PCOS, my story, aka. every doctor acts like this?

DISCLAIMER!: I`m not a doctor, medical professional or and expert on this topic. I`m just sharing my personal experiences that might help others feel connected and less alone in their medical journey.

Doesn`t matter your gender, nationality, we all know that being a woman isn`t rainbows and unicorns. I`m a woman in her mid-twenties and there are things that I wasn`t ready for. One of those was PCOS, but more like how medical professionals looked at it and formed an opinion about it or more about me having it.

I have been struggling with very bad period cramps since I got my first one. I didn`t think much about it, because my mother did too, so I thought it is how it`s supposed to be. But shocker, it was not.

I was 16, when I had to go to a gynaecologist, because I had issues with my period. It didn`t want to stop. Even though, I was used to loosing blood in a monthly basis, but when it doesn`t want to stop for weeks straight, you know something is not okay.

When I got there, their firs question was if I was pregnant, which was an expected question. But I was very sure, I wasn`t. They weren`t convinced, they were “Are you suuuuure?! How sure are you?! Really?!”. They went on until I set the record straight, that I was still a virgin. That convinced them enough to move past this dilemma. After some tests and ultrasound, they found cysts. Plenty of them. They also figured out that my specific issue made me reeeeaaaally anaemic. But even after these, they dismissed me with the explanation, that I should come back if it goes on for another couple of weeks. Oh, and about the cysts. They told me that they are causing everything, the pain, the issue, but it should go away after I get pregnant.

I`m not sure that it was the most comforting thing to say to a scared 16 years old, who is in pain and has been bleeding for week, that just wait and get pregnant…

Flash forward, about a year later. I`m still in pain in the monthly basis, still anaemic, but at least my period is back to its normal routine. One day woke up with really bad abdomen pain, and I knew it was not period cramps. Other than the pain, I couldn`t stand straight and I was nauseous. Couldn`t eat and function. I went to the doctor prepared with my previous gynaecology papers. Same circles with the questions, same tests, but different results. They couldn`t find the cysts… I told them that they were there and it`s not like they got bored of me and just left. They told me that probably they exploded in me. THEY DID WHAT NOW?!

Apparently, it happens… And can you guess what would fix it?! Me getting pregnant. And just as a clarification, this was a different doctor than the year before. As a matter of fact, I have seen at least 3 different medical professionals at that point and their only advice was to get pregnant…

And here we are about 10 years later. I was in pain again and this time, it was different. It always came a week before my periods for months. So, it meant that I had period cramps for 2 weeks. Amazing! Because of the pandemic, only a private practice was able to give me an appointment in a decent time. A week later, I went for my appointment got trough the same routine questions about me not being pregnant and such. But this was the first time they did more tests than the bare minimum and finally, officially got diagnosed with PCOS. But, they also found other issues, things that have been there before, but never were cared for. Things previous doctors said, “You will grow out of it! It will go away in a couple of years”. Well… apparently I didn`t grow out of it and it didn`t go away in the last 10 years.

According this private practice doctor, the cysts, the pain was all caused by my PCOS since the very beginning. Well… I guess, good to know. Finally, the answer wasn`t “just get pregnant and it will go away”. But for some reason, he also dived deep into the topic. He was asking me if I was single, and that it would be a shame if I never had kids. I`m not sure, why would my relationship status be any of my doctor`s business… I mean, he just told me that I have an illness that can`t be cured, just the symptoms can be treated. I might never be physically able to have kids and my relationship status is the issue?! Hmmmm…

So, here we are now. I have been having PCOS for a while, but it took over 10 years to diagnose me with it. Why?! That`s a good question. Why was the answer always “just get pregnant”?! Even better question. But now, that I finally know what I could have / should have known 10 years ago, things finally make much more sense. The pain, the weight gain, the hair loss, the bad acne, the working out, but seeing absolutely no results,… It`s all part of it. Until now, I thought that I was just fat and that won`t chance, because of my luck. Now I know, that I`m fat, because I`m sick. Can`t change it, but I can learn to live with it. I can treat the symptoms and I can adjust.

If it wasn`t rainbows and unicorns to be a woman in general, than imagine being a woman with PCOS. Let`s just say, it`s definitely not a walk in the park.