PCOS Diet is here!!

Knicname posted a great post to all of us suffering from PCOS and wanting a diet that works. Here’s the post:

Over the last 7 months I’ve lost 45lbs by keeping a food diary of EVERYTHING I EAT & how much; & slowly substituting fattening food with less fattening food. By decreasing the portions of meals & eating more meals but smaller ones.
Eating nonfat yogurt, soy cheese; lean protein; almonds; bran muffin instead of donut;fish, etc. I still eat birthday cake& a slice of pizza once in a while.

I haven’t really done any exercise. I think my weight lose would be greater if I had exercised, but I had torn a Tendon in my ankle.

Take your weight, divide in 1/2 & that’s the number of oz.s of water you should drink everyday.

No carbonated:Reg or Diet sodas. They add belly fat.

I also take Omega 3 fish oils 1000mg after every meal or snack up to 6000mg/day. Green tea EXTRACT capsules, 1 with each meal also.
They both help you lose weight.
Take a good multi-vitamin/mineral.

It is really heartening to read of someone with PCOS actually losing weight!

Metformin can help you lose weight!

This is the second time I’ve heard this, but this time there are studies and links to studies to back this up. On this page there is a list of studies about the effectiveness of using Metformin for PCOS. A side benefit is quite a bit of weight loss too.

The crazy thing is that Metformin has been shown to help with mental conditions as well. Wow. Crazy stuff. There is also the top three side effects caused by Metformin listed as well. Now I know why you can’t have alcohol while on this. It can substantially increase your risk of getting lactic acidosis which is fatal. Now why can’t they print that on the medicine bottle? Instead of the generic DON’T DRINK ALCOHOL WHILE ON THIS MEDICATION which does nothing to stop people, they should tell us the reason like DON’T DRINK ALCOHOL OR YOU WILL DIE PAINFULLY. Seriously.

The main side effect is a decrease in B12. And killer diarrhea which is what I ran into. I have the extended release pills, XR, so I’m very unlucky in that I can’t cut the pills. I’d like to try taking 2 1/2 pills, but you can’t cut the pill! So I’m stuck getting that third pill in. Every time I add it I am in the bathroom sicker than hell 12 times a day. Ugh. I want this miracle weight loss everyone speaks of.

Yummy turkey rice spaghetti sauce meal for 7 points

I managed to make an incredibly tasty meal without burning anything, setting the stove on fire or putting too much seasonings in! I even more stunned that I didn’t even use a recipe.

I made brown rice which is 3 weight watcher points for 1 cup.
1 jar of Ragu chunky mushroom and green pepper 2 points for 1/2 cup.
2 green peppers
Fresh ground turkey.
Balsamic olive oil and grilling seasoning

I browned the turkey with grilling seasoning sprinkled on it. I got the seasoning from Sam’s Club. I heated up the spaghetti sauce in another pan till the turkey was all cooked, then poured it on the turkey. Cut up 2 green peppers and added it to the pan along with drizzling olive oil over it all. Put it on medium.

I had 1 cup of brown rice and 1 cup of the meat/sauce mixture for a total of 6/7 points. It could be 6 as I don’t think I had that much spaghetti sauce. But I went with 7 just to be safe.

It was amazingly delicious. Really really good! And very filling. In the old days I’d probably help myself to another serving because it tasted so good. Instead I had a skinny cow chocolate peanut butter ice cream sandwich for 3 points. That also was amazingly good. First time I had ever tried the Skinny Cow. What an amazingly yummy meal!!

Don't eat the bread! Wild cravings occur!

I know with PCOS you need to pretty much follow Atkins, South Beach Diet or Fat Flush Plan. All are low carb eating plans. It’s those pesky carbs that kill us. Even starchy vegetables are bad.

I started Weight Watchers last Wednesday for the accountability. When you have to go somewhere (it’s 2 minutes from where I work) and weigh in, the leader knows your name, there are others that have lost a lot of weight, then you get inspired and you stick with it. I’ve tried online only plans, but there was no accountability. Plus the weight watchers community boards are the most helpful of any place I’ve seen and I’ve tried dietwatch, ediet, sparkpeople.

One thing the 100+ board helped me figure out is that eating bread made me immediately starving to death. It is the craziest thing but if I don’t eat the bread, I’m fine. I can eat my points for the day and get through it just fine. But if I eat a whole wheat bagel or multi grain piece of bread, the extreme starvation kicks in and I have a heck of a time. Isn’t it crazy? Even if the bread is 1 point it just kills me.

So I think it’s a PCOS or insulin resistance thing. So from here on out I’m going to eat no bread. I’m still trying the 0 point whole grain tortillas. If I don’t eat them for one day and do better, then those will go as well.

Metformin liquifies my intestines

I’m sure you really didn’t want to know that, but there you have it. I’ve been trying to take the 3rd pill of Metformin for a few months now, but every time I try I end up in the bathroom losing 10 pounds of water. I have the diarrhea so bad that I get completely dehydrated.

I’m sure that taking only 2 pills is not making the Metformin as effective as it could be. Maybe it’s not working at all without that 3rd pill. I don’t want to try and take it again though. I mean it is hell!

