Polycystic Ovary
Syndrome (or PCOS for short), is one of the most common female
endocrine disorders, but the condition is virtually unheard of
outside of the 5 to 10 percent of women who suffer the symptoms of
this distressing complaint.
Women suffering from
PCOS generally don't like to discuss their illness with others
(including myself, this will be the first time I totally open up
publicly about my experience with PCOS), in fact, four out of the
five ladies I spoke to whilst conducting my research were walking the
path completely alone. No help from doctors, not wanting to talk to
family members or friends about it, and on no medication for it.
Nothing. And why should we go it alone? Why should we be embarrassed
about our bodies? Why should we have no help from the doctors? To
some people it may seem like a tiny, minuscule illness. But for some,
it's completely life wrecking.
My symptoms started
when I was around thirteen, I'd always been a chubby kid but as soon
as I hit puberty, I started to realise hair growth in places girls
wouldn't usually have hair (hirsutism), it didn't bother me at first,
I put it down to hormones and thought it would settle down after a
few years. But it gradually got worse and worse, and as I got taller,
I grew out as well, and my weight didn't help the extra hair on my
body either. I spent my school days refusing to do P.E because I was
ashamed of my body. I remember thinking “I really got the short
straw, I'm fat AND hairy”. I hated myself growing up.
As I got older, the
symptoms got worse, and more started appearing; irregular periods, my
hair got thinner, I had oily skin. I soon went to my GP, who put it
all down to me being overweight. So me and my Mum joined Slimming
World when I was fifteen, I lost a couple of stone and was healthier
than ever. But over the years my weight just crept back up, and
before I knew it, I was back where I started. I knew as I got older,
it would be harder to lose the weight but I just stopped caring, I
had it in my head that I'd never be thin so what would be the point?
And I'm not alone. It's
saddening to realise that so many women feel this way.
“The doctors [sic]
just shrug it off. I've been there many times with it and they say
'lose weight'. It would be different if they were in our
situation...I wear different clothes, mainly clothes that cover my
body, my friends don't know what it is and it prevents me from
socialising with the opposite sex. Doctors don't understand how it
actually affects us having PCOS. No one does, apart from those
suffering.”
PCOS is thought to be
one of the leading causes of female infertility, due to the ovaries
not producing all of the hormones needed for an egg to fully mature,
and also producing male hormones (this is also the reason that women
with PCOS may have an irregular or absent menstrual cycle).'You may
have a hard time conceiving' are words that some women dread. And
often, the doctor may start off with this when PCOS is being
diagnosed. In a lot of cases, this is not true. A family friend of
mine was told she couldn't have children due to her PCOS but then
went on to have not one but two healthy kids within two years!
“I was told when I
was nineteen that I wouldn't be able to conceive naturally by a very
unsympathetic male doctor. I discovered four years later that I was
22 weeks pregnant! Completely natural and no intervention at all. To
this day, no one is able to explain how I managed to fall pregnant so
quickly. I've never been able to conceive again, but one miracle is
good enough for me.”
In the future, I hope
for more funding to go towards PCOS research, and that doctors take
us seriously when we tell them we're suffering. But there's one thing
ladies, you are not suffering alone!
Thank you to all of the ladies who helped me with my research and shared their experiences with me, you're all stars!
Links:
Help and support groups for women suffering from PCOS.
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ReplyDeleteThis was a great post Rachel! It's very enlightened to read about yours and other women's struggles with PCOS. I think you're right, people don't necessarily understand he full implications of the illness. Having a chronic incurable illness myself i know how tough it is to know you can never get better just improve symptoms. Really awesome article which was informative and enlightening. I wish you all the best with your health lovely! x
ReplyDeleteSo good to see someone opening up about it publicly. I think I might have it, or at least some of the symptoms, but it's all self diagnosed because my GP just puts it down to my weight.
ReplyDeleteIt's nice to know I'm not alone!