The Hemp Connection:
eating disorders

I have been out of the full-time eating disorder world for awhile now, so issues that are daily topics of debate for some colleagues aren't on my radar as frequently. One that just came to my attention is that the proposed diagnostic criteria for eating disorders for the new Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, version V, may not work in the favor of women with PCOS.

For those of you not familiar with this manual, it is a handbook written by the American Psychiatric Association containing diagnostic criteria for diagnoses ranging from schizophrenia to learning disabilities. Eating disorders are all included, and treatment teams at eating disorder centers use this manual daily as a way to diagnose and categorize treatment plans for their patients.

Here is the main link with further links to all three proposed eating disorder diagnostic criteria: anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and binge eating disorder.

The nice change that I am happy to see, is that binge eating disorder is actually a proposed official diagnosis. It has been very hard for men and women with this diagnosis to be taken seriously when asking for help. This step on the part of the APA is a much-needed advancement in eating disorders treatment.

What I'm very troubled by, is that there is no recognition, whatsoever, in any of these three diagnoses, of the hormonal changes that are an important part of the diagnosis and treatment of them.

--Loss of menses in anorexia nervosa, part of the diagnostic criteria in DSM-IV, has been removed from the proposed DSM-V version.

--Changes in menstrual health, though well-documented to exist in bulimia, are not noted as a diagnostic criteria.

--No mention of menstrual function exists in the new proposed criteria for binge eating disorder.

My personal belief is that one of the most crucial points of identification for PCOS…is eating disorder treatment. When a woman recognizes that her hunger and appetite mechanisms are not working, and she asks for help with this problem from eating experts, it seems to me that one of the very first things this team should be evaluating, is whether or not the problem has a physical/metabolic origin. If you try and treat a metabolic issue primarily as if it is a psychiatric and/or behavioral issue, you're likely going to have a lot of trouble succeeding in the treatment of that problem.

I'm not the only person who feels that way. A dietitian who completed the inCYST training and who worked in an eating disorder treatment center screened the population of that center for the potential presence of PCOS. The findings were so profound that she shared with me once that she believes screening for the presence of PCOS, by anyone working in eating disorders, should be a universal precaution.

I'm optimistic that some of the research I hope to fund with our up and coming nonprofit foundation will change the way eating disorder treatment professionals currently think. To not include neuroendocrine disruption in the diagnostic criteria, is a huge oversight and it keeps the professionals working in eating disorder treatment from improving their reported rates of treatment success from being higher than they currently are.

And that by the time I am hopefully long retired and working on my screenplay that has nothing to do with PCOS, the diagnostic criteria for the DSM-VI, for all three eating disorders, will certainly include menstrual irregularities.

As you saw yesterday, I was at an eating disorder conference last week.
It was exciting to see a lot of information coming out about the link between nutrition, the brain, and eating disorders.

Many of you may not be aware that it was my own research into this topic that got me started in PCOS research! My book was originally published in 2000, it was the very first book on eating disorders the American Dietetic Association ever published. It was a really tough book to write because at the time almost no one was even looking at the connection. And it turned out to be a bit of a difficult sell because the idea was new and I don't think the professional community was used to someone with my credentials (as opposed to an MD or PhD) was the one who was writing it.

To this day, people will tell me,"Yes, yours is the book with the picture of the brain on it!" That always feels great, as it took a lot of lobbying to even get that photo on the cover of the book.

The connection turned out to be a crucial one, and spending all that time reading all that research prepared me for creating inCYST. So I'm really glad I took the time to sit through all those library hours!

It is out of print at this point, but still available on on amazon.com for anyone who might be interested.

It felt a little lonely out there when I wrote that book, so it's really nice to hear other colleagues with an interest in the topic and to see it even make the program of a national conference!

I got my start in this specialty in a nontraditional fashion. Even though I did a lot of work in endocrinology initially, I gravitated into sports nutrition, and from there, eating disorders. I initially started my business thinking that it would be a resource center for eating disorders. But PCOS followed me. I kept getting phone calls from women looking for help with their eating disorder who mentioned they'd recently been diagnosed with PCOS. Thinking there must be some relationship, I started mentioning the symptoms of the syndrome at local mental health networking meetings. I started getting counseling referrals from eating disorder specialists--and they tended to be women who had initially been diagnosed with bulimia, put into traditional eating disorder treatment, and then a few years later,"relapsed". It was with this"relapse" that the PCOS was diagnosed.

