The fuzz. The dark, coarse, scraglys. The beard. One of the most hated symptoms of PCOS in my community, and why wouldn’t it be!

Whether it’s just on the face, or excess hair growth on other body parts too- there’s nothing fun about being a super hairy woman. We are told it’s sexy to be as hairless as possible – but we need to also have beautiful, thick, voluminous and shiny hair on our heads at all times.

Well I say fuck those standards. Some women are hairy, and I’m one of them.

If you’re reading this, I bet you are too.

Did you know that the hair growth caused by PCOS is called Hirsutism?

Well, that’s the technical term.

Did you also know that diet and lifestyle intervention can help in reducing Hirsutism?

Oh yes- you read that right.

Now, every woman’s experience with hair growth is different, so results vary from woman to woman of course.

But isn’t it worth trying some stuff for a little while, even if it means one or two less days of shaving each week? I think so.

The #1 Reason PCOS Causes Hirsutism

The #1 reason PCOS causes hirsutism is elevated androgen hormones. Androgen hormones are the “male” hormones that get out of whack in women with PCOS. Androgen hormones include testosterone, DHEA and androstenedione, to name a few.

The hormone I’m focusing on today is testosterone, and it’s “naughty” form, DHT or dihydrotestosterone.

How Do Women Get High Androgens?

From insulin resistance.

Insulin resistance is when your body becomes desensitized to the signals of the blood-sugar balancing hormone, insulin.

So, you’re left with extra insulin AND extra sugar rolling around in the blood, and this is bad news bears.

Insulin is a storage hormone, so not only do some women get a beard, they also gain weight, especially in the belly area because insulin stores fat.

Back to Hirsutism. . .

When insulin resistance is present, it causes the theca cells of our ovaries to over-produce testosterone.

Elevated testosterone is often converted to that “naughty” form, DHT at the tissue site- this site being the hair follicles on your face and body.

Once at the hair follicle, elevated androgens can:

Speed up hair growth
Enlarge the hair follicle, creating thicker and darker hair

So you get a beard, and maybe even a “treasure trail” on your belly.

How Does Insulin Resistance Happen?

Insulin resistance is a process that happens over years. Years of shitty diet, sedentary lifestyle, and internalizing stress. Insulin resistance also happens due to uncontrollable factors, like pollution and toxins in the environment.

Additionally, with PCOS, there is a chronic, low-grade level of inflammation that contributes to insulin resistance.

In a healthy person, insulin is secreted the the pancreas in response to food (sugar) coming into the body. Insulin holds the “key” to your cells, so that sugar can get in to make energy.

Eventually, because of the factors listed above (and others), blood sugar is constantly high, so your body makes more insulin to compensate. Eventually, your cells change the locks and insulin can’t open the cells to let sugar in.

So your body makes even MORE insulin to desperately try and get those cells open for sugar, to no avail. So insulin remains circulating at high levels, creating many issues- including Hirsutism.

If you’d like to learn more about how to use FOOD and LIFESTYLE to reduce Hirsutism (and other PCOS symptoms like acne, weight gain and sucky periods), join me for my live PCOS Secrets webinar!

Simply click here to go check it out and choose a PCOS webinar date that works for your schedule. Can’t wait to see you there!

I am a beautiful, strong woman. I am a woman with PCOS. I have excess hair on my face, neck and other parts of my body. And that’s okay. It makes me feel really shitty sometimes. And that’s okay.

If you are like me and have excess hair on your body, especially in areas such as the face, neck, chest and abdomen, it is known as hirsutism. As women are supposed to have lower levels of androgen hormones like testosterone, the amount of body hair we have generally is much less than men. In women with PCOS, there are excess androgens, especially DHEAS, testosterone and dihydrotestosterone (DHT) which causes more (often darker) hair than we’d like, or typically see in women.

If you are wondering really how severe your hirsutism is, check out the Ferriman-Gallwey chart below, designed to help clarify the extent of your hirsutism.

Image Credit: http://bit.ly/1SAFGxP

Over the years of balancing my own PCOS and working with women who have PCOS, I have discovered that there are a few natural remedies to help you conquer (or at least reduce) your hirsutism. While there are more permanent solutions like electrolysis or laser hair removal, and there are prescription drugs for this issue like Spironolactone, we won’t be talking about those here.