Excessive facial hair with PCOS

You know what I really hate about PCOS? The facial hair. I didn’t used to have a lot of facial hair but then it started growing and bam! Now I actually have to wax or pluck or shave above my lip, my chin, jawline. I haven’t done anything about my cheeks but this is ridiculous! What kind of horrible thing is this for a woman to grow hair there? I’m blonde so it’s not as bad as someone with dark hair. But you can still tell I have very long hair on my chin. It’s horrible.

Polycystic Ovaries Symptoms by Dr Dach

Dr. Dach has a really good page on PCOS. I didn’t know that PCOS used to be rare and now 6-10% have it. It’s sad because it’s an embarrassing medical problem and so many don’t know they have it. I didn’t know until I got a pamphlet in the mail for the former home owner. For years I battled the huge abdomen, acne all over and facial hair. I thought I just was cursed. Nope, it’s PCOS. Of course that seems like a curse.

Polycystic ovaries symptoms are:
no periods
no ovulation
Weight gain, obesity
excessive hair growth, male pattern
Insulin resistance (pre-diabetes)
Acne
Male-pattern baldness
Multiple small ovarian cysts on sonogram
darkening of the skin at the nape of the neck and under arms

I have all of those symptoms though some didn’t show up till just last year. That’s when I went to a different ob/gyn and asked again about PCOS. This doctor actually listened to me, got tests and said due to the symptoms and test results I have it and need to take Metformin. My acne is pretty much gone and the hair growth has slowed down.

Weight Watcher Points Restaurants & Points Calculator

Ok so I bombed today again. Actually today is worse than yesterday.

I looked up how many Weight Watchers points at restaurants today using Dotti’s Weight Loss zone and decided to eat at Jimmy John’s. The Turkey Tom was 13.5 points and I figured there would be less points with the whole grain bread. Wrong. 15 points for a sandwich! But at the time 13.5 sounded ok, but 15 was way over the line. How crazy is that? Half my points used up on one sandwich. The really bad thing is that I was starved still! STARVED.

Actually that was the name of today. STARVED. I was weak, sleepy, starving, light headed all day. It was torture. I don’t know if it’s because my eating is cut by more than half now, or what. But I’m having a really hard time adjusting to these weight watcher points.

I blew breakfast running out the door with a frozen breakfast sandwich. 9 points. Ate apples but still starving. So ate 1/2 a Valentine’s Day cookie for 2 points. Then the Jimmy John sandwich for 15. At the pickle which had 0 points. A small cookie at the bank as again I was starved and going to gnaw my arm off. Ate a donut with frosting after work on way home as again I was so starving and light headed I didn’t think I could drive. Casey’s was a few seconds from work. It just did not go well today.

I did get groceries after I took a nap. I don’t why I’m so tired now too. Is it due to eating less? I took my points calculator slider thing to the store and figured out points for things. I have a lot of food now. And I have frozen meals for 5 points. I can eat that and several apples and still not equal 15 points! I’ll never make that mistake again.

Weight Watchers Does Help Insulin Resistance

I went to my first Weight Watchers meeting today. In their book it does say that scientific studies showed it to help with insulin resistance. So that’s good. That was one thing I was really worried about. I didn’t want to get there and find out that I couldn’t be low glycemic too. But I can!

There’s the core plan and flex points plan. The core plan is low glycemic, the flex plan allows you to choose. But you can still choose what to eat. So you can be low glycemic if you want, or spring to go out. I bought the extra book about dining out. I eat out a lot for lunch and dinner and I want to stick to my points.

I think people that join Weight Watchers thinking just doing the points or being at the meetings will make them lose weight, will be disappointed. You have to do the work yourself. You have to plan out your meals or at least have an idea so you don’t blow all your points early on and have none left for the rest of the day.

I tried losing weight myself. I went to a nutritionist, a dietician, tried sparkpeople.com, dietwatch.com, ediets.com. I tried diets out of books. But on the third day, or second week when you don’t want to do it, you have nothing good to eat and you’re starved, out the diet goes. No one will know except you and if you don’t care, then who cares!

So that’s why I joined Weight Watchers and am going to weekly meetings. It’s the accountability. People know. The people at work even know now. And it was very inspiring to see people get their 5 pound stars. Two people got 50 medals. One guy lost 5 more pounds to make it 132 pounds he’s lost. The leader lost 80 pounds 30 years ago and kept it off for 30 years! I’m really glad I went.

Polycystic Ovary Diet Setback

Ok it’s not exactly a polycystic ovary diet setback, well yeah it is. I didn’t go to the first Weight Watchers meeting because right as I was going to leave, one of our clients sent us Pizza Hut pizza for lunch as a thank you. Free food. So I stayed. Hence the reason I need Weight Watchers.

I don’t know how their plans work but I sure hope they include something for insulin resistance that goes with PCOS. Low carb with lots of fiber is what I think I need, from what I’ve been reading. South Beach Diet and Fat Flush Plan and also the Perricone Prescription would all work for PCOS. But you do those plans on your own. Hence the reason I need Weight Watchers.

It sounds like such an easy plan to just not eat things that mess up your insulin resistance. But it is. It’s really hard to change your eating when you’re eating for emotional reasons and don’t want to punish yourself by not eating your comfort food. Ugh. I really hope Weight Watchers addresses emotional eating.