I put that word into quotes, because you can only relapse from a disease you've been treated for…if the treatment you received is for the problem you have. The word blames the person for the diagnosis with the problem.

I have come to believe the problem may lie, in large part, with the caregivers. Eating disorder symptoms are primarily behavioral. There isn't a blood test you can administer, or an x-ray you can examine. And therefore, if you fit a certain criteria, you must have the disorder.

Just as diabetes won't respond to psychotherapy, PCOS, which in many cases is PREdiabetes, won't either.

The problem with PCOS is, the hormonal imbalances it renders can induce the very same behaviors that we use to diagnose eating disorders. Carbohydrate cravings are extreme. Hormones are so out of whack that the only thing that manages them, it seems, is extremes in diet and in activity. And God forbid, if no doctor caught on to your hormone problem and you decided to take things in your own hands…then you have control issues and you have an eating disorder.

What can make it especially challenging to diagnose PCOS, if it has progressed this far, is that the extremes in exercise and diet may, at least temporarily, suppress abnormal labs. It takes a skilled clinician to even see what's going on. I think back to my 3 1/2 years in an inpatient treatment center, and how many young women came to me complaining that as they started to refeed, they were craving carbohydrates. And because it was the treatment center's philosophy, I smiled back and told them all foods could fit.

A lot of eating disorder treatment is about the battle between the clinician, who wants his/her clients to believe that they can get back to eating everything in moderation, and the client wanting to tell the clinician that just isn't so, but playing the game as long as she needs to in order to graduate to the next level move toward discharge.

Last year I wrote to several hundred mental health practitioners who specialized in PCOS, introducing my company and the work I do with PCOS. I described the symptoms and explained to them what I just explained above. I received who knows how many polite responses, thanking me for my interest, but they worked with eating disorders, not PCOS, and there wasn't really a need for my information. I wondered how many thousands of women were sitting in therapy, being told if they just addressed their"issues"…they could beat the problem.

Don't get me wrong, I know there are plenty of issues in PCOS that psychotherapy can benefit. But there's a difference between anxiety over the prom and anxiety driven by excess cortisol levels resulting from a poorly balanced nervous system.

Sometimes I wonder if it's not the same diagnosis, being given a different name depending on the office in which it first shows up?

I sure hope at least some of those women have found my website on the Internet and have benefitted from the information I've learned and posted there since that tenure.

This is the final installment of this series, but probably the most important one to understand. Weight fluctuates. Even when you eat exactly as you've been advised to. Even if you weigh and measure everything out. It just does. And it's not 100% tied to what we eat. We cycle as humans, and those cycles are reflected in our weight.

We weigh more in the evening than we do in the morning. Of course we do, there's food in our bellies, and there's water we've drunk! In the morning we're dehydrated and hungry. So it is counterproductive to weigh in the morning as well as the evening and assume that any conclusion that the evening weight reflects how much fat we've gained or lost…is logical. I can't stop you from doing that…but I can tell you it isn't a scientific…or self-esteem promoting…technique.

If you have lost your menstrual cycles, it's important to remember that as they return, they will affect your weight. Your weight can fluctuate between 1 and 10 lbs. throughout the month. Every woman is different in this respect. Part of that is fluid, and many women (unfortunately, myself included) experience constipation as part of their PMS. It just happens, and it's a reflection that your body is working just as it should.

I used to notice when I worked more exclusively with eating disorders, that weights would often cycle a couple of months before the period actually returned. It was kind of like the reproductive system was ramping up and taking running starts at menstruating, and eventually got there. Since my clients didn't have the period to validate that this internal process was what was happening, it was hard for them to live with the temporary weight shift.

So in addition to, as I mentioned in the last post, being sure you compare a Monday weight to a Monday weight, etc., you may do best to compare a Monday weight from week one of your four week cycle to the Monday weight from four weeks earlier.

