I wish I was a man.

Well, that might be exaggerating a little... maybe I just wish I was a normal woman.

I've had more spotting since last week. Mostly nothing to write home about until today. Today I feel like I'm going to die. I hate it when I tell girls about my cramps and they say something like "oh, it's not that bad!". No ma'am, YOURS are not that bad. I feel like someone has taken a fiery hand blender to my insides. At least the week is half over and since I worked so much the last two days I'll be able to take it easy for the next three. I have class from 2-4:30 today and then I work until ~7:15 but then I can come home, curl up in a ball, and cry myself to sleep go to walmart because we have nothing to eat or drink. >.<

I went to my new endocrinologist today. His scale says I'm 5 pounds heavier than mine does. I've got another appointment in a month so I'm going to see if there's still a 5 pound difference. If so I'm going to chalk it up to scale configuration. I'm down to 185 according to my scale, BTW. He doubled my metformin dose and ordered a bunch of blood work. I know what some of it is for, but not others. This is what he's checking: 17-OH Progesteron D, CBC, CMP, Cortisol AM, DHEA-Sufate D, Estradiol, FSH, Insulin, LH, prolactin, Testosterone T&FR, and TSH. If you know what any of that means, feel free to leave a layman's definition in the comments. He also told me that whenever we decided to TTC I just had to give him the heads up and I'd have a clomid prescription. Even though that won't be for a while it's nice to know.

At some point a bunch of crap got piled up on the exercise bike that I should give a name. However I'm getting a much better strength and cardio workout at work than I would using that thing anyway lol.

That's all the updates for now I think. I'm gonna go lay down with my heating pad and listen to R.E.M now.

That Aunt Flow, she's such a tease!

I lied. AF did not come to visit. She just called to say hello.

I guess it was just some kind of break-through bleeding/spotting. I can't say I'm not disappointed. I was so hopeful that this meant my body was right on track and the medications were working. Of course, it does say that they could take 3-4 months to kick in.

On the bright side I won't have to start school in horrible pain.

Who knew not having your period AND not being pregnant could make someone so depressed?

I'm supposed to be happy about this... right?

You know how yesterday I mentioned AF was due to arrive in about a week? Well guess who showed up early! I guess the bloating was PMS related after all.

To be honest, I totally did not expect to get it again this soon based on my body pre-HBC. But this is good, right? This is one of the reasons I'm on the medications. It means my body at the very least isn't getting worse. I'm still late by the normal 28-day cycle (this one was 42 days), but it's an improvement over my last 46 day cycle. Seeing as that was when I was on HBC to regulate things I thought it would be much longer than that my first month off the hormones. Pre-HBC I could go as many as 9 months without even a postcard from AF.

So this is exciting. But still sucks, you know? Off to get some pineapple I suppose!

Week 3 update

That whole Day *insert number here* thing was getting old. I can remember what week I'm on much better. =)

I actually weighed myself yesterday (Monday) but didn't get a chance to update. Not surprisingly I didn't see much of a loss, only half a pound to be exact. Last week I was pretty bad and ate like half a gallon of ice cream and had pulled pork for three of my meals. I also only rode my bike twice. This weekend I got plenty of unconventional exercise though as we went through pretty much everything we own and rearranged our bedroom. I don't even know how many trash bags of stuff we either threw out or gave away...

According to monthlyinfo.com AF should be coming to visit in 5 or so days. I've been feeling kinda bloated (which would contribute to my lack of weight loss), so we will see if that's PMS or just my body hating me like normal.

I've got a post about how we view food and eating that I'm working on. I hope to finish it this week as school starts on Monday. We aren't quite finished with our room yet though, as as we waiting for some cables to come in that we ordered online.

I never knew a home, until I found your hands

*This post has nothing to do with my health or PCOS really, I just wanted to get it out and didn't want to resurrect my old blog just for this*

I can't believe in just over a month I will have been married for a year, especially since I wasn't supposed to be married till next month lol. I love my husband, I do. I would not give up being his wife for anything. But I still feel like we missed out to some extent doing things the way we did.

