Dreams can come true… but these ones better not

One of the side effects about Metformin that noone has warned me of is the vivid dreams that have been plagueing me the last six weeks or so. They are seriously beginning to damage my equilbrium.

There are two different kinds. The dreams of horrible deaths of people I love. Recurring, and so vivid that I wake up with tears streaming down my face and my throat raw from crying. And smutty sex dreams so sexy that… erm I wake up orgasming. Either way, it’s making me rather a disconcerting bedfellow at the moment.

Has anyone else had any experiences like this? The nightmares mean I’m not sleeping brilliantly – it’s like my brain doesn’t want to switch off. The bags under my eyes have bags. But, yannow, the smut dreams break things up a bit I suppose.

In other news, I have lost a load of weight which means I have cheekbones for the first time in my adult life. I don’t know how much of this is down to eating properly and going to the gym and how much is Metformin, but I am a 16 on top and bottom for the first time since I was about 14 years old – and down from a 24/22 about a year ago.

I’d feel cheerier except, while I lost a chunk of that before the drugs the fact that the drugs seem to have kickstarted it further makes me feel a bit unworthy about it to be honest. The main impetus for it seems to be that Metformin has utterly killed my appetite. It’s just very rare nowadays for me to actually fancy eating anything special. I am currently the queen of soup and cereal bars. I just can’t summon up the energy or interest in anything else. This means the weight is dropping off, much to my parents’ particular joy, but I do feel a smidgen of a fraud.

Although skinnier and a fraud *is* still skinnier!

Keeping it in the family…

As PCOS is in part a genetic thing and she was displaying a lot of the same symptoms as me, my lovely little sister went for an initial blood test at the GP’s to see if she had it too.

I’ve just had the following text through:

Test results back. I don’t have PCOS. Don’t know whether to be thrilled or gutted: I don’t have PCOS. I’m just spotty, hairy and overweight. *sigh*

Personally I’m really relieved for her. Although the text did make me laugh!

I have just started *another* period and have been weeping and vomiting my way through the weekend. What a barrel of fun.

Despatch from the doldrums…

One of my favourite films is Clerks, a low budget flick about a put upon guy who works in a convenience store who gets dragged in on his day off and has a catalogue of catastrophes befall him.

From wrestling with a locked security shutter (he reassures customers they can still buy their groceries by writing ‘I assure you, we’re open’ on a big sheet in shoe polish and hanging it outside the window), to dealing with a guy who dropped dead in the shop’s loo, his lament through it all is a sometimes forlorn, sometimes furious, sometimes frustrated refrain of “I’m not even supposed to be here today!”

That’s kind of how I’ve felt this week with the PCOS. Although – despite some occasionally ropey smells – no-one has dropped dead in my loo for which I should be profoundly grateful.

Instead, I have spent a week shouting “I only went to the doctors for some spot stuff!”

It all started badly on Monday when I got a phone call from my GP – while I was sat at my desk at work – to give me the results of the scan I had a few weeks ago. Now I have never been the victim / recipient of what I now understand is called telephone triage before, so when he rang I rather dimly thought ‘surely it’s a waste of resources having *him* ring up to tell me my results are in and I should make an appointment, couldn’t they get a receptionist to do that?’ Of course there was no appointment, so while I sat in the office with my minions lurking in earshot he told me all about the cysts and fibroids the scan had shown up, although in an attempt to cheer me up he pointed out the scan proved my coil was fitted correctly – great although to be honest I don’t think a surprise pregnancy is really a concern at the mo anyway.

The conversation ended with him basically saying ‘the scan says you have PCOS, which we knew already from the blood tests. We know the extent of it now and all there is left for you to do is keep taking the Metformin and come back and see me in six months. Byeeeee’.

