No periods doctor won't help

[PCOShell]

Hi,

My DH & I are TTC and I have PCOS. I have been to the doctors and they've done 3 sets of blood tests and nothing has come back and have apparently sent a referral to the fertility clinic but I have no idea how long that will take.

It's seriously affecting my mental health. I haven't had a period for 5 months and the GP are just being completely unhelpful. I've never actually had an appointment with a doctor. They just do a 2 minute phone call then send me in to get bloods taken. Then they say my hormone levels are too low and I need to get bloods on a certain day of my cycle which is impossible.

What can I do? I'm willing to pay to go privately but don't know where to start. If I take out health insurance will it cover fertility treatment? I haven't had any appts yet so don't think they can class it as pre-existing.

I've heard of clomid, can I ask the GP to prescribe it?

I've posted in the correct topics before and had no response so apologies for posting here. It's really starting to make me hate myself. My DH is great and doesn't apply any pressure but I know he's desperate for children and I feel like there's something wrong with me.

I have PCOS and like you, had very intermittent periods.
I used Agnus castus until I ovulated (which wasn't happening before) and then stopped for two weeks. Then started again until my cycle had regulated. I was pregnant within two months.
I assumed that I would need to do this for any subsequent children as well, but both of my other children were conceived without any help. All that happened was that I had lost some weight before. Both conceptions were unexpected.
Agnus castus is worth a try as is losing weight (if you are overweight).
Hope something works for you.

No advice really except to say that I have pcos and doctors are shocking with any help. Any help I've had has been through my own research.
Have you tried changing diet? I've been doing fast 800 mainly for weight but as a result I've had more periods. Not regular but more than 2 a year!
Keep pushing for help. It runs in our family and we have all have kids...pray you do too 😀💐

I haven't heard of this before, is it something you can buy or does it have to be prescribed? Congrats on your family and thank you

OP are you tracking ovulation anyway? Slightly different but when i came off the pill to TTC, i had no period for 4/5 months but then realised i would need to ovulate before a period would come anyway, and i managed to catch ovulation using the tests each morning.

I went to the fertility clinic with my pcos and I got Metformin. I dropped 2 stone without changing my diet, got more regular periods and managed to get pregnant after a few months. Hope this helps! Wishing you the best xx

Glad I'm not alone but sorry you had to have a similar experience with the doctors. My diet is quite good at the minute and I've tried to lower my (usually quite high) sugar intake. Losing weight isn't really an option as I'm already slim and have struggled with ED in the past. Thank you and glad you managed to have children

I have no idea how to track my ovulation or whether I'm even ovulating! If daily testing would help I'd be willing to try, although it would be very expensive as the kits I've seen are £20

Thank you! I'm not needing to lose any weight but I will see if I can make an appointment at the clinic myself as the referral hasn't produced an appointment and it's been a while x

Just wanted to say that you it would probably show as a pre-existing condition as you've had telephone appointments, blood tests and a referral.

Hope you have some luck if you try the Angus Castus and also hope that your referral appointment comes soon.

Have you found the Infertility Section on MN? That's usually very supportive

Agnus castus can really REALLY put your hormones out of whack, so I suggest doing a bit of research before you dive in. You can buy it at Holland and Barrett et al.

Your GP can’t prescribe clomid. I think referrals to fertility clinics are taking some time at the moment.

I was like you, no periods and awaiting the clinic. Now I’m at a clinic and they are still a bit useless. It depends on how quickly you want to start trying gonadotropin drugs.

Get yourself to a nutritionist that specialises in PCOS or low carb diets. PCOS is known as diabetes of the ovaries.

I reversed my PCOS with keto and it happened really quickly. Within the space of two months my ovaries were normal, no cysts other than the normal follicle one growing as normal. I got my normal periods back.

Just a warning that ovulation sticks can be unreliable with PCOS as hormone levels are off (instead of getting a peak on one day of ovulation you may see several days in a row as levels are high but there's no ovulation). If you're not having periods then you're probably not ovulating even if you get positives on them.

