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Grade nine was rough. At 15, I used too many million-dollar words, always had my nose in a book and couldn?t help but put my hand up in class. A lot. I was also slightly heavier than my friends?and I had terrible, painful acne and sparse but dark facial hair on my jaw line.
My dermatologist suggested the birth control pill to help balance my hormones. I didn?t have anything close to a regular cycle either, and the doctor assured me that the pill would make my periods more consistent. I didn?t see a downside. I was looking for anything to make my teenage years more bearable, and I didn?t think to ask for the reason, other than puberty and maybe my Italian lineage, behind my unfortunate symptoms.
It wasn?t until five years later that the alarm bells sounded. I?d gone off the pill to give my body a break and my period never returned. After nine months without menstruating, I sought the opinion of the on-campus doctor at my university, who took my history and suggested I might have a condition called polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS). What is PCOS"

I?d never heard of PCOS before. The doctor explained that it?s very common (affecting five to 10 percent of women aged 18 to 44), and that it boiled down to an abnormal level of androgens, or male hormones, coupled with abnormal levels of luteinizing hormone (LH, which stimulates ovulation). The imbalance of these hormones interferes with the normal function of the ovaries, delaying or ceasing ovulation and leadi...