MY PCOS TIPS
A few of my tips that help with my PCOS and can help you too!
1. Drink a cup of spearmint tea twice a day. It helps lower free testosterone in the body, which can help lower hirsutism (facial and body hair growth). I drink one by Traditional Medicinals, you can get it at whole foods and on Amazon
2. Use cinnamon whenever you can! It helps lower blood sugar... and it's yummy, so why not? They say it's better to use Ceylon cinnamon, and of course it should be organic.
3. Put a scoop of Collagen Peptides in your tea or smoothie everyday. It helps make healthier hair, skin, nails, is good for your stomach lining and is extra protein. I use the brand Vital Proteins, you can get it directly through their site or on Amazon. While you're at it, put a 1/2 tsp of Ashwagandha in your beverage as well, it's so great for stress and balancing hormones. I use Sun Potion's, also available through their site or Amazon.
4. Workout 4-5 times a week for 30 minutes. Try stress-reducing workouts like yoga or bike-riding and also incorporate lifting weights (a necessary component for beating PCOS).
5. Try to eat only organic foods. I know it's more expensive, but the pesticides on produce and the hormones in the meat can really have a negative affect on your body, especially if you have PCOS. Our hormones are already off-balance, so we don't want to make it any worse.
6. It's also a good idea to switch to all-natural bath and beauty products. The chemicals found in non-natural products can really wreak havoc on your system. It's amazing what crap they put in beauty products these days. And our skin absorbs everything we put on it, if you wouldn't eat it, you shouldn't put in on your body. I use the app Think Dirty to find the best beauty products. You can scan or search any product, then it will give it a 0-10 "dirty" rating. It also will give you suggested products that have a 3 or under rating and are considered the healthiest. You can see a list of my faves on my PRODUCTS page.
7. Do anything you can to stay as stress-free and relaxed as possible. Meditate, do yoga, go for walks, go to therapy, bike rides, journal, take a bath, get acupuncture (highly recommended for women with PCOS), whatever works for you. It's very important to keep your stress levels down if you have PCOS, or any other syndrome/illness/disease, as we all know it just lowers your immune system and makes problems worse.
8. Go to a naturalpathic or holistic doctor, not a medical doctor, to treat your PCOS. If you go the medical route they will want to put you on medication (probably Metformin) and birth control. This will only mask your symptoms, not reverse PCOS (which most doctors say can't be done, but that's because it can't be done medically. It has to be done with diet and lifestyle). A naturalpathic doctor will prescribe natural supplements that will give you what you need and help to balance your hormones. I'm taking quite a lot, but I'd say the most important ones are a good women's multi-vitamin (I take Women's Pure Packs by Ore Encapsulations), some hormone balancing herbs (I take OvaBlend by Vitanica), magnesium, selenium (I just eat 2 brazil nuts a day), and Myo-Inositol (I take Ovasitol, it's a blend of two types of Inositol and is formulated for women with PCOS).
9. Get plenty of sleep. At least 8 hours of night. Our bodies are working extra hard to deal with PCOS, so you'll need as much rest as you can get.
10. Try to stay away from caffeine and alcohol. They both will overload your system, especially your liver, which you need even more to process anything else that comes into your system. Once you ditch caffeine and alcohol for a few weeks you'll start to feel a lot better. You won't have the crash you used to have a few hours after having coffee, or the hangover after having that whole bottle of wine. If you want to have a bit of caffeine, try green tea especially matcha green tea. It has so many health benefits that it outweighs the small amount of caffeine. And there's a few caffeine-free, gluten-free coffee alternatives out there, I love MediDate Coffee, made purely from date seeds! I haven't tried it yet, but I've heard good things about Dandy Blend as well.
11. Sugar - probably the hardest thing to give up, for me at least. At first I was using Stevia, some say it's OK to have, others say your body doesn't know the difference between that and sugar. So in the past couple months I've just cut it out completely. Bananas were another one I kept having for awhile, I love them. But they're just way too high in sugar and are starchy as well. So I recently gave those up too. Dates are a good way to sweeten things in baking and such, but I try to use sparingly. They say eventually your body stops craving sugar. I'm not sure I ever will, but I'm hoping. I let myself have a "real" dessert maybe twice a month. That's enough to at least not feel like you can never have your cake and eat it too. ;)
12. Plastics - plastics are hormone disruptors so you should definitely stay away as much as possible. I try and put most of my food in glass containers and use a glass and silicone water bottle. I switched out all my cooking utensils for wood and metal ones. When I do grocery shopping I put my produce directly into my shopping bags and leave them just my fridge drawer when I get home. It's crazy how much plastic there is in our world and it's destroying our planet and us.
13. Switch to natural clothing. We absorb the chemicals used in our clothing so it's important to use natural materials like cotton. A lot of clothing companies also use toxic dyes, which we also absorb through our skin. It's quite expensive to go out and get a whole new natural wardrobe, so what I recommend is to start with your basics. So if you can have organic cotton (with natural dyes) underwear, socks, pjs and loungewear then that's a great start. I love Pact Organic because they are very affordable and so comfortable.