Most of my clients actually notice that they lose waist inches before they lose real weight. That's a really good sign the rest will follow. But you are going to have to look up from your scales and focus on the more important information in order to see that for yourself.

If you're addicted to getting on and off the scale multiple times in a day, perhaps you should hand your scale to a friend for safe keeping. It's not the most accurate indication of how you're doing with your nutrition plan. Really, all it's telling you is how hard the earth has to use gravity to keep you from floating off into space. Really? Really. Maybe it's time you gave up your astronaut fantasy and focused on what is important.

If your mood is stabilizing, your hormones are cycling, your cravings are dissipating, and your energy is better, that's what matters most. Take care of that…and the rest will follow.

This webinar will be broadcast at noon Eastern time on Friday, March 25, 2011. If you cannot make it live, it can be emailed to you after the broadcast is complete. It is the first installment of the 2011 PCOS Professional Training.

Is it PCOS? Is it an eating disorder? Is it both? Or are they one and the same?

This webinar will explore research on this topic and consider. Treatment considerations, nutritional, psychological, and medical, will be discussed.

If you registered for the 2010 training, this is part of your package. There is no need to pay, but please do RSVP so we know to connect with you on webinar day.

If you would like to register for the 2011 training (to be announced soon), your fee paid for this webinar will be applied toward that total.

Presenter: Monika M. Woolsey, MS, R
Cost is $40.

Register at this link:

http://yhst-34497545168533.stores.yahoo.net/the-important-relationship-between-pcos-and-eating-disorders.html

For more information about the 2011 comprehensive PCOS training and network membership, visit www.afterthediet.com/AftertheDietWorkshop.htm

Friday, March 25 · 12:00pm — 1:00pm

This webinar will be broadcast at noon Eastern time on Friday, March 25, 2011. If you cannot make it live, it can be emailed to you after the broadcast is complete.

Is it PCOS? Is it an eating disorder? Is it both? Or are they one and the same?

This webinar will explore research on this topic and consider. Treatment considerations, nutritional, psychological, and medical, will be discussed.

If you registered for the 2010 training, this is part of your package. There is no need to pay, but please do RSVP so we know to connect with you on webinar day.

If you would like to register for the 2011 training (to be announced soon), your fee paid for this webinar will be applied toward that total.

Presenter: Monika M. Woolsey, MS, RD

Register at this link.

I actually came into working with PCOS through the back door, as someone who had specialized in eating disorders treatment first. I'd left my work at a treatment center, launched an eating disorder website, and women started calling me saying,"I used to have an eating disorder, now I have something called PCOS…do you know anything about it?"

It happened enough times that I started researching the syndrome, realized there was not a lot of good, standardized information about PCOS, saw the niche that needed filling…and there you have it, the Cliff's Notes version behind the inception of inCYST.

The correlation between the two conditions is so strong that I often wonder if it isn't the exact same problem being given a different name and treatment, depending on whether or not a physician or a mental health professional makes the initial diagnosis.

Because diagnosis and treatment can start in two completely different environments, there can be problems with outcome.

--Physicians accustomed to other diagnoses that respond to a simple medication or surgical procedure, may not have the interest in considering the emotional aspects of PCOS. A dermatologist actually said to me once,"I just want to take care of skin cancer. I really don't want to deal with all of those emotions."

--Even dietitians who work with diabetes and can assume they have expertise with PCOS, may not have the patience to delve through the layers of hormones and emotions and reactions to imbalances between the two, to help a client understand how all of these pieces fit together.

--Psychiatrists may be prescribing medications that exacerbate hormone imbalances and PCOS, and not consider that the weight gain and other side effects are a huge reason for medication noncompliance.

--Psychologists may not understand that anger, even rage, and depression, is very strongly affected by hormone imbalances, not entirely based on what's going on in a person's world. They also need to understand that a client can be absolutely, completely, 100% compliant with every single assignment they're given…and STILL have cravings and not lose weight. They need to not project that disappointment on the client, but take it as a cue that they may be missing an important part of what's going on.

--Eating disorder specialists I've worked with seem to be much more comfortable working with"thin" women with eating disorders. I remember when I worked in the treatment center, the women with binge eating disorder never seemed to get the same sort of attention. There seemed to be a size discrimination even coming from professionals who were supposed to be advocating for the opposite.

