Beating PCOS

Sixteen months ago, I entered the Ms. Chronic Disease of America pageant hosted by The Meanest Mom and was selected as one of the seven finalists. Jana Matthews, the meanest mom herself, has Crohn's Disease and felt it was high time us women with autoimmune issues unite in one hilarious satire of our ailments. My entry was as follows:

“Congratulations! You will have the privilege of being interviewed today by the Editor-in-Chief of Sexy Disease Weekly, the most popular disease tabloid in the world.”

(contestant squeals with excitement)

[everything that follows written by Ms. POS]

SDW: So tell me Miss PCOS, you look A.MAZ.ING and our readers are clamoring to know: what’s your skin care regiment?

Ms PCOS: Okay, I confess. (whispers) Excess androgens.

SDW: Really? You mean, like elevated levels of testosterone?

Ms PCOS: Believe it or not, yes. I totally underestimated the effect testosterone could have for my skin. The excess facial hair and body hair. The acne. The skin tags. The sun spots. If Lancome ever gets hold of this patent, I’ll be a lot less interesting to the paparazzi and I may lose my job (laughs).

SDW: Speaking of the paparazzi, they seem to catch you at the gym frequently. Rumor has it that you work out 2+ hours per day, usually twice a day, every day. How is it that you can exercise so much and still maintain that voluptuous figure of yours?

Ms PCOS: Another secret of the testosterone. As my celebrity nutritionist has informed me, my body “stores fat efficiently.” I don’t even have to worry about all-purpose flour, refined sugars, desserts, white bread, chocolate, juice, anything! My body will maintain my fat reserves and increase them just by thinking of a snickerdoodle. AND, I can gain weight by eating fruit before 2 pm, unlike my unfortunate friends. They eat doughnuts for breakfast and chocolate all day long--the poor little things can’t gain a pound. They'll have to work their way up to the ranks of obesity, whereas I don't even have to try. They're victims of circumstance and it's unfair to them.

SDW: Truly. So when did you discover your own good fortune? When did you know this was your chosen path?

Ms PCOS: The turning point in my career was in college when I went from a size 3 to a 10 in less than a year. Seven sizes! I didn't even have to change my eating or exercise habits. I just sort of fell into it, ya know? Not a lot of people have that good fortune.

SDW: Wow. Incredible. With all this good luck, can you even narrow down your journey to the best experience thus far?

Ms PCOS: (enthusiastically) Yes, certainly! The most favorable part of the whole experience was the infertility. Due in part to amenorrhea and anovulation and 73 cysts on my ovaries, I didn’t have to have a child for 5 years. And even after conceiving, the labor was super-easy. The contractions weren't any worse than my usual nether-region pain. I was well-prepared for it, thanks to my body's foresight.

SDW: Everything just came together for you and I don't suspect that to end any time soon. Your future looks so bright--any plans in the works?

Ms PCOS: If I play my cards right, I have a really good shot at breaking into the diabetes scene. Possibly even hypertension, heart disease, uterine cancer, stroke, ovarian cancer...the works!

I may not have been able to beat out Ms. Rheumatoid Arthritis; however, nearly a year and a half later I'm beating PCOS.

The short end of it: Nutrition. Nutrition. Nutrition. Sleep. Exercise. And not the way your doctors, personal trainers, government agencies, and media sites have been telllin' ya!

The long end of it: Eat Paleo. Eat clean. Take some fish oil. Get some rest. Build muscle.

How to do it? More to come.