Latest / Cry It Out Loud: Navigating Infertility, Miscarriage, Stillbirth, Infant Loss & Pregnancy After Loss / PCOS, Infertility, Cycles & Your Path to a Healthy Baby

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PCOS, Infertility, Cycles & Your Path to a Healthy Baby · Cry It Out Loud: Navigating Infertility, Miscarriage, Stillbirth, Infant Loss & Pregnancy After Loss

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  Crying Out Loud, a podcast by Chasing the Rainbows with your
• 0:20
  host Bernice Quisenberry. Welcome back to Cried Out Loud,
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  the podcast where no fertility struggle, miscarriage, or
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  pregnancy loss is too heavy to talk about.
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  Today, we're talking about the journey many women know all too
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  well, navigating PCOS, irregular cycles, and fertility challenges
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  that come along with it. If your cycles are
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  unpredictable, you're not alone. And you're if you're not
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  ovulating or you're feeling exhausted, frustrated, or like
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  your body isn't ready for a baby, this episode is for you.
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  Because the truth is, fertility struggles don't mean you're
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  broken. And there is a path forward.
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  Joining us is Doctor Angela Potter, a renowned PCOS and
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  fertility expert who has been featured on CBS, Fox, EBCNBC,
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  and The CW Doctor Potter specializes in helping women
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  uncover the root causes of their PCOS struggles and creating
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  individualized plans to regulate cycles, restore ovulation, and
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  prep for a healthy pregnancy and baby.
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  Doctor Potter, thank you so much for being here.
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  Bernice, I am thrilled to be here.
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  Thank you for having me. Absolutely why?
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  Can't wait for our community to get to know you.
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  And I would love for you to start out.
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  You know why you focus on PCOS, what PCOS is, You know all of
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  those initial things for everyone to hear.
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  Yes, So PCOS, I love working with women who have PCOS.
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  And, you know, I've studied as a midwife and a nutritionist and a
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  doctor and I've been just in love with hormones and helping
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  women to go through this process.
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  And, you know, a few years back, all of a sudden I was getting
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  all these women who had PCOS in my practice and they were saying
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  to me, I've been working with a doctor and they tell me that
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  medication is the only way forward.
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  I've tried it. And now they're telling me IVF
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  is the only thing. And I, I don't feel like that's
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  right for my body. Is there anything else?
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  And we started working on things and they started getting their
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  periods back, started getting positive ovulation, getting
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  pregnant naturally. And I just realized how deep of
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  a hole this is in the medical community.
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  How so many women with PCOS are just getting dismissed and being
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  told that, oh, there's nothing that we can do to help you when
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  in fact, there is. And so that is what is just, you
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  know, jump started my passion with working with these women.
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  And it's so rewarding to be able to see these women who were
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  told, oh, you can't get your period back because you have
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  PCOS or oh, you're not going to be able to get pregnant
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  naturally. And then they're actually seeing
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  those results. Thank you so much.
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  Yes, and and you asked, you know, let's dive into what PCOS
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  is too. So everyone's clear on that.
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  So PCOS is polycystic ovarian syndrome and that it it's a
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  syndrome. So it's made-up of different
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  systems and symptoms to create this syndrome.
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  OK. So it's, that makes it a little
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  more complex because you have to, there's three different
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  pillars for the PCOS diagnosis. You have to fall into two of
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  those in order to be diagnosed that you know, I do you want to
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  go down that clinical path. I can explain more about that.
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  But what do you think your listeners would like the most?
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  Absolutely, yes, go ahead. Yeah, if the two, I would love
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  to understand, you know, also the three pillars and and how to
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  get diagnosed. Oh sure.
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  So, so if you are having irregular periods, can't get
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  pregnant, and you want to know if you have PCOS, you need to go
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  in and talk with your doctor. And your doctor's going to look
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  for three different pieces of information.
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  One is cysts on the ovaries, and those are typically diagnosed
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  through an ultrasound. It's surprising to a lot of
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  people that you don't have to have cysts on the ovaries in
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  order to be diagnosed with PCOS, right?
