Thinking like a PCOS Diva works much the same way. In order to thrive and be of service to those around you, you must first love and take care of yourself (or put on your oxygen mask). You are no good to anyone if you can’t breathe.
Taking care of yourself is not selfish. It is necessary.
The key to thinking like a PCOS Diva is knowing that you deserve to feel good. Again, this is the critical mindset shift that will keep you on the path to thriving with PCOS. You must love yourself and recognize that you are worth the time, effort, and expense of being healthy and happy.
When you feel this self-worth, put effort into self-care, and really invest in self-love, the pieces will come together. You will feel better, and when you do, you will radiate this love to others. Your capacity to do good and be of help increases exponentially.
No, this does not mean you become an obnoxious diva, only worried about herself. You will not be demanding only green M&Ms in your dressing room. Holiday dinners with the family do not need to completely conform to your dietary choices. Self-love manifests itself in self-care. It means that you will respect yourself and your health enough to make time to care for yourself (mentally and physically), make self-respectful choices about what to eat and how to fit movement into your day, and speak to yourself in an encouraging and positive manner.
“Rest and self-care are so important. When you take time to replenish your spirit, it allows you to serve others from the overflow. You cannot serve from an empty vessel.”
—ELEANOR BROWNN
Six Ways You Can Practice Self-Care
1 Eat like a PCOS Diva. In the next chapter, we will discuss how to eat like a PCOS Diva. You will learn new habits that reach way beyond what to eat. You will learn how to plan meals and grocery shop, avoid pitfalls and weather cravings, and read your body’s signals and where to invest time and money in choosing the right foods to nourish your beautiful body.
2 Move like a PCOS Diva. In Chapter 5, we will explore ways to take self-care in a new direction: movement. You will find ways to move that you enjoy and look forward to doing. Stress relief, symptom relief, and joy will be the products of your work in this chapter.
3 Reduce stress. We have already spoken a little about stress. You know that stress releases the hormone cortisol, which wreaks havoc on your other hormones, immune system, and thyroid. Throughout the 21-Day Plan, we will practice stress relief as a critical part of self-care. You will learn how movement can reduce your stress levels. You will learn to meditate in order to center yourself and prepare for the stresses that you encounter every day. You will practice mindfulness and learn to savor seemingly mundane moments (and even stressful ones). Finally, you will learn to diffuse stressful situations with on-the-spot stress relief.
4 Get adequate sleep. We don’t need research to tell us that sleep is critical for brain function, but there’s plenty of it out there. We’ve all experienced the groggy feeling, poor decision making, and memory loss after a night of little or no sleep. Did you know that studies also show the clear relationship between sleep, food consumption, weight regulation, and metabolism? Chronic sleep deprivation impacts every system and hormone in your body. Your body’s ability to signal when to eat, process glucose, and repair cells are all affected. As a result, you become forgetful, can’t process insulin and glucose properly, have increased inflammation, make bad food choices, and gain weight. There are countless reasons for this sleep deprivation, including cortisol or melatonin imbalances, medications, medical conditions, and lack of self-care. In the 21-Day Plan, you will learn sleep habits that will (most nights) help you get the rest you desperately need.
5 Find a creative outlet. Using your creativity is healing, whether you write, dance, scrapbook, draw, paint, quilt, sing, play an instrument, or color (I love adult coloring books). Any sort of artistic expression can stimulate stress relief and help you express yourself. Throughout the 21-Day Plan, you’ll make time to tap into your creative side as part of your self-care regimen.
6 Indulge. Being a PCOS Diva isn’t about deprivation and denial. That is no way to live. Being a PCOS Diva is about living your best life and taking steps to make that possible. An important part of that is taking time for yourself, even just a few minutes per day, and replacing old destructive habits with joyous, indulgent, positive ones. Think about how you reward yourself or relax. Do you grab a pint of Ben & Jerry’s? Sack out on the couch with movies for the afternoon? It might feel good to do those things in the moment, but afterward you are left feeling lousy. Consider replacing these habits with others that make you feel great long term. In the 21-Day Plan, you will begin your very own “Sweet Stuff” list of things you can do to indulge a little. We all need them.
Starting Today
You will start thinking like a PCOS Diva. You will stop being a victim and partner with your body. You will do your best to be patient with yourself, acknowledge that you deserve to feel great, and take the steps to be that way. You will begin and end your days with gratitude for all you have and the beauty around you.
These invisible changes will soon have very visible results that benefit both you and the people around you. You are not being selfish when practicing self-care. You are investing in yourself in order to reap rewards for your friends, family, and coworkers. They will notice the difference. But what’s more important is that you will.
I was raised in the 1980s and 1990s, the era of margarine, diet soda, and fat-free everything. As a teen, I wouldn’t have been caught dead with a package of Oreos, but a fistful of fat-free Snackwells cookies sounded like a good choice. Wash them down with some Diet Coke, and I had a good “skinny” snack. Looking back, it is no wonder I felt terrible. Not only was I not getting the nutrients I needed, but I was filling my body with artificial chemicals and inflammatory foods that wreaked havoc on my hormones.
The pattern continued into college. My body was crying out for protein, and I was answering the cry by secretly binging on peanut butter. I should take this moment to apologize to my old college roommates. I admit it. I was the Peanut Butter Bandit. All those jars of peanut butter that went missing—that was me and my PCOS. I’m sorry. I didn’t understand what my cravings were trying to tell me, and your stores of peanut butter paid the price.
To make matters worse, being a vegetarian was trendy and sounded like a healthy option, so I jumped on the bandwagon. Unfortunately, I wasn’t a particularly good vegetarian. I ate almost no protein. Tofu sounded weird, and beans were not glamorous. I filled in the space where lean protein should have been with carbs.
Later in college, when I no longer had to eat in the cafeteria, I gave up vegetarianism and discovered both that I actually liked to cook and that I was pretty good at it. I began hosting dinner parties and cooking for myself and friends on a regular basis. I didn’t put it together until much later, but I started feeling better. I was finally giving my body what it craved—lean, clean meats and vegetables!
A Healthy Relationship with Food
Let’s talk about the second most important part of the PCOS Diva lifestyle: food. Many (dare I say most) women with PCOS have an adversarial relationship with food. In fact, a startling number of us have some level of eating disorder. Whether it is occasional binge eating, bulimia, or anorexia, our dysfunctional