This left me feeling (a) a bit bereft in a very daft kind of ‘how can you lumber me with this thing and then say that and leave me to deal with it. Help!‘ way and (b) furious because he caught me so far on the back foot I didn’t get a chance to ask anything. Although in a be careful what you wish for kind of way I sent L1 a text bemoaning my lot in life and saying that I hadn’t even been able to ascertain exactly what a fibroid *was* much less what the implication was to having loads of them on my ovaries. To which his textual reply was:

“Fibroids are quite common, especially when you’re 30+ and can cause pain, heavy menstrual bleeding etc, although generally they’re asymptomatic. They’re sphericalish benign tumour growths of tissue, muscular I think, that can be within the uterus or outside it, in the abdominal cavity, on the ovaries etc, often attached attached to the wall by a stalk of connective tissue – there are several types, depending on wheere they are. They can be anything from tiny to coconut size (rarely). If they cause any pain they tend to remove them surgically.”

By the time I got to the bit about coconuts I was pretty much about to burst into tears and had to disappear into the loo for 20 minutes to try and pull myself together. I am usually a coper. I don’t feel out of control often. And I hate that this means I am incapable of keeping either my emotions *or* my body under any kind of control.

Being diagnosed with PCOS, completely out of the blue having not had an inkling anything was wrong with me is proving harder to deal with than I ever anticipated it would. Partly in practical terms – thankfully taking the Metformin isn’t making me ill any more, but the first couple of weeks were absolutely hideous for nausea and the kind of emotional meltdown brought about by shifting hormone levels – and partly in emotional ones.

It’s ridiculous but the more I read the more it seems that everything I thought I knew about myself seems to have been a unrecognised symptom of PCOS: The hairyness of my body I always put down to being of part Asian ethnicity? PCOS. The body shape which means I have skinny legs and bums but very booby on top which I always jokily moaned was down to me getting my Mum’s top half with my Dad’s bottom? PCOS. My sexuality? Apparently PCOS too. I just feel I don’t know who I am any more.

Except the person that I *am* is moaning all the time. Ok, mainly on here, because I don’t want to inflict it on my friends and family and because partly it feels like such a ridiculous thing to be getting het up over – one of my best friends’ Mums is currently undergoing chemo and in comparison my non-life threatening faintly pointless moaning about something that actually I have been pootling about with for the last decade or so with no visible outward signs is just laughable.

I am so sick of thinking about this. I’m eating purely to ensure I can take my pill three times a day, my interest in actual exciting food has waned. My energy for doing anything or being sociable has dropped through the floor. It takes effort to make plans to see people. I’ve not been to the gym for the last fortnight, having been going at least four times a week for months before that. I can’t sleep properly. If you were to sum up my general feelings for life at the moment in one word it would be a resounding meh.

Now I’m not sure I can blame all of this on PCOS (although I’m hoping my Sad Sack style negativity is in large part being affected by hormone changes because otherwise things are very bad indeed!) but it feels like everything was great (don’t get me wrong, I was hardly a blimmin’ Disney heroine, everyone has bad days but overall I was happy with my lot in life, fairly dynamic, losing weight, seeing friends and enjoying things) and now they’re not. Don’t get me wrong, the drug addled Metformin blues of the first couple of weeks were the worst… but while things have improved from then it’s not a lot better, it’s just not *bad*. Not great but not terrible. Just, well, flat.

And I only went to the doctors for some spot stuff!

Still, all is not completely lost. One of the women I sit next to at work has just brought in a load of sweets she’d bought for Halloween and which weren’t given out to trick or treaters.She’s just given me a little stack of Fruit Salad penny sweets, and I can honestly say they’re lovely. I’ve not had one since I was at primary school probably and seem to have forgotten the wonderousness. Yum.

Hmmm. Maybe I just have to try and chill out, stop beating myself up and take pleasure in the small stuff for a while. Hopefully everything else’ll drop into place. And in the meantime I’ll just keep eating Fruit Salads until I get some kind of sugar high…

I want your…

I’m not hugely lucky with my love life. I tend to suffer from that irritating thing where the one you want doesn’t always want you, while the perfectly lovely person who you know wants more just doesn’t quite set your world afire *that* way. Which is very entertaining when you’re watching it in a screwball romantic comedy, or (with a slightly twisted turn) in Corrie or Eastenders, but in real actual life is just a bit tiresome really and has the propensity for people to get hurt if you’re not careful.

What it does mean though is that sometimes I have to make sure that I don’t say anything to encourage the lovely one who wants more (who I might just call L1 now because it’s a bit less unwieldy). Generally discussing anything to do with my sex life, people I fancy, all that kind of stuff, stays *way* off the agenda, things are just safer that way.

