I come from a long line of diabetics. I guess Diabetes has been ingrained in my family for generations, after generations. The male generations, that is. Only the males in my family have ever gotten diabetes, until me. My history with diabetes is not an easy one, and it certainly did not come by way of poor eating habits and a lack of exercise. My life has been marred with endocrine disorder after endocrine disorder, with the more predominant ones being Hypothyroidism and Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome or PCOS. Particularly, PCOS is an illness in which the body's fat fails to communicate with the hormones leptin and insulin, causing the body to produce massive amounts of insulin to deal with food intake, and wrecking havoc along the way. We all know the side effects of too much insulin: weight gain, insulin resistance... and Type 2 Diabetes. With PCOS, you also get serious damage to your ovaries, infertility, cysts, facial hair, hair loss, mood swings, cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, skin tags, acathonsis nigricans, you name it. There is NO known cause for PCOS. It causes weight gain, and not the other way around. PCOS took me from a thin, active child to an overweight child, in just a very few years: You can see the hair getting wirier, the weight piling on, and my neck becoming dark, dirty looking, and velvety. I began to look like a boy, with the excessive male hormone.
It has taken me years to control my PCOS, though the weight issues are still a persistent challenge. But here I am... A warrior with Hypothyroidism, PCOS, and now... Diabetes. Only a low carb diet (relative, to whatever my body can tolerate) has been able to help me lose around 70+ lbs.... If this story sounds familiar to you, I URGE you to talk to your Endocrinologist about PCOS. It might be the difference between taking a simple anti-androgen medication, and worsening Diabetic complications. It is not your fault... and it was NEVER your fault. If you struggle with PCOS and Diabetes, like me, please join us at Women with Diabetes and PCOS: A confidential group where we can openly share about our struggles.