My Story
My food “revolution” started in October 2010 when my husband and I decided we would be ready to try for a baby. I was diagnosed with Polycystic Ovary Syndrome in 2009 and I was told my chances of conceiving naturally would be affected by this.
PCOS is a condition where there is a hormone imbalance in a woman’s body and it can cause physical changes in appearances as well as affect your monthly cycle and reduce your chances in having a baby. It can also lead to serious health problems like heart disease and diabetes if left untreated. A common feature of PCOS is to have a resistance to insulin (the hormone that controls sugar levels in the body) which means that your body produces higher levels of insulin to overcome this which then impacts on the production and activity of other hormones.
I felt I needed to regain control of my body – I understood it to be that my body doesn’t recognise sugar normally and therefore I crave more and more and more…
With the belief that it would take me probably a year to regulate my very hit and miss cycle after coming off the pill, I knew that I had to switch from my sugary, processed and refined diet in order to help my chances of conceiving naturally – surely reducing my sugar intake would help my body find a true balance??
From that October, I ate only wholemeal flour, pasta, noodles, brown rice and ate more vegetables and fruits and drank only milk or water and had no refined sugar. Of course there I times when I “fell off the wagon” or had no alternative, but I kept my focus and now I’m a lot stricter because I actually don’t want to eat anything else. In the early days, I don’t think I had a real understanding of what went into food so when I would check ingredient lists I would look up ingredients that I didn’t know to make sure it was all appropriate – I was so surprised what can be added.
In early December I had my first natural monthly cycle and I was so surprised and happy, but when I didn’t have one in January I was gutted. On Jan 29th 2011, I took a pregnancy test ahead of a planned visit to the GP (as I wanted to discuss other options I could take) and I thought it was a good idea to rule out being pregnant so I could speed up their action. I was shocked and so very happy and felt extraordinarily lucky. I truly thought we would struggle, having read so many heartbreaking stories on the internet and listening to what doctors had said, so this baby was a true blessing. I really stand by my belief that changing the way I ate greatly increased my fertility, that was being affected negatively by PCOS.
In both my pregnancies I was very careful with what I ate, I figured I had to give the baby the best start I could and then when they were born I continued to eat healthily as I was breastfeeding. Once they were six months old and started solids, I made sure what they ate was the best.