However, we had a phone conversation this weekend that left me agog. It went a bit like this…

L1: So how’re you adjusting to the PCOS?

Me: Fine. [You're reading this blog, you know I'm not really, but I'm trying to make a vague attempt at pretending everything's ok, cause when people ask how are you doing after the first couple of weeks you can almost see them thinking I can see she's got a face like a smacked arse, but please just say fine! Just say fine! Don't tell me about your ovaries. Or mention your apparent obsession with the fact you have toe hair. Please!]

L1: I found a new site about PCOS this week and I found out something really interesting I hadn’t realised before. [NB: L1 is one of those people who likes to find stuff out. He was one of the first people I told about my PCOS and he went away and read up on it to the extent I think he knows more than me. This can be very useful. Occasionally it can be a smidgen scary]

Me: Really? What’s that then?

L1: Well did I tell you about the only other person I’ve ever known who had PCOS?

Me: No.

L1: She was at uni with a load of us, and she was a really nice woman. But she was one of those who, well, she sort of got about a bit. I mean, it was university and everyone was having a great time, being away from home, but well, she was a bit of a slapper to be honest. She kept making moves on my flatmate’s boyfriend. And if we went out anywhere she’d always end up going home with *someone*.

Me: [starting to feel a bit freaked out about where this is going] Right.

L1: She just loved sex. She was always thinking about sex. All the time. And she was just really into it. Having it with anyone. It was a bit irritating for the rest of our group cause you’d go out somewhere and then she’d be off, banging someone in the loo, or she’d disappear completely and that’d be it. But she was so nice in every other way we just tried to discount it as a bit of a character flaw. Like one of my flatmates who insisted on keeping all his plates in his wardrobe when he wasn’t eating off them so none of us could use them.

Me: [mind blown by the idea of someone keeping crockery in their wardrobe, but realising now is not the time]. Riiiiiiiiiight.

L1: Well I was reading that apparently women with PCOS can have a humungous sex drive. Like huge. Like nymphomaniac levels. And I didn’t realise at the time that, you know, what we thought was her slapperish tendencies, well they were actually part of her medical condition. [In a voice that I think was meant to be sympathetic and understanding, but just came across as a bit creepy] She couldn’t help it.

Me: [As the silence lengthens, and I realise this is the point in the conversation where I am (a) supposed to be saying yes, I completely agree, frankly I need rogering at least three times a day at the minute and am finding it difficult finding enough people to keep up with me or (b) pointing out that I buck this apparent PCOS nympho trend, but can't bring myself to discuss anything to do with my sexual urges with L1 at all. Ever] Riiiiiight.

[long pause]

[I take a breath to say something to fill the silence. Can't think of anything that isn't going to cause me to crawl away later and bang my head on my desk. Remain quiet.]

[Finally]

Me: So. Did you see Heroes last night?

…

This news, if true has blown me away. I like sex. With the right people (singularly I hasten to add, although if groups are your thing then good on you) I like sex a lot. I write porn for fun (and even get paid for it). I’m a fairly uninhibited person. But is that me? Or is that the PCOS?

And most importantly, should I be changing the title of this blog to Hairy Toed Nymphomaniac?!

I don’t have my handbook with me currently, but I shall be reporting back on this one once I have been able to look it up

Five things no-one told me before I started taking Metformin…

1) The first few weeks the change turned me into a hormonal lunatic who found herself weeping at everything from TV commercials and the fact I’d run out of jam to local newspaper blogs. Shouting at people for walking too slowly down the aisle at the supermarket (although it *is* annoying, let’s face it). Feeling like I couldn’t explain what was going on to anyone else, not my friends, not my family, like I was walking around with a perspex sheet between me and the rest of the world.

2) Suddenly you’re pooing custard. Seriously. Custard. It’s like Sin City but grimmer and with more Toilet Duck. Speaking of which, never have I spent so much money on toilet cleaning products. I’m considering buying shares as frankly, even in this economic climate, I can singlehandedly ensure no downturn in the market.