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  Even though it's in the name, you might not have cysts, you
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  fall into the other two, but you're still diagnosed.
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  So that's one. Another one is elevated androgen
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  hormones, testosterone being our most well known androgen
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  hormone. That is the hormone that's
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  common, that's that's the natural reproductive hormone in
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  a person with male organs. And so for those of us with
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  female organs, we have a little bit of testosterone, but when we
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  get a lot of of testosterone, that shuts down ovulation.
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  It makes symptoms like hair on the chin, acne, things like
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  that, that are really common with PCOS.
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  So that's the diagnostic criteria #2 and the third one is
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  ovulation issues. So it's kind of a blanket thing.
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  We can diagnose that through looking at progesterone levels.
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  We can use ultrasound to look if somebody's ovulating or not.
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  But really it's just OK if you're having irregular cycles,
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  you know, if your cycles are 75 days long or you haven't had a
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  cycle in the past year or two, even if you have 45 day cycles
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  but you are not ovulating, any one of those situations would
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  put you into that place where you're having ovulation issues.
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  So again, if you fall into two out of three of those, then you
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  fall into that PCOS diagnosis. Well, thank you, Angela for
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  really shining light on that because I was one of them
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  Starting, I got my period later in life.
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  I was around 16 years old. I was constantly in my OBGYN
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  office because I was having really painful periods, was
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  experiencing issues like us women were very in tune with our
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  bodies and just knowing something was wrong.
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  And each time, you know, being told, here's birth control
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  pills, everybody has painful periods, kind of suck it up.
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  And it wasn't until my late mid 20s that finally I was diagnosed
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  by my doctor. And she, you know, you have PCOS
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  and This is why you're dealing with infertility struggles.
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  This is why, you know, you've had I had cysts removed.
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  No doctor ever explained it was PCOS during that time.
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  You know, and, and it's almost like gaslighting an individual
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  who, you know, for 10 years has been saying there's something
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  wrong with me. And I know this, but just being
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  told you no, no, no. And wondering why, you know, I
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  was only getting my cycle every other month, like all the
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  different things. And, you know, hearing that and
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  going through that, you know, it really resonates because I was
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  like, yes, yes, yes, like there's check marks.
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  And it was interesting because as my doctor was testing me for
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  PCOS and she was like, you know, hair on the chin.
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  She's like, I can tell right now, there's like already some
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  things that I see on you and like acne and things like that,
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  that are contributing factor. And I was like, interesting.
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  So, you know, because I was like, oh, I just think this is
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  normal. And it's not, you know, it's
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  from different conditions. Yes, I, I'm so glad that you
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  share that and you bring that up because, you know, we're talking
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  about myths and roadblocks to pregnancy.
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  And that's one of them that's a big roadblock is just being
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  given a medication before figuring out the why of OK, why
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  are your periods irregular? Why do you have really painful
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  periods? Why are you getting the hair on
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  your chin? And you know, we live in this
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  this society really that we think or we're being told that
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  one pill fixes this one symptom. And so we want like, yeah, this
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  one pill to fix PCOS, everything that's going on with PCOS.
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  And 9 times out of 10, it doesn't work.
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  That one pill, you know, and I'm specifically talking about like
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  ovulation medications. And because that's, you know,
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  that is the recommendation for someone who wants to get
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  pregnant with PCOS to get on letrozole or Clomid.
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  And so these women are going in and being told, well, this
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  medication will fix it, when in fact, that medication has one
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  job and that's to get the egg out of the ovary, which of
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  course we want that egg out of the ovary.
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  But if that's not the reason why you aren't pregnant or why
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  you're having irregular cycles, then that medicated cycle, that
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  medication is not going to solve the issue for why you're having
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  those issues. And so that's a very common
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  roadblock to to baby to having optimal fertility.
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  Absolutely. Thanks, Angela.