There are options such as Metformin and clomid which can help trigger ovulation and you should definitely ask about them. But diet can really make a difference with PCOS so it really would be worth trying low carb while you wait for any referral to come through. Have a Google of pcos recommended diets, there's a lot of resources out there.

To note you can have insulin resistance and not be overweight, so you may still see benefits from low carb. You just wouldn't need to have lower calories as part of the diet.

When were you diagnosed with PCOS and how has it been managed up until now?

Thank you all, I'll definitely switch to low carb and low sugar. I'll take a look online at some PCOS recommended diets as advised.

I was diagnosed with PCOS about 3 years ago so went on the pill for a year to try and regulate my cycles. The first 3 periods after coming off stayed regular and then they went back to being very intermittent.

I know there will be risks with drugs but I'm willing to try them at this point as it's really taking a toll on me mentally.

I had this when trying to conceive, 100+ days with no period.

Route my GP took was:

• urine test for pregnancy - negative
• bloods - showed high testosterone and confirmed no pregnancy
• gave me progesterone for 5 days which kick started a period
• referred for a US which showed multiple cysts on right ovary

Due to having 3 of the common symptoms - high belly fat, testosterone and cyst was officially diagnosed with PCOS at which point I was told to lose weight and left to my own devices. End of from the doctors POV.

Went on a low carb/low GI diet and lost a couple of stone at which point my cycle regulated. Took 3 years but did conceive in the end.

Hi OP,

I'm the same as you. Basically I had high levels of testosterone in my blood tests, they asked me to go back on day 1-4 of my cycle and by then the testosterone had dropped to 'normal' levels. However, since then I haven't had any more periods. I have had 3 periods total in 14 months. I'm not TTC which means my GP won't help me. I just want all of the symptoms of PCOS to go away but they told me unless I want to conceive there is very little they can do. It's so frustrating! However, I do have a child who was conceived 10years ago so there is hope! I feel PCOS isn't well understood, and that HCPs don't recognise the impact on women with it.

Most people are saying losing weight helped. I could probably only safely lose around half a stone without being underweight :(

So glad you got there in the end!

How old are you? If you’re under 30 I’d be looking at waiting for your NHS appointment. If you’re over, then I’d look into going privately. Health insurance won’t cover you for fertility treatment. You should be able to find out from your GP’s receptionist where you’ve been referred to, then you can give them a call to find out how long their NHS waiting list is. Going privately even for clomid cycles is likely to run into thousands so better if you do this on the NHS if you have time on your side.

Your GP won’t prescribe Clomid as you need to have each cycle of it monitored with scans and sometimes blood tests and trigger injections.

In the mean time, while you wait, I’d definitely invest in some ovulation test sticks so you can track what’s going on with your cycle.

Good Luck 🍀

Weight is important but with PCOS it's more about insulin. Lots of people with PCOS are insulin resistant. We are at higher risk at T2 diabetes and Gestational Diabetes.

So eating low GI, getting exercise regularly and following a 16:8 fasting period so your body has 8 full hours a day where it's not having to process sugar, can be really helpful.

I was the same as you, some years I just had 2 or 3 periods. My ‘cycle’ was impossible to track. The usual drugs were useless as no one knew when or if I was ovulating. I had a small surgery called ovarian drilling, read up on it. It’s a laparoscopic surgery and I was home the same day as far as I remember. The effects wear off so it’s important to try to conceive regularly over the following weeks. I had it on the nhs 20 years ago and was pregnant within a few weeks. Best of luck.

Thank you, I'm late 20s but we would both like a big family which is making it worse for me thinking that may never happen.

I didn't think insurance would cover it really but I'd be willing to pay if it meant things moved quickly. I know with all the struggles the waiting times on NHS are lengthy at the minute.

Hoping clomid will work for me 🤞

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3178699/

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3849664/

I know this might sound odd but could you try he C25K, if you don't run already. The time you take running might help you to cope with what's going on

Meant to say I was a slim woman with pcos, I did have cysts on my ovaries and excessive hair but I was not over weight.

Really want to thank everyone for helping, it can be so upsetting when the GPs make you feel as though they simply don't care and this has given me much more hope