3) If you’re taking it three times a day and you need to take it with food, you need to take it with *major* food. Not a breakfast person? Tough. Cause an apple and a yoghurt doesn’t count as food for Metformin purposes. If you don’t eat more – or at least chuck in a couple of nuts for protein – so you’ll find yourself hightailing it to the toilet before you know it where you will be reminded once more of point 2, above.

4) In fact, the first few weeks you won’t feel comfortable anywhere except the loo. I work on the basis there are two kinds of people in the world, people who admit to reading while sitting on the toilet and those who don’t. Whichever you are put a book in there. You’ll need it. And don’t think being at work makes it any easier. The first week I was on the pills I was so uncomfortable I was having loo breaks every hour or so. If I’d been cheerier I think my colleagues would have thought I’d developed a cocaine habit. Although I am a journalist by trade so I guess I have a stereotype to live down to.

5) It would kickstart a frakking 15 day period. Seriously. I’ve had shorter holidays. Mr Mackey from South Park once famously said he didn’t trust anything that bled for five days and didn’t die. He’d have had me strung up as a witch. That paired with the PMT from hell… well let’s face it, it’s probably as well I’d turned myself into a self styled hermit for a bit.

Diagnosis

The irony about being diagnosed with PCOS is that I’ve spent probably the last decade of my life with it and not for a second thought anything was wrong at all.

I’ve always been spotty. When I was about 20 I went to my then doctors in tears and asked them if they could give me something to stop the outbreaks I’d had since I was about 12. He gave me a prescription which did the job, and that was me sorted for the next decade. Seriously. Getting the repeat prescriptions just became part of my routine.

But I recently moved to the other end of the country and when I registered with my new doctor he told me I’d have to book a consultation before he gave me my first prescription. I sat in his office and he asked me lots of questions – about the acne I have had all my life, about my weight (I’ve recently lost four stone, but am still putting the arse into lardarse quite impressively), about my menstrual cycle, about my ethnic background, about whether I have thick hair growing in annoying places.

I said yes to everything except irregular periods and acted as casual as you can when you’re discussing random long hairs that appear by your nipples overnight (seriously, how can it be two inches long when it wasn’t there yesterday?) that you’ve been merrily shaving as part of your health and beauty routine and just assuming everyone had.

This started a merry go round of tests – I had blood tests and swabs and then was put on the list for a scan at the hospital. But before I even got my appointment through for the scan I got a phone call to come in and my doctor broke the news that the blood tests showed I had PCOS.

I don’t remember a huge amount of what he said, although he gave me a leaflet and a prescription for Metformin three times a day. He also told me the levels of imbalance shown by the tests meant it would be difficult to have children, although on the plus side – as he kept telling me in a vain attempt to stop me starting to weep in his surgery – the pills should cause me to lose weight faster. So if I do end up childless at least I’ll be skinny. Or skinnier (while being overweight is another symptom of PCOS I am fairly sure that my love of cheese has an impact too).

Actually, that does my doctor a disservice. I know he wasn’t as tactless as that, it’s just my mind was spinning so fast that those two facts were the only things I was able to take in sitting in his office that day. Overall he’s been amazing – let’s face it, two other doctors have been giving me acne products for the last 12 years without considering it could be a symptom of something else – and even if I’m not having children there’s enough other ramifications of PCOS that mean it needs treating and I am grateful and lucky he picked it up.

But there is still a part of me that wants to bleat forlornly ‘all I wanted was my spot stuff’.

Dipping a (hairy) toe into the blogosphere…

I am a sister. A daughter. A friend. A writer. A geek. I love Marmite, hate intolerance and spend way too much money on comics and gadgety tat.

I am 30. I live in the UK. I am single. I am generally happy. I never really thought about having children. Except just lately it’s become apparent I may not be able to and that hurts more than I expected it to, proof if any were needed that I am very contrary indeed.

It turns out I have polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS).

It’s a new thing and I’m getting my head round it. This blog is my place to do that without my friends and family backing away at my bouts of rage, occasional self pity and way too much information about all my bodily functions. I don’t claim to represent anyone other than myself, and if you’re looking for actual medical advice then this is definitely not the place. But if you want an honest account of what’s going on in a (currently Metformin-addled) eccentric mind then pull up a chair and make yourself comfy.