Thank you, Omega...
I think I've been relatively lucky with PCOS -- I had a doctor who diagnosed me when I was 19, but she never told me I had PCOS. She just put me on BCP, and those worked -- and since I was a girl, I obviously was obsessed with not gaining weight, so I was okay -- it was easy to do in college.
Now, over a decade later, it's not so easy, and for years, I lived in denial that I had PCOS. I had people tell me that I was heavy because I ate too much and exercised too little, without realizing that I have always been a very active person. But of course, it just seemed that if I did as much exercise as I claimed, I couldn't possibly be heavy.
This belief was so strong, I believed it myself. Even as my sister was diagnosed with PCOS and my father a diabetic, I still believed that nothing like this could touch me.
It couldn't happen to me. I just ate too much, exercised too little.
I think it really began to hit last year -- when I signed up at this forum because my doctor insisted I lose weight and she gave me a few months to do it in, and I came back to her office weighing MORE than my original appointment.
I had an ultrasound made, the technician saw the infamous "pearl necklace"... I went to a nutritionist, had a personal trainer, and worked out twice a day... and yet... no a single
pound lost.
That's when I realized I was probably over my head and things weren't right in my
body.
I finally decided to go to a counselor, because clearly I must have an eating disorder if I can't lose weight with all that exercise.
The conclusion?
Not eating disorder, but probably severe denial that my
body doesn't do well with carbohydrates and that I need to change my
diet to something that I can:
1) Live with for the rest of my life, because PCOS won't ever be "cured"
and
2) That it's low in carbohydrates, especially refined ones, because my
body doesn't do anything with those carbohydrates except make them immediately into
fat and carefully put that
fat on my belly.
(Oh, I remember the days when my belly was flat -- I was the envy of my mother, my sister, and friends... now? I look like the Pillsbury Dough Boy)
I think I can the exercise part right. The real struggle is the
diet. I've never been able to restrict my food intake for any lengthy amount of time, which is why I recognize that I need to make a plan for my life -- not a "diet."
This is how I need to eat daily, forever, rather than just for "now."
I guess this has turned into a diary entry, and a response, Omega.
Thank you for telling me who else is struggling with this. I hope that I can also be a success story and that I can find the right combination of exercise and
diet that work for me and lasts me for life. I don't want to be on the road to diabetes -- although I know I'm on it -- and I want to have a
body that somewhat resembles who I am inside, rather than what I see now in pictures.
Bleh.
This weekend I had someone tell me that I needed to lose weight. Duh. Like I don't know that. Tell me something useful.
