"I have facial hair, weight gain, I'm exhausted all the time."
PCOS is often misdiagnosed and misunderstood. Torri Sunshine describes her experience living with polycystic ovary syndrome …
PCOS is often misdiagnosed and misunderstood. Torri Sunshine describes her experience living with polycystic ovary syndrome …
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00This is two days of not shaving.
00:02You can see it's pretty noticeable.
00:06PCOS is on a spectrum.
00:07For me, how it shows up is I have facial hair,
00:11weight gain, I'm exhausted all the time.
00:13All the symptoms are surrounded by shame.
00:23I gotta hop in the shower
00:24and then I'm gonna zap my face.
00:25This is like three days.
00:27Look at that big space though.
00:29That's very promising.
00:32This isn't really hurting.
00:43So I was in seventh grade
00:44when I first started experiencing symptoms.
00:47I had like two long black hairs on my chin
00:50that I didn't even notice,
00:51but my mom had pointed them out.
00:52And then when I started my period around that time
00:55in seventh grade, I had like really, really horrific
00:59periods.
01:09Recently talking to my endocrinologist,
01:11she was like, I wish that they would change the name
01:13because you don't have to have cysts on your ovaries
01:16to have PCOS.
01:17For me, what it looks like and how it shows up
01:20is I have facial hair, weight gain,
01:23I'm exhausted all the time,
01:25and irregular heavy periods.
01:27Probably the biggest misconception with PCOS
01:29is that it's all about your weight.
01:31I've been 103 pounds, size zero,
01:35with a full facial hair
01:37in every single symptom that I currently have.
01:39With PCOS, especially the kind
01:41that I have, insulin resistant PCOS,
01:43you gain weight so fast.
01:45Like, look at food, I swear, and you're gaining weight.
01:49But growing up, I shaved
01:52and I still shave every single day.
01:54Welcome back to my series
01:56called Getting Rid of My Facial Hair as a Female.
01:59Let's zap my face.
02:00This is like three days with no shaving.
02:03I've spent over $10,000 in years of my life
02:06on getting laser hair removal
02:08and it never fully went away.
02:10So with something like this that I can do at home,
02:13it's made life so much easier
02:15and I have seen like a significant reduction
02:18in hair growth.
02:19It's an IPL at home device.
02:26I've seen probably three different endocrinologists.
02:29Two of them have been kind of like,
02:31I don't know, here's some birth control,
02:33come back when you want to get pregnant
02:35and just had no answers.
02:37And I cannot tell you how defeating that is
02:40to go with all of these issues and be basically dismissed.
02:44You have to advocate for yourself
02:45and run these more detailed tests.
02:48I realized that I need to talk about this.
02:51Like, this is healing.
02:53These women who are commenting are feeling so seen
02:56and like, this is healing to them
02:58and it's healing to me too.
02:59I wish that people knew how common it is
03:03and how many people struggle actually
03:06with getting rid of their facial hair.
03:08I wish that people knew how common it is
03:11and how many people struggle actually
03:14with getting rid of their facial hair.
03:16I wish that people knew how common it is
03:18and how many people struggle and some capacity with this.
03:22I hope that when people see my content,
03:24that yes, they see a woman who has facial hair
03:28and deals with weight gain and all of that kind of stuff.
03:31But I hope that more than that,
03:33that they see someone who is thriving
03:35and living their best life
03:37and that they can do that too,
03:39despite any of the things that they might be going through.