--Body image specialists may not completely understand that with PCOS, there are genuine and valid body image issues that are not distorted thoughts. There is facial hair. Acne scarring. Hair loss. And the cysts on the ovaries can create a feeling of bloating that is valid, not imagined.

My personal feeling is that you cannot effectively and successfully treat PCOS unless you are helping both mind and body.

If you're a physician, you need to be sure that your client has adequate emotional support rather and not just increase a medication dosage because you're not seeing progress on lab reports that you'd like to see.

If you're a dietitian, you need to have access to a size-neutral psychologist who understands the syndrome and not be afraid to refer and work together as a team.

If you're a mental health professional, you need to understand that just because your client has a disease with a physiological basis, your place in their treatment is not threatened…in fact, it is more important.

You just need to enhance the number and type of issues you can help them with.

All of us need to stop attaching symptoms and needs to a certain weight. To assume that if we get down to a certain weight the syndrome magically goes away. It's there no matter what. I just had an enlightening conversation with a dietitian who has gone through my training, is embarking on her PhD, is normal weight, and teaching at the university level. Even though she's doing all the right things, she says she STILL has times when her appetite is out of control and it completely frustrates her.

The link between eating disorders and PCOS is very, very strong. We need to embrace it and study it so we can help women tackle both and accomplish great things in their course of managing the syndrome. All of us are going to have to step outside of our personal comfort zones as professionals to be effective, and to stop thinking we can help women with PCOS all on our own outside of the structure of a team. inCYST would like to make that a rewarding risk for anyone who chooses to take it.

So 2011 has been designated inCYST's year of eating disorder outreach. We've got two learning opportunities for you who are interested in learning more.

This coming Monday, at 12:30 pm Eastern time, inCYST dietitian Janenie Wade and her business partner Ellen Shuman will be on our radio show sharing more about their collaboration with A Weigh Out, an online and phone coaching program specifically designed to help women with binge eating disorder and able to account for the presence of PCOS. Come tune in and get your toes wet, and see what they're doing! Maybe it will inspire you to want to do more as well.

This spring, in Scottsdale, Arizona, the Binge Eating Disorder Association is holding its annual conference. It's a great place to start learning more (in a beautiful climate, I have to add!).

Of course, we're always looking for mental health professionals to join us at inCYST as well. Our training is open to anyone who would like to take this on. Just let me know if you're interested.

Malnutrition is another cause of low progesterone. If you automatically assume that this can't apply to you, your loved one or a patient, because sitting in front of you they are"overweight", consider the many ways someone can be malnourished.

You can be malnourished if you eat a lot of calories without nutritional value. Eating a lot of junk food, and very few fruits and vegetables, for example, can deplete the body's supplies of important vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants.

You can be malnourished if you eat so much of one kind of food that in the process of metabolizing it, you burn through important nutrients. That can happen if you eat a lot of carbohydrates, for example, it uses up a lot of chromium.

You can be malnourished if the list of foods you eat is very narrow--even if all of them show up somewhere on the Internet as the"world's healthiest". You need variety in order to get all the nutrients that makes your hormones work.

You can be malnourished if you take certain medications. The list of nutrients that can be depleted on certain medications is long. If your physician or dietitian have never checked yours, maybe it's a good service to request on your next visit.

You can be malnourished if you only consider"nutrition" to be what you weigh and you starve yourself in order to change that number. That happens a lot with PCOS. It is an erroneous belief that overweight causes PCOS. PCOS is worse if your weight is too high, but your weight does not cause it. Eating healthfully will steer your weight down, if you need to lose some, but starving yourself may keep you stuck at a weight you'd rather not be at.

You can be malnourished if you yo-yo diet. That is what happens when you put all of the above together in one scenario. Eating disorders and PCOS go hand in hand. Most of the women I work with are soooooo afraid of food on our first visit. They don't eat anything because they're scared that one indiscretion will elevate their blood sugar, prevent that pregnancy, make the scale go up…and then when they can't take it anymore, they binge on all the foods they tried to avoid.

That is simply no way to live!