Josh needed surgery. The only way to get insurance was for us to get married. We were already engaged so we figured, why not? But then they fired him two days before his insurance kicked in. Obviously he still needed surgery, so good-bye wedding budget! Now we have no idea when we can actually have our ceremony, actually say the vows we chose for each other, and celebrate our love with our family and friends. One day, I tell myself, one day...

Today I listened to our ceremony music. I knew I shouldn't, but I did anyway. I still love it as much as I did when I picked it out over a year ago. I still love the dress I picked out but never got a chance to try on. I still love everything about it. But I love my husband more and that is what matters.

At least we are finally going to go on our "honeymoon" in December, right?

Couch to 19k

Several people I know are starting the Couch-to-5K® Running Plan. Unfortunately due to an injury I got in pre-k I am not allowed to run. :( So instead I have modified the plan for my stationary bike! My bike has 5 pre-set programs of increasing difficulty. They are all 30 minutes long but have different resistance levels, mimicking increasingly more difficult hilly landscapes. For example the first program starts off at resistance 1 and slowly builds up to resistance 6 over 15 minutes, then immediately goes down to R3 for 2 or 3 minutes. After that it climbs back up to R6 over 5-6 minutes, and then gradually decreases to R1 over the remaining 5-6 minutes. So P1 has two moderately high hills. P2 has three hills, one lower than P1's (like 4 resistance or something), one the same as P1's, and one higher than P1's (I think it gets up to R8). For the remaining programs sometimes the hills get closer together, sometimes they get higher, sometimes its both. My primary goal is to be able to do P5 twice in a row by our cruise in December. Yes, I know this is nothing like C25K, but it's what inspired me and that's what counts. =P

My secondary goal is to be able to bike 19k (or a little less than 12 miles) in half an hour on a low resistance. And how did I come to this number, you ask? Well I was trying to figure out what the equivalent of running 5k is for cycling. From what I understand a century = a marathon, so that is what I went off. A marathon is 26 miles and 5k is 3 miles. 3 goes into 26 8.6 times. A century is 100 miles. 100 divided by 8.6 equals 11.6. 11.6 miles is 18.7k. I rounded up to 19 just for fun. (Look Mommy, I did math and no one even made me!) Hopefully by building up my endurance through my above plan I will be able to make this goal. Right now I can only do about 6 miles lol.

Since C25K is broken up into weeks (9) I figured I should break mine up into weeks as well. Mine is 10 weeks because I can't do an hour yet, so I am starting off with only 30 minutes. If everything goes to plan I should finish mid-October, but everyone knows that doesn't happen which is why I've given myself till December 13th. I will be trying to do this 3-5 days a week, because otherwise I won't have improved enough to move on I don't think.

Week 1: Program 1 (started 8-8-10)

Week 2: Program 1 twice

Week 3: Program 2, Program 1

Week 4: Program 2 twice

Week 5: Program 3, Program 2

Week 6: Program 3 twice

Week 7: Program 4, Program 3

Week 8: Program 4 twice

Week 9: Program 5, Program 4

Week 10: Program 5 twice

My mother is trying to kill me.

Several months ago (like February or something) we stumbled across the lord of all ice creams, Birthday Cake by Blue Bell. It was only around for like a month, but we continued looking for it whenever we went to the store just in case. We figured that it was just some kind of promotion to celebrate the company's anniversary or something.

That is, until my mother showed up with some two days ago. >.<

Apparently this wondrous frozen confection is on rotation, meaning it is out for 3-month periods at a time. Well there goes my December goal...

Day 6 - Monday Weigh In!

Don't I look sexy in my "it's okay to sweat in these" clothes and elbow brace? (It's okay to say "no, no you're not." XD)

As of this morning I weigh 189.8 pounds! That's a little over 5 pounds less than I did last Tuesday. How freaking amazing is that?! Under normal circumstances it would take a month or two to lose that much, if I was dieting pretty strict and exercising 5 days a week. While I have been watching my sugar to avoid getting nauseous, I haven't exactly been dieting... and I only worked out one day last week.