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  Yeah. And I, you know, please share,
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  you know, the other roadblocks, you know, that are so crucial
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  for our listeners to hear. Well, so another 1A roadblock to
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  getting pregnant is not having an individualized plan because
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  which weaves into that. Why so often women tell me this,
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  that they feel like they're just being put into A1 size fits all
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  box and they're like, but I don't feel like I fit into a
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  box. And that's so key to, to
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  understand that about your body. And that's true.
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  And that is why because if you are going forward with a
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  fertility plan that is inside a box, right?
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  Just everyone who has PCOS goes into this box and it gets the
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  same exact treatment plan, then that's not going to answer that.
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  Why? And so getting an individualized
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  plan is the #1 hands down most important step to get in order
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  to understand what's actually going on in your body with PCOS.
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  And if you're not getting an individualized plan, that's a
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  roadblock because you're not able to answer that why?
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  And you want to know well, why are, why haven't you had a
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  period since last March? There is the information, you
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  know, a lot of doctors like you were saying, like, you know, we
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  can't do anything for you or oh, just this medication will take
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  care of it. But our bodies are meant to be
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  cyclical like this. If we have female organs, our
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  bodies are natural rhythm is in a way that we will have, you
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  know, roughly every month have a bleed.
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  And so if you're somebody who hasn't had a period since last
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  March or it comes every 75 days, there is on your lab report.
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  It's not like we're just pulling this out of thin air on your lab
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  report. There will be the hormones that
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  are out of place or the nutrient deficiencies there that will
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  point exactly to why that's happening.
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  And so if you've been told, well, we don't know what to do,
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  you need to then work with a doctor, doctor like myself who
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  is able to pinpoint that, to really individualize the care
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  for you so that you can understand what's going on in
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  your body. And then you get a plan that
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  addresses that. And that's when that roadblock
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  goes away and that path to baby opens up.
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  That is so important, you know, that individualized evidence
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  based root cause instead of blanket statements or being
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  lumped into, you know, a general population because honestly, you
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  know, we all our bodies are different.
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  Our cycles are different. What is going on inside of our
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  bodies is different. What we consume is different.
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  Like everything is so different, you know, and and celebrate our
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  differences. But in this case, it's like
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  educate to advocate for yourself.
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  And, you know, we're given a certain timeline to be able to
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  get pregnant, you know, like the window and already feeling like
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  a ticking time bomb. And so getting more concrete
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  answers to and about you is, you know, very significant in this
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  matter. Yes, because the diagnosis of
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  PCOS, by definition, it's not just, you know, streamlined.
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  One thing makes you have PCOS. No, people have different issues
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  that create their PCOS, so why should we expect that one
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  treatment treats everything with PCOS?
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  That's that's the big missing link there.
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  Absolutely. Yeah.
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  So, you know, when we're talking about more roadblocks, when you
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  know, and, and I say this with such deep, you know, the path to
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  baby can be so long and difficult.
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  And a lot of times the women who are approaching me, wanting to
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  work with me, you know, have been trying to get pregnant for
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  years. And so of course they're, they
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  wanted to get pregnant months ago, right?
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  And you know, we honor that. And that's it's very difficult
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  mental, emotional, spiritual place to be.
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  But because PCOS is interacting in so many different systems in
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  the body, the, the path forward that brings the best results is
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  1, where you can optimize your health first before jumping to
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  medications or jumping to procedures like IVF.
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  And that it does, you know, it does take some time.
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  It takes a few months to really help the body come back into
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  regular rhythm. You know, I'll share a story
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  about this. I was working with somebody who
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  was trying to get pregnant for over 10 years before trying or
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  before starting to work with me. So working with me was kind of a
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  last chance. She just knew she was like,
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  there's got to be something else because her previous doctor was
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  telling her things like, well, you know, no diet or lifestyle
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  is going to help PCOS. Like, you really shouldn't try
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  anything because nothing but these medications are going to
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  help. And her, in her mind, she's
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  like, OK, but that just doesn't really sit right to me.
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  So that's when she reached out to work with me.
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  And so I did some lab testing for her, some more comprehensive
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  testing than her previous doctors had done for her and
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  found some very obvious reasons why she wasn't ovulating for
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  her. There was some thyroid issues,
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  there was some gut health issues.