I had the most enjoyable visit with a client a few days ago who was exactly like that when we first met. I was so surprised when, in the middle of our visit, she took me into her kitchen and showed me her refrigerator, loaded with all kinds of fruits and vegetables. Then she cooked me some green beans in red chile that she'd created. We finished the visit over mango slices sprinkled with chile powder. (For another post!) It was such a turnaround, and I was so happy to see that the focus had become all of the wonderful things you can DO with food, instead of all of the sacrifices you have to make if you want to"eat healthy".

She's pregnant now. At one point she rubbed her belly and said,"Thank you, baby!" That little miracle we are all extremely excited to meet did her mama a huge favor by introducing her to food as something fun, and something to enjoy.

I am hoping that all of you enjoy your Thanksgiving dinners and think about what you eat as how you NOURISH, not what you DEPRIVE yourself of. It may prove to be an important part of pumping up your progesterone.

Hello everyone,

If you've been enjoying the PCOS Challenge Radio Show, you'll love Sasha's latest venture! Dr. Van Dyke, Ellen Goldfarb, Gretchen Kubacky, and myself will be presenting more in-depth seminars on our areas of specialty.

Topics to be covered include:

Nutrition Essentials for PCOS--Monika M. Woolsey, MS, RD
Tuesday, October 20

Eating Disorders and PCOS--Ellen Reiss Goldfarb, RD
Tuesday, October 27

Living Happier and Healthier with PCOS--Gretchen Kubacky, PsyD
Tuesday, November 3

Hair Removal Solutions for Women With PCOS--Susan Van Dyke, MD
Tuesday, November 10

The Natural Solution to Overcoming PCOS--Julie Walsh, ND
Tuesday, November 17

All webinars will be held from 8:00 — 9:00 Eastern Time.

Space is limited for the live sessions, but if you can't make any of the live sessions, they will all be recorded and made available on CD.

Please join us! We've all been working hard on this project and it's all been especially for YOU!

Here is the link to the article:

http://www.womensonlinemagazine.com/losangeles/category/health-fitness/ask-dr-gretchen/.

Thank you to Christine Marquette and Michael Keele for such an informative program this morning!

If you're interested in hearing our discussions about vegetarian eating, home design for better health, and farmer's markets, please visit our show archives. It is the second show on the list. (I'm still learning how to work the software and didn't properly title it.)

This post is part of the Women's Health Blogfest. Please click on the links below to read more from other contributors! And thanks to everyone who took the time to participate!

In the almost 10 years I have been studying PCOS, I've learned much about what drives a woman's motivation to seek out information. The top reasons women find this blog are:

1. to improve their fertility,
2. to more effectively manage their weight, and
3. to feel and look better

As I've read and met women with the syndrome, I've learned that PCOS is about a whole lot more.

1. A woman's breastfeeding practices seem to significantly influence her child's hormonal health. Many women I've worked with were formula fed at a time when baby formula did not contain essential nutrients.
2. Whether or not you as a woman with PCOS were born to term, and potentially whether or not you were part of a multiple birth, seem to be red flags for PCOS risk later in life.
3. Just because you're a teenager, too young to want to conceive, or a woman who has already had her children, doesn't mean PCOS isn't something to be concerned about. It can mess with your mood, and in turn your energy level and relationships. It can provoke eating disorders. It can elevate your cholesterol. And…through its link to diabetes, it may increase your risk for Alzheimer's disease.

A blog attempting to tackle a syndrome with such widespread effects is not easy to manage. I've been working since we've started to find experts in areas outside of nutrition to complement what I as a dietitian can discuss and promote. I'm really excited to be partnering with lactation consultants to address breastfeeding issues specific to PCOS, and to have Gretchen Kubacky, PsyD, on board, to help us understand what PCOS can do to thinking, mood, and energy. We have one dietitian, Karen Siegel, who is also an acupuncturist, and another acupuncturist will soon be contributing her insight as well.

For the very first time, we are collaborating with Green Mountain at Fox Run in Ludlow, Vermont, to offer PCOS Program weeks this coming September! It's been a dream of mine to see this kind of program and there is no better place where it could be launched. Green Mountain is also participating in this blogfest, if you'd like to learn even more, be sure to read their contribution.

