Can You Lose Weight with PCOS?
Weight loss is a complicated and often taboo area of PCOS health and wellness. We know that weight gain does not cause PCOS - and we also know that weight loss won’t cure it - but that doesn’t leave a lot of room for those who have PCOS and still desire to lose weight. Studies show even a small reduction in body fat may help PCOS symptoms.
To preface, this blog post is specifically speaking to people who experience weight gain as a symptom of PCOS and want to change it. If you are healthy and comfortable in your body, don’t change a thing.
In my experience, rapid and unexplained weight gain was the second hardest symptom of PCOS. I felt uncomfortable in my own skin and ashamed of what I thought I looked like. For me, I didn’t see a space to talk about losing weight without being bombarded with quick-fix fad diets or, on the flip side, judged for wanting to look and feel my best in the first place.
Now listen, I would love (!!!!) to remove myself and all women from the constraints of the beauty standards that our society has set.
Unfortunately in this lifetime, that seems unlikely. And as with all things, I think there is a happy medium between having a desire to change your body and not letting diet culture control you.
First things first, you can’t heal a body you hate.
Creating sustainable change means starting from a place of self-compassion and nourishing our bodies in ways that feel good - physically and emotionally. Placing harsh restrictions on what foods we can or can’t eat and punishing ourselves by undereating will not lead to the results that we’re looking for. It’s not diet culture, weight stigma, or fatphobia to add in healthy foods and behaviors that lessen the impact of insulin resistance and inflammation.
It took a really (I mean, really) long time to lose the weight I had gained after coming off the birth control pill and being diagnosed with PCOS. But with the right guidance, support, and accountability to learn what nutrition and lifestyle factors actually worked for me, it was possible. It’s possible for you, too.
As a Holistic Nutrition Health Coach, I help women lose weight and have a healthy relationship with food to look and feel their best living with PCOS. Through gentle nutrition and step-by-step lifestyle habits, long-term transformation is key for hormone balance. If this resonates with you, take control of your well being and set up a free consultation with me here.