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  And so we first, you know, having that information in front
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  of her was great. And again, for her, you know,
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  she had been trying for over 10 years.
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  And so she was so frustrated and heartbroken, but also was
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  holding on to hope. Once she saw this information,
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  it was like, oh, This is why I haven't had a regular period in
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  so long. And so we worked on that.
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  Then I was able to get her a plan that addressed specifically
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  those hormones that were out of balance and get her on a plan
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  that helped gut health and her she had a 30 day cycle right
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  after that she had 430 day cycles in a row as she moved
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  forward again. You know, four months that's it
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  can feel like a long time when you wanted to get pregnant
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  months ago, right? But but when you are doing the
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  work, when you know what it is, that's, that's that block and
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  you're actually getting a plan that's fixing it, that makes
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  those four months, you know, more worthwhile.
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  And for this person in particular, you know, it was
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  after those four months, then she was pregnant naturally.
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  And so after so many years of not getting answers, it just
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  took her spending that time to optimize her health and then
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  seeing what could open up from there.
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  Oh, it's so beautiful. And I mean, what a long haul
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  journey, like we call them long haulers, you know, and you know,
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  being on it for years and just feeling like each time it's like
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  all your hopes and dreams just keep getting shattered and like
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  your new lows and bottoms just keep getting lower and lower,
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  you know, during and it's so much complex trauma with trying
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  to conceive and on an infertility journey and hearing
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  this, it's like, Oh yes, it's so beautiful that you were able to
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  Angela recognize different things that weren't being picked
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  up already that she could change and you helped her change to get
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  healthy cycles. It's beautiful.
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  Yes, yes, because I will say that most women who I'm talking
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  with, and I'm talking with a lot who have PCOS, you know,
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  pregnancy and having a baby is the ultimate goal.
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  Yes, but there's also this. I want to have a baby, but I
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  want to be healthy. I want to feel like my body's
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  working as it's supposed to. And even if it is going to take
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  a lot longer for me to get pregnant, I want to see that my
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  body's changing, that I can have a regular period.
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  And even if I could have a regular period and start seeing
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  ovulation happening, at least I know there's a chance.
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  Yes. And feeling like then, you know,
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  'cause women will say to me, if I haven't had a period in so
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  long, is my body even set up for a healthy pregnancy?
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  And that's my goal. It's not just to get pregnant,
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  it's to have a healthy pregnancy.
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  And so there's this underlying tone of, but I want to feel
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  healthy while I'm going through this process for to have my
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  baby, but to show up every day for myself, for my partner, and
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  to just feel good. Yes, absolutely.
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  Wow. And so then when we talk about,
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  we're talking about four different roadblocks.
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  The last one I would say is, you know, thinking that one pill
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  will fix everything. And if you're moving through a
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  fertility journey with that mindset that, OK, I just will
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  take one more round of this one medication and that's going to
• 19:39
  fix it all. That's a roadblock.
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  And it's a hard truth because I so much what a magic pill to
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  give people, right? But it just, it's not out there.
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  It's specifically with PCOS. You know, I've been in practice
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  for over 10 years. It it just PCOS in particular,
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  you need to see take this whole body approach to fertility.
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  And you know, when we get really hyper focused on the ovaries and
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  getting that egg out of the ovary as the medication does,
• 20:19
  then we miss the why, we miss that root cause and we miss what
• 20:24
  is going on that's standing in the way.
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  And it's absolutely possible to figure out what else it is, as
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  long as we open up the the viewpoint and and move it away
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  from thinking that one pill is going to fix everything.
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  It is that holistic, like systematic, like our whole
• 20:48
  entire systems and all of it being in tuned because all of
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  them play a role in sustaining a pregnancy.
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  Everything. And yes, I just, I feel this so
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  much, Angela, when you're speaking.
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  Yes, yes, I love that because for so long in our medical
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  worlds, it's we've looked at the human body from this very
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  mechanistic perspective. Like OK, you have, you're having
• 21:16
  trouble getting pregnant. So here's something that will
• 21:18
  help that like, oh, you have a headache.