We don't just care about your ovaries. We care about all of you, from birth through retirement, and we hope that as we grow and diversify, the expert opinions you will see expressed here on this blog will address the many important ways we can keep our hormones working positively for us.

Thanks for stopping by our contribution to the Women's Health blogfest. If you enjoyed us, you can follow us with the signups you see here on the blog, through our Facebook inCYST group, or through Twitter, via @incyst.

For more information on women's health:

Angela White at Blisstree’s Breastfeeding 1-2-3 – Helpful Skills of Breastfeeding Counselors
Angie Tillman, RD, LDN, CDE – You Are Beautiful Today
Anthony J. Sepe – Women's Health and Migraines
Ashley Colpaart – Women's health through women
Charisse McElwaine – Spending too much time on the"throne?
Danielle Omar – Yoga, Mindful Eating and Food Confidence
Diane Preves M.S.,R.D – Balance for Health
Joan Sather A Woman's Healthy Choices Affect More Than Herself
Laura Wittke – Fibro Study Recruits Participants
Liz Marr, MS, RD – Reflecting on Family Food Ways and Women's Work
Marjorie Geiser, MBA, RD, NSCA-CPT – Healthy Women, Healthy Business: How Your Health Impacts a Powerful Business
Marsha Hudnall – Breakfast Protein Helps Light Eaters Feel Full
Michelle Loy, MPH, MS, RD – A Nutritionista’s Super Foods for Super Skin
Motherwear Breastfeeding Blog – How breastfeeding helps you, too
Rebecca Scritchfield, MA, RD, LD – Four Keys to Wellness, Just for Women
Renata Mangrum, MPH, RD – The busy busy woman
Robin Plotkin, RD, LD – Feeding the Appetites of the Culinary, Epicurious and Nutrition Worlds-One Bite at a Time
Sharon Salomon, MS, RD – Calories, longevity and do I care
Terri L Mozingo, RD, CDN & D. Milton Stokes, MPH, RD, CDN of One Source Nutrition, LLC – Crossing the Line: From Health to Hurt
Wendy Jo Peterson, RD – Watch Your Garden Grow

Hello everyone,

I missed the live version of this interview but stayed up until midnight listening to it. I was going to just catch the first few minutes but Ellen and Sasha did such a wonderful job of talking about body image, eating disorders, and PCOS, I was hooked!

It's such a great, thorough, and compassionate look at a part of PCOS that is not easy to discuss. A lot of physicians who treat PCOS are more skilled at managing your lab values than your emotions…and it can be frustrating to feel that such an important part of your disorder is not being acknowledged.

I do not intend to criticize physicians with my comment. They are often under pressure to see their patients in a tightly scheduled day, and if they're good at managing your insulin level, they need to be respected for what they're best at.

One of the things PCOS Challenge AND inCYST are trying to do, is provide support that sometimes simply is not available in a medical office visit. A major goal at inCYST, as well, is to network with physicians and help them understand the importance of recognizing this very important aspect of PCOS, and knowing where to refer their patients if they can't or don't want to be the caregiver offering emotional support.

If you've been feeling like that support is what you need, then a good start might be to listen to this broadcast. I guarantee, at the very least, you will learn that you're not alone. www.pcoschallenge.com

Thanks, Sasha and Ellen, for taking the time to talk so compassionately about such a challenging topic!

You've seen Ellen here, on her own blog, and in classes she teaches in West Los Angeles. Here is your opportunity to hear her talk on an issue important to followers of PCOS information.

'Eating Disorders, Body Image, and PCOS' on Sasha Ottey's PCOS Challenge!

Time: June 24, 2009 from 6pm to 7pm EDT
Location:"PCOS Challenge Radio Show"

Event Description:
On Wednesday, June 24, 2009 at 6pm EDT, Sasha Ottey speaks to Ellen Reiss-Goldfarb, a Registered Dietitian with a Private Practice in West Los Angeles, California. She was co-founder of"Through the Looking Glass", a support program for people with eating disorders and body images issues. She has worked as a clinical nutrition consultant and nutritional educator for over ten years. Her vision is to assist people in achieving their personal goals through nutrition education, as well as supporting their efforts in attaining balance in all areas of their lives. Besides Specialized work with Eating Disorders, Ellen has recently also expanded her practice to specialize in Women's hormonal issues which include PCOS and problems with Fertility. Ellen has been involved in nutrition and dietetics due to a personal passion to support and educate people on how to develop a healthy diet and lifestyle.