14. Stay in our routine of eating on the PCOS diet in the week, but on the weekend, let yourself "cheat" a couple times. And don't feel guilty about it or worry what it will do to you. Just let go and know that you deserve it and it won't have much of an affect as long as you're not making a habit of it. It's a lot easier to eat good most of the time when you know you get to splurge once in awhile. It's especially nice to do this on a holiday or birthday so you can join in with everyone else and enjoy yourself.
15. Join some PCOS support groups on fb. I've found a few and I find them really helpful. You can post a question about anything PCOS related and you get tons of ladies giving you advice and their thoughts. It feels nice to know your not alone and it comes in handy when you have a bizarre question that no one without PCOS would understand. You can also use it to just vent or to express excitement when you finally get your cycle after 6 months. It's just nice to have people that you can relate to.
16. I also recommend following women on social media that have reversed their PCOS and give their help and advice for free. They are great resources. I love Lee Tilghman, her instagram is @LeefromAmerica, she reversed her PCOS with diet and shares her everyday adventures in hormone balance with amazing smoothie bowls, coconut fat balls and beauty product suggestions too. I also follow Clare Goodwin (fb @reversePCOS and insta is @thepcosnutritionist), she's a nutritionist who also reversed her PCOS with diet and exercise. She has an active community on fb with videos, takes personal clients and also has a PCOS protocol program you can sign up for as well. I find having women who have reversed their PCOS to look up to is so helpful. I hope that I can become one of those women for you!
17. Think positive and love yourself. It's very hard to love yourself when you have hair growing in unwanted places, your hair is falling out of your head, you can't lose weight even though you've cut out all "bad" foods and your period has been missing for months. But you have to. You have to know that if you work hard and stay positive, you can lower your symptoms and maybe even reverse your PCOS. I've only really been working at this for about 8 months now, but my hair has stopped falling out by at least 75%. And my facial and body hair growth has stopped completely. I feel like myself again, my hormones must be pretty balanced (I used to be on a rollercoaster ride of emotions, it was horrible). And I feel like there's light at the end of this very dark, confusing, scary tunnel. But one thing I know is that trying to stay confident in myself has helped more than anything else. And I know this because there were times when I had zero confidence and I wanted to give up. And you will have those days, but remember you're not alone and if you put in the work and stay positive you can do this!
1. Drink a cup of spearmint tea twice a day. It helps lower free testosterone in the body, which can help lower hirsutism (facial and body hair growth). I drink one by Traditional Medicinals, you can get it at whole foods and on Amazon
2. Use cinnamon whenever you can! It helps lower blood sugar... and it's yummy, so why not? They say it's better to use Ceylon cinnamon, and of course it should be organic.
3. Put a scoop of Collagen Peptides in your tea or smoothie everyday. It helps make healthier hair, skin, nails, is good for your stomach lining and is extra protein. I use the brand Vital Proteins, you can get it directly through their site or on Amazon. While you're at it, put a 1/2 tsp of Ashwagandha in your beverage as well, it's so great for stress and balancing hormones. I use Sun Potion's, also available through their site or Amazon.
4. Workout 4-5 times a week for 30 minutes. Try stress-reducing workouts like yoga or bike-riding and also incorporate lifting weights (a necessary component for beating PCOS).
5. Try to eat only organic foods. I know it's more expensive, but the pesticides on produce and the hormones in the meat can really have a negative affect on your body, especially if you have PCOS. Our hormones are already off-balance, so we don't want to make it any worse.
6. It's also a good idea to switch to all-natural bath and beauty products. The chemicals found in non-natural products can really wreak havoc on your system. It's amazing what crap they put in beauty products these days. And our skin absorbs everything we put on it, if you wouldn't eat it, you shouldn't put in on your body. I use the app Think Dirty to find the best beauty products. You can scan or search any product, then it will give it a 0-10 "dirty" rating. It also will give you suggested products that have a 3 or under rating and are considered the healthiest. You can see a list of my faves on my PRODUCTS page.
7. Do anything you can to stay as stress-free and relaxed as possible. Meditate, do yoga, go for walks, go to therapy, bike rides, journal, take a bath, get acupuncture (highly recommended for women with PCOS), whatever works for you. It's very important to keep your stress levels down if you have PCOS, or any other syndrome/illness/disease, as we all know it just lowers your immune system and makes problems worse.
