About This Book

When you’re first told that you have a particular medical condition, you’re given a whole heap of advice from different people, including your friends and your Aunty Nelly! And, more than likely, different bits of advice are contradictory.You may have looked up PCOS on the Internet, or leafed through a few books about it. You may even have read articles about it in popular
magazines, or read about some celebrity who cured herself by eating nothing but peanut butter sandwiches. Well, what’s a girl to do?

This book gives you down-to-earth and up-to-date advice. It tells you what’s worked and what hasn’t for PCOS sufferers, and takes you through what you can be doing for yourself to help reduce your PCOS symptoms, mostly in the area of diet and exercise. I also briefly cover the medical treatments available for PCOS, but only so that you’re aware of what’s available and what route your doctor or specialist may want to take you down.


How This Book Is Organised:

The great thing about For Dummies books is that you don’t have to read them all the way through. You can simply turn to the bit you want – a chapter, a section, even just a paragraph. The table of contents and the index help you out. This section gives you an idea of what lies ahead.

Part I: PCOS in a Nutshell

When you’re initially diagnosed with any condition, the first order of business is getting a good enough understanding so that 1) you’re not terrified or panicky and 2) you can make good decisions about how to take care of your health. So in this part, I give you basic information about PCOS: what it is,what causes it, what symptoms may accompany it, what changes you can expect as you age, and – most importantly – how you can take control and manage it.


Part II: Taking Control of Your Diet

Your diet can really help to control symptoms of PCOS. This part covers following a balanced low glycaemic index (GI) diet, whether simply to control PCOS or also to lose weight. As many PCOS sufferers tend to be overweight,this part is full of helpful and practical tips to keep the weight off.


Part III: Recipes for Life

Part 3 is very practical, explaining how watching the calories and the GI gets translated into actual meals and recipes. You don’t need to look at another recipe book with these chapters! As well as tips and advice, the recipes cover breakfasts (Chapter 6), lunches and starters (Chapter 7), snacks (in Chapter 8 and, yes, they are allowed!), and last but not least dinners and puds(Chapter 9). The recipes also include some indulgent ones and meals you can safely serve up at a dinner party.


Part IV: Other Helpful Stuff for PCOS

This part looks at other ways that you can help to reduce your PCOS symptoms,including the importance of physical activity. When you have PCOS you may well be tempted to try all sorts of other ‘cures’ that you find out about.Part 4 sorts out the good from the bad, and points out the downright ugly of these so called ‘cures’. PCOS is often accompanied by psychological problems such as depression, loss of control, and stress, so this part helps you find the right balance between body, mind, and spirit. Finally, this part gives you some really down to earth advice on what to do to ensure that you maximise your chances of getting pregnant and having a beautiful bouncing baby.


Part V: The Part of Tens

This part contains five lots of ten tips, which form a quick reference guide.Most of these tips are mentioned throughout the rest of the book, but this part brings them all together as a handy reference. You can find tips on the PCOS symptoms that you can diminish by using the advice in this book; how to distinguish the good diets from the bad; good reasons for following a low-GI diet; and ten superfoods you can incorporate into your diet to help reduce your PCOS symptoms. Finally, Chapter 18 lists ten organisations that offer support and advice to people like you who have PCOS or have a close friend or relative with it.