Tune in on Wednesday, June 24, 2009 at 6pm EDT to listen to Ellen impart her knowledge about eating disorders, body image, and the role they play in PCOS.

If you have any questions you would like to ask Ellen during the show, you can leave a comment here.

Or, if you would like to call in during the show to ask her a question, call (646) 929-0394.

If you would just like to listen, you are welcome to do so at
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/pcoschallenge

Yesterday I had the honor and pleasure of speaking to a group of eating disorder professionals in Santa Monica, California, about what happens when an eating disorder and PCOS collide in the same person.

Here are some of the statistics I shared with them:

**Women with PCOS have a higher lifetime incidence of depressive episodes, social phobia, and eating disorders than controls.

**Suicide attempts are seven times more common in women with PCOS than in other women.

**In a sample of women with facial hirsutism, the prevalence of eating disorders is 36.3% (Compared to about 10% in the general female population).

**Depression, anxiety, low self-esteem, and poor social adjustment are more common in participants suffering from an eating disorder, and the presence of PCOS was universal in eating disordered cases.

Those are some pretty heavy statistics…and the points I was making to the audience were that medical doctors who treat PCOS need to understand its emotional and behavioral components, and professionals who treat eating disorders cannot be effective if they don't understand the hormonal implications of PCOS. You need to know how to treat both.

The good news is, the professionals in the room were interested in helping. And inCYST dietitians happen to be very interested in disordered eating as well as PCOS. So we're ready and very eager to help you negotiate your way to solutions for both. inCYST providers Ellen Reiss Goldfarb, Diane Whelan, and Mary Donkersloot were with me in Santa Monica, putting a friendly face onto PCOS and eating disorder help and networking with capable and sympathetic doctors and psychologists. With the teambuilding that happened, I have to say, anyone in SoCal who needs help, is going to be in very capable hands!

Please check out our referral list and reach out to someone who can help.

If the topic of eating disorders and PCOS interests you, be sure to catch Ellen Reiss Goldfarb, RD, (West Los Angeles) in her interview on the topic on PCOS Challenge, Wednesday, June 24, 6 pm EDT.

REFERENCES

Mansson M, Holte J, Landin-Wilhelmsen K, Dahlgren E, Johansson A, Landen M. Women with polycystic ovary syndrome are often depressed or anxious--a case control study. Psychoneuroendocrinology. 2008 Sep;33(8):1132-8. Epub 2008.

Morgan J, Scholtz S, Lacey H, Conway G. The prevalence of eating disorders in women with facial hirsutism: an epidemiological cohort study. Int J Eat Disord. 2008 Jul;41(5):427-31.

We had a wonderful conversation this week with Janelle Fuchs, RD, LD, of the Emily Program's new Seattle outreach program.

Here is information on the open house she invited our listeners to. Please stop by and check it out!

Thursday, June 23, 2011
4:30 to 7 pm
The Emily Program
Lake Union Building
1700 Westlake Avenue North
Suite 650
Seattle, WA 98109

Appetizers and beverages will be served.

Please RSVP to Kari Fox by June 2 at
kari.fox@emilyprogram.com
1-888-364-5977, x 1169

Just a quick note of congratulations to inCYSTer Marissa Kent, one of the very first members of our network. Marissa just completed, and passed, her exam for her Certified Diabetes Educator (CD) examination. Marissa has a great combination of knowledge and skills pertinent to PCOS, including this CDE certification, and training in eating disorders and intuitive eating. Her practice is located in Mission Viejo, California.

Marissa is accepting registrations for her next intuitive eating group, starting in June 2010. If you are interested in learning more, please visit her website, http://www.marissakentnutrition.com/.

Congratulations, Marissa! That's no small deal what you've accomplished and we're excited that women with PCOS in Orange County have you to guide them toward balance and health.