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  So this one thing should help that process for your headaches.
• 21:26
  And if that helps, oh, in in many ways, right, emergency
• 21:31
  services, urgent care, that you know, you have a broken arm, you
• 21:35
  need pain medication and a cast, right?
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  Like there's absolutely places where that works.
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  But when that's the whole medical perspective and we're
• 21:46
  putting it into places like PCOS, that's when we say, see
• 21:51
  the system failing. And so many women are finding
• 21:56
  that they're being told they're, they're on that path of that
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  very mechanistic approach. As in we're going to give you 5
• 22:06
  rounds of letrozole. If none of those work, then IVF
• 22:09
  is your only next step. Now, none of those are a bad
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  thing, not, not at all. But it's just the, the timing
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  because if, as we've talked about, right, if you can
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  optimize your body first, then imagine having regular cycles,
• 22:27
  getting ovulation tests and like, for whatever reason, you
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  just can't get pregnant. Imagine then trying a medication
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  to get you, you know, over that finish line and how different of
• 22:40
  a scenario that is then just from the very beginning being
• 22:44
  like, well, I'm trying these medications one after another.
• 22:49
  Yes. Which really leads us into, you
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  know, we wanted to talk about the biggest myth with fertility
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  and PCOS. And what I see after talking
• 23:00
  with countless women is that the biggest myth is that as a person
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  with PCOS trying to get pregnant, you fit into a box and
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  your path forward should be the same as everyone else who has
• 23:17
  PCOS. And that's just not true because
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  you're you do not fit into a box.
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  Your symptoms do not fit into a box.
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  Your PCOS diagnosis does not fit into a box.
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  And we're being fed that information so often from
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  articles online or even if you're sitting in a doctor's
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  appointment, being told that, well, you know, this is the path
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  forward. And no, no diet or lifestyle is
• 23:53
  going to help PCOS when that's, that's simply not true.
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  And I have hundreds of case studies to back that up to say,
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  no, It's what what leads to you getting over that finish line
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  and in reaching your goals is understanding what exactly it is
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  about your PCOS that's setting you up for your regular cycles
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  for not being able to ovulate and really getting that
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  understanding of what it is that's going on with you.
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  And as we've talked about, OK, it might not be specifically
• 24:35
  your reproductive hormones like estrogen or progesterone.
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  It could actually be your insulin, your blood sugar.
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  It could actually be your cortisol better than creating
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  this cascade, this waterfall effect that then impacting your
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  ovulation and your being able your ability to have a regular
• 24:55
  cycle and to be able to get pregnant.
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  But it's just going completely missed because you're in this
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  this conveyor belt, I like to call it, of just hyper focused
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  on the ovaries and your lady parts, right?
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  Just on this one process and it's missing actually what is
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  actually keeping you from understanding why your body is
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  having these irregular cycles and knowing what to do about
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  that? Wow, Angela, thank you.
• 25:29
  Thank you for leaving our listeners with that biggest, you
• 25:34
  know, myth and that's huge. And also for coming on and
• 25:38
  explaining all the roadblocks. And for anyone listening, we are
• 25:41
  going to do a follow up podcast all around the three biggest
• 25:48
  misconceptions and we're going to debunk those together on
• 25:52
  here. So, you know, stay tuned and
• 25:54
  listen in for that. But thank you for breaking down
• 25:57
  with such compassion and clarity.
• 25:59
  For anyone listening, remember, you're not broken.
• 26:01
  Your cycles are not the enemy, and a healthy pregnancy is
• 26:04
  absolutely possible. So thank you, Angela.
• 26:07
  Yes. Oh, thank you so much for having
• 26:10
  me. Absolutely.
• 26:12
  If you are navigating PCOS, infertility or pregnancy loss,
• 26:16
  or if you want to honor your journey, volunteer, donate, or
• 26:19
  host an event, Chasing the Rainbows is here for you.
• 26:21
  Visit chasingtherainbows.org for free support, trauma informed
• 26:24
  resources, and a community that understands.
• 26:27
  Thank you so much for tuning in.