If you'll notice, my little virtual weight loss model girl has changed a bit. Apparently she changes to reflect the weight you've lost every ten pounds. I've decided that I'll do the same and take a new picture every ten pounds. I don't see a change between this one and the last one really, but it's only been five pounds not ten for this first one. And really, there's not *that* much of a change with the VWLM either, more like a shift in where the weight is sitting.

In slightly related news...

Josh is trying to convince me to rethink the whole "never touching that demon Adipex crap again" thing. It is obviously too strong for me, but there's a good chance it's helping. I care way more about health than I do about numbers on a scale, but I also have to realize that losing weight is a big part of getting healthy. I'm going to look some stuff up online/call a pharmacist and see if I can only take half a pill, or maybe only take it every other day or something. If I can find a way to get some of the benefits while also avoiding flushing my metabolism down the crapper then I'll do it. If not I'll just wait till my doctor appointment at the end of the month and see what she thinks is best.

I can't do this anymore...

As I've said in other posts, my doctor put me on Adipex to help me lose weight. Since that was less than a week ago it's still too early to know if it's working. This drug (along with most weight loss meds) works in two ways, one of which is an appetite suppressant. That is probably great for most obese people but sucks for me.

See, the problem is my appetite is suppressed all by itself. I am not fat because I eat too much. If anything I often eat too little or too rarely. Sure some of my food choices aren't great, but an appetite suppressant isn't going to help me choose the whole wheat toast with sugar free all natural jam over the "hot now" Krispy Kreme doughnut. (If anyone comes up with a pill that does that, let me know kthanx?)

I knew all this when I agreed to take the medication. My thought was that sure I don't need the appetite suppressing part, but the other part, that part could be useful... you know, the part that releases chemicals to break down stored fat. I knew it might not work as well for me as it does for others, put it can't hurt either right?

Wrong.

It has suppressed my appetite even more than normal. I got up at about 9:30 am, got a 16 oz bottle of apple Crystal Light and a 90 calorie oatmeal raisin granola bar. It is now 4:30pm - seven hours after eating breakfast, and I'm not remotely interested in eating anything else. I know I *should* eat. I should have had lunch hours ago. But my brain is like "nah, that's okay... I'd rather just sit here and starve for a while longer..." Sometimes my stomach growls so I know my body is hungry, but my brain doesn't care. Getting up and making food will mean I miss part of the Top Chef rerun I'm watching, and that will just not do.

Its an odd feeling similar to having a horrible stomach flu. I know my body needs nourishment, so I go in the kitchen to find something. I open the fridge or the pantry and then my brain goes "Hold up, wait right there. You don't want food. Food = bad. Food makes you sick. That delicious chipotle sliced turkey breast was planted there by Satan HIMSELF!" so I just go and sit back down again. Darn you norepinephrine induced fight-or-flight response. *sigh*

So I have decided that I will no longer be taking the Adipex. At this rate my metabolism is going to slow down to the speed of a turtle trying to walk through molasses in the winter, and I just don't need that. I'd rather not lose the weight, or do it super duper slowly, than yo-yo right back after going of the medication.

Day Four - I feel like either a drug addict or an old woman

My desk is covered in bottles of medication. Everyday I get up and take my little round blue pill, my little oval white pill, my big round white pill, and my big oval pink pill*. I thought so much medication wasn't necessary unless you were old and decrepit, or a druggie needing to get their fix however they must. I am neither.

At night I take both the little round blue pill and the big round white one again. Last night I took two big oval blue ones as well.

Sounds pretty bad without knowing what they are, doesn't it? I hope I don't have to do this the rest of my life. Taking so many pills every day makes me feel so broken and helpless.

* Little round blue pill = Inderal, for migraines and anxiety; little oval white pill = Adipex; big round white pill = Metformin; big oval pink pill = prenatal vitamin; big oval blue pill = Nyquil

Day 2 - Holy side effects, Batman!

