieving but at least i know where i stand with my own body as such!

I still get very down about things and my weight is such a problem to me! But i have a wonderful boyfriend who has supported me over the last 2 years with my weight and confidence problems etc

So thats my PCOS story to date

Well, my story isn't really much of a story really, I had alwasy thought this was normal anyway! I got my period, on cue, at 13 and it was a little light. I didn't see it again till I was 14, but I really wasn't too worried since I was told it would take for me to get to 16 to straighten it out. It never really did. I would have cycles that would last anywhere from 3 weeks to 8 months at a time. I went on BCP, regulated my cycle and forgot about it. I got off BCP when I was about 24 and went through about 4 years of irregular periods until I went to Korea. The Korean diet (as I was to discover later on) is in essence low carb. My periods were finally regular. A year later I discovered I was pg with my daughter and I felt blessed since I was worried with such irregular cycles I might not ever get pg.

Now this is really where my PCOS story begins. After the birth of my daughter I discovered that my hormones were in complete imbalance. I was diagnosed with post partum depression, later with anxiety disorder. I have struggled with this debhilitating illness for 2 years, and yes, I had about a year of denial. Meanwhile, my dh and I decided to have another baby and began ttc. When it was clear that my newly diagnosed illness was affecting my periods, my doctor referred me to an obgyn. He was the one that told me I had PCOS and did the bloods to confirm it. I wasn't shocked or bothered, I had suspected as much since I decided to start low carbing and the term PCOS kept popping up. The more I read about it the more "ah-ha's" I got.

Different from what most people I have met, I never had a weight issue until after I had my daughter. I was always thin actually, I modelled for several years in my teens. I got larger as I grew more "womanly", but never overweight. My pregnancy basically lit the fuse for the chemical imbalances I experience today. I am currentlt overweight by about 65 pounds, due in large part by the meds I take to counter balance my anxiety disorder, the PCOS, and insulin resistance.

Right now, I am on 100mg of Clomid and actively trying for another child. I am being monitored every other day with blood tests and ultrasounds. I am determined to make this work and I am thankful that I already had a system of wellness and support in place before I found out about the PCOS. I am undeterred, I am very well aware of the challenges I face and I know that I will get there. I have a lot of good people surrounding me, all willing to support and cheer me on. It is a long and arduoous road I face, the road of infertility. You know, it's funny--I can deal with being insulin resistant, I can deal with having anxiety disorder, I can even deal with having PCOS, but it's the infertility that really hurts the most. But I'm strong and determined and I know that what I'm doing now will help me in the long run.

So that's my story--next?

I started my period when I was 12 and instantly had problem periods. I was irregular thoughout my teens. By the time I was 21 I was only having a period about 3-4 times a year. I had normal pap smears and my gyno never seemed concerned about it. It was not until I changed gyno's at 28 that someone finally made the diagnosis. I was not ovulating and had'nt had a period in nearly a year. So far the only medications anyone will prescribe me are birth control pills. I can't take them because they raise my blood pressure. I am newly in the UK so I don't know what else is available here, but a few months ago I started taking a combination of evening primrose and agnus castus(Vitex) Its really helped, my periods have become like clockwork. I would be interested to know if anyone else has had results with herbal remedies? I am especially concerned about my pcos because I am 32 and am starting to be awoken by my bio-clock in the middle of the night...LOL Its so great to be able to post on this board, I don't know anyone who has it and nobody understands what I go through dealing with it.

Here's mine.

All of my girlfriends started their periods in Jr. High. We all read the Judy Blume books and couldn't wait to start. I was the last one. Now, I can't even remember when I started because I finally lied to my girlfriends and mom. I told them all I started at 13 just to get them to stop asking me everyday!. I was going full speed at 15, though.

During puberty however, I gained quite a bit of weight. I was always a skinny kids (so skinny that strangers would offer me food because they thought I wasn't eating) then, I got these giant boobs and gained all that weight. It was weird. I gained so fast, that I got stretch marks all over my body.

Anyway, I never had a problem with my periods. I could set my watch to them. They were short and easy and I never even bothered to track them on a calendar like all my friends did, because they came like clockwork. I never had any of the "female" problems either. No cramps. No heaviness. Nothing, except some acne and irritability the week before. I never could understand these girls wo stayed home in bed with a hot pad on their period. I was like, "What's the big deal?"

Over the past ten years, I have gained about 100 pounds. I just attributed it to age (and actually I didn't realize I had gained that much because it happened over a long period of time)

And then last year, my periods stopped. I had one really heavy one last Oct. Then, nothing. I didn't even realize they were missing at first because I never really thought much about them at all. But I was incredibly moody and irritated and almost left my husband and dumped all of my friends because I was so *****y all of a sudden (well, I am pretty much that way anyway but this was worse than usual) and I felt like I couldn't trust my emotions because they changed so quickly. I even yelled at my boss a few times [gasp! what would men do if we told them what we really thought? I wonder!]

Then, I went to my GP who didn't even give me an exam, called the amenorrhea "stress induced", and gave me some Provera. The Provera forced one period and that was all. It didn't work again after that.

So, I found a Gyna and diagnosed me with PCOS before she even examined me. She asked if I wanted an US to confirm it and I agreed.

Now, the US showed nothing and I am waiting for the glucose tests. She gave me BCP in the meantime and I think that is how she plans on treating me, although I can speculate yet.

Meanwhile I wonder if she just lumped me into the diagnosis du-jour category and and I am wondering if all this is for real. Actually, I don't even know right now if I care one way or another. I wrote another post on this subject, but I really don't want to have to take meds from now until the day I die. Yuk!

Betty

I started my period at age 8. Yes girls age 8. From the day I started it, it was horrible. I had very bad cramps and gushed blood. From the time I hit 6th grade, they put me on Birth Control pills and I was on pain meds for my intence pain. I was not a very heavy girl but since my JR Highschool years have steadly gained wieght. The doc told me I had bad cysts (sp?) and not even the BC made them better. Just something I have had to live with.

I have been preg. 3 times and had 2 great girls. I had no problem with that. But after having the girls, everything got worse. My moods have been horrible and I have gotten facial hair, acne, and have gotten tired. My gyn (although very nice and accepting of me) only ever gave me BCP. Some made my period worse. I would just stop taking them.

Well that leads us to today. I finely made a doc appt with my fam. doc and after looking at my chart and asking some questions said she is almost positive that I have PCOS. Since I already know I have cysts she isn't going to do an ultra sound but I go tomorrow for blood work. She put me on the right BCP and an antibiotic for the acne. She said that next month if my blood work doesn't show a problem with my sugar or thyroid then she is going to give me another med. (it's mentioned here quite a bit) She has also mentioned that she has this as well and since she started her practice in Europe (25years ago) she has been dealing with this for longer then US doc. So I am very happy with her. She said that in a year or so, if meds don't work then she is going to have me speek to some one about getting my tummy stapled. (that is what she ended up doing) But she assured me that we would get things worked out. It made me so happy. Now I can tell my husband and family that it's not all my fault that I'm not loosing wieght.

Well that's my story.
Bella23