8. Go to a naturalpathic or holistic doctor, not a medical doctor, to treat your PCOS. If you go the medical route they will want to put you on medication (probably Metformin) and birth control. This will only mask your symptoms, not reverse PCOS (which most doctors say can't be done, but that's because it can't be done medically. It has to be done with diet and lifestyle). A naturalpathic doctor will prescribe natural supplements that will give you what you need and help to balance your hormones. I'm taking quite a lot, but I'd say the most important ones are a good women's multi-vitamin (I take Women's Pure Packs by Ore Encapsulations), some hormone balancing herbs (I take OvaBlend by Vitanica), magnesium, selenium (I just eat 2 brazil nuts a day), and Myo-Inositol (I take Ovasitol, it's a blend of two types of Inositol and is formulated for women with PCOS).
9. Get plenty of sleep. At least 8 hours of night. Our bodies are working extra hard to deal with PCOS, so you'll need as much rest as you can get.
10. Try to stay away from caffeine and alcohol. They both will overload your system, especially your liver, which you need even more to process anything else that comes into your system. Once you ditch caffeine and alcohol for a few weeks you'll start to feel a lot better. You won't have the crash you used to have a few hours after having coffee, or the hangover after having that whole bottle of wine. If you want to have a bit of caffeine, try green tea especially matcha green tea. It has so many health benefits that it outweighs the small amount of caffeine. And there's a few caffeine-free, gluten-free coffee alternatives out there, I love MediDate Coffee, made purely from date seeds! I haven't tried it yet, but I've heard good things about Dandy Blend as well.
11. Sugar - probably the hardest thing to give up, for me at least. At first I was using Stevia, some say it's OK to have, others say your body doesn't know the difference between that and sugar. So in the past couple months I've just cut it out completely. Bananas were another one I kept having for awhile, I love them. But they're just way too high in sugar and are starchy as well. So I recently gave those up too. Dates are a good way to sweeten things in baking and such, but I try to use sparingly. They say eventually your body stops craving sugar. I'm not sure I ever will, but I'm hoping. I let myself have a "real" dessert maybe twice a month. That's enough to at least not feel like you can never have your cake and eat it too. ;)
12. Plastics - plastics are hormone disruptors so you should definitely stay away as much as possible. I try and put most of my food in glass containers and use a glass and silicone water bottle. I switched out all my cooking utensils for wood and metal ones. When I do grocery shopping I put my produce directly into my shopping bags and leave them just my fridge drawer when I get home. It's crazy how much plastic there is in our world and it's destroying our planet and us.
13. Switch to natural clothing. We absorb the chemicals used in our clothing so it's important to use natural materials like cotton. A lot of clothing companies also use toxic dyes, which we also absorb through our skin. It's quite expensive to go out and get a whole new natural wardrobe, so what I recommend is to start with your basics. So if you can have organic cotton (with natural dyes) underwear, socks, pjs and loungewear then that's a great start. I love Pact Organic because they are very affordable and so comfortable.
14. Stay in our routine of eating on the PCOS diet in the week, but on the weekend, let yourself "cheat" a couple times. And don't feel guilty about it or worry what it will do to you. Just let go and know that you deserve it and it won't have much of an affect as long as you're not making a habit of it. It's a lot easier to eat good most of the time when you know you get to splurge once in awhile. It's especially nice to do this on a holiday or birthday so you can join in with everyone else and enjoy yourself.
15. Join some PCOS support groups on fb. I've found a few and I find them really helpful. You can post a question about anything PCOS related and you get tons of ladies giving you advice and their thoughts. It feels nice to know your not alone and it comes in handy when you have a bizarre question that no one without PCOS would understand. You can also use it to just vent or to express excitement when you finally get your cycle after 6 months. It's just nice to have people that you can relate to.
16. I also recommend following women on social media that have reversed their PCOS and give their help and advice for free. They are great resources. I love Lee Tilghman, her instagram is @LeefromAmerica, she reversed her PCOS with diet and shares her everyday adventures in hormone balance with amazing smoothie bowls, coconut fat balls and beauty product suggestions too. I also follow Clare Goodwin (fb @reversePCOS and insta is @thepcosnutritionist), she's a nutritionist who also reversed her PCOS with diet and exercise. She has an active community on fb with videos, takes personal clients and also has a PCOS protocol program you can sign up for as well. I find having women who have reversed their PCOS to look up to is so helpful. I hope that I can become one of those women for you!
17. Think positive and love yourself. It's very hard to love yourself when you have hair growing in unwanted places, your hair is falling out of your head, you can't lose weight even though you've cut out all "bad" foods and your period has been missing for months. But you have to. You have to know that if you work hard and stay positive, you can lower your symptoms and maybe even reverse your PCOS. I've only really been working at this for about 8 months now, but my hair has stopped falling out by at least 75%. And my facial and body hair growth has stopped completely. I feel like myself again, my hormones must be pretty balanced (I used to be on a rollercoaster ride of emotions, it was horrible). And I feel like there's light at the end of this very dark, confusing, scary tunnel. But one thing I know is that trying to stay confident in myself has helped more than anything else. And I know this because there were times when I had zero confidence and I wanted to give up. And you will have those days, but remember you're not alone and if you put in the work and stay positive you can do this!
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