My first day on Metformin and Adipex was okay, but not great. I'm hoping things will get better as the days go on.

Yesterday afternoon about 3pm I noticed my blood sugar drop rather abruptly. I new this was a possible side effect, but it was still rather scary. When this happens to my diabetic friends they usually reach for a Snickers or a soda or something sugary to get it to go back up. Well, another side affect for the Metformin is getting nauseous after eating sugar! So I wasn't sure what to do. I ate a sandwich for the carbs, but it didn't really help. I ended up having to get a soda so I would be okay be 4:45 when I needed to go to work. I did get sort of nauseous but not too bad! From now on I think I'm just going to try and get a steady carb intake all day so it doesn't happen again.

Another side effect is insomnia. You're not *supposed* to suffer from this unless you take the Adipex within 4 hours before bed, but I guess that doesn't apply to me. I was able to fall asleep fine, but woke up after about two hours and could never quite get back to sleep. This sucks since I really need my 8 hours to function in the morning, 10 is better. I'm just glad I didn't need to drive anywhere today until closer to 2pm. Josh has a doctor appointment today and I'm going to get him to ask if you can take Tylenol PM or something while on these meds to help me sleep.

Normally I would only weight myself every week or so, but I needed to adjust some of the settings on my scale (goal weight, starting weight, etc) so I hopped back on again this morning. It said I'm down to 192 pounds?! It's probably just water weight or something though because I don't think it's possible to actually lose that much in one day. Especially since it would normally take me closer to a month to lose that much. I'll probably weight myself again on Monday, and then make Mondays my official weigh in days, so we will see if it's actual weight loss or not then.

I found an online period/ovulation tracker at monthlyinfo.com that I'm gonna give a try. I only had two cycles to input and both of those were when I was on BC so I'm not expecting the predictions to be accurate. According to it I should be ovulating right now but I'm pretty sure I'm not. I don't know much about NFP, but I think I know what my fertile mucus looks like and it's no where to be seen. It says AF should be in town near the 22nd of August, so we will see.

Day One - It begins

Today is my first day on Metformin. I have been instructed to take 500mg twice a day. We will reevaluate the strength at my appointment next month. My doctor has also prescribed me Adipex to help boost my weight loss, but I'm not so excited about taking it. It's supposed to suppress your appetite, but my appetite already sucks! My husband Josh says that I should try taking it and see how it goes, so I will.... *grumble, grumble, grumble*

As of this morning my weight was 195.2 according to our handy bathroom scale. That's the heaviest I've ever been. If you want to see a picture I posted one in the blog below.

AF last came to visit like a week ago. Lasted about three weeks. First week was light, second was really heavy with lots of cramps, and third was super duper light. I think I'm going to have to find some kind of AF calender so I can see if this stuff is actually working. Otherwise I'll just forget when my last period was lol. If you have any suggestions for that kind of thing let me know!

I was also thinking of starting NPF to see if and when I start ovulating again but I'm not sure about it. Once school starts in two weeks I might not keep up with it very good. Heck, I might not even keep up with this! So we will see...

This is me, as I am.

I don't like having pictures taken of myself. I don't remember the last time I had my picture taken and thought it actually looked good. Hopefully through my doctor's help I'll be able to change that. This is me, as I am. I wish I was smiling in this picture but oh well, what can you do?

As it says in the little about me thingamabob, I've suffered from PCOS my whole post-puberty life. If you don't know what PCOS, perhaps this is the time to look it up. I didn't have the guts to go to the doctor about my problems till I was 19, and since then have been "treating it" with hormonal birth control. This worked okay, it's way better then no treatment at all, but still not up to my standards. With this method PCOS still ruled my life, and I'm determined to put an end to that. So this blog will follow my new plan of using Metformin and how well that works. If it doesn't work, perhaps this blog will then follow my next experiment. Who knows! So wish my luck on my journey to health and happiness. :)