Natural Remedies for Hirsutism

Diet

As with almost any health condition, maintaining a healthy diet is so, so important. When it comes to PCOS, we must think about regulating insulin and blood sugar, as insulin resistance is a big part of what aggravates PCOS.

Here are a few tips for a proper PCOS diet:

Eat green vegetables with at least 2 meals per day to help balance blood sugar and detoxify excess estrogens
Enjoy a low to moderate carbohydrate diet
Choose non-starchy vegetables and starchy vegetables instead of grains and baked goods like bread and crackers
Include at least 20g protein with every meal like chicken, fish, shellfish, some legumes, turkey
Make healthy fats a part of every meal and snack: think nuts/seeds, avocados, coconut oil, ghee, olive oil
Drink lots of fresh, filtered water between meals, about half your body weight in ounces per day

Reduce Stress

You may not know this, but our stress-managing adrenal glands make androgen hormones too. When we get really stressed, from kids, the commute, finances or anything else, we create more stress hormones. Stress hormones like cortisol negatively impact our blood sugar control in certain situations, and unmanaged stress could lead to an increase in androgens, especially DHEAS. Androgens like these can be converted into DHT, a more potent form of testosterone at the tissue level- inciting acne, hirsutism and hair loss.

For my personal health, I was absolutely not able to regulate my cycles, reduce my hirsutism and other high-androgen symptoms like acne until I made a conscious effort to reduce my stress in any way possible. Sure, you can’t always avoid stress, but how you react to stress matters.

Here is a sample of what I do to reduce my stress:

Daily yoga, meditation and walking outdoors (weather permitting)
Turning off all devices at least 1 hour before bed
Enjoying hot baths
Drinking calming teas like lavender, chamomile, lemon balm, tulsi and others
Journaling
Spending time in nature
Sex

For even more ideas on taking care of yourself to help your PCOS, check this out.

The Ultimate PCOS Checklist | The Hormone Diva

Balance Insulin

As I mentioned above, balancing insulin is super important for PCOS. A happy bonus is that it often leads to weight release!

Here’s how:

Enjoy a delicious plant-heavy diet like I outlined above
Reduce and manage your stress as much as you can
Move your body regularly
Try some insulin-sensitizing supplements, as I’ve outlined below
Try some of these other ideas

Supplements

There are many supplements out there that can help with PCOS and androgen symptoms like hirsutism. A whole book could be written on them! Below I’m focusing on 5 supplements that have some good science behind them and that I’ve seen helpful clinically in the women I work with.

NAC: N-acetyl Cysteine is an amino acid (protein building block) that has been shown many times over to be beneficial for PCOS. Specifically for hirsutism, one study showed that androgen levels in the body and corresponding symptoms like hirsutism were reduced after using NAC for only 5 days! The daily dose in this study was 1,200mg per day.

Green Tea: A delicious and highly antioxidant substance, green tea is one of my favourite beverages. The benefits of this tea are so numerous, and luckily supplement-makers have developed capsules so we can get loads of this great tea into our bodies. Green tea contains epigallocatechins, which may inhibit 5-alpha-reductaste, the enzyme that converts testosterone into DHT (the hirsute-making hormone).

Spearmint: While I’m more of a peppermint girl myself, the benefits of spearmint might outweigh the taste in my opinion. And for those like me, spearmint can also be found in capsule form. Spearmint has been shown to reduce levels of free testosterone in the blood (reducing the amount that could be converted into DHT) and perhaps for that reason increased the perceived quality of life in women with PCOS who were studied when drinking spearmint tea.

Licorice: Another common food item, licorice root has a huge history in herbal medicine as a remedy for many things, including menstrual cycle difficulties and signs of hyperandrogenism. It has been shown to reduce total testosterone in the blood, which could potentially be beneficial for hirsutism. Note that taking licorice is not recommended if you have high blood pressure. Clinically I find that a tincture (alcohol-based extract) of licorice works well.

Reishi: A mushroom with the latin name of ganoderma lucidum, reishi has many medicinal benefits. For hirsutism, it is believed that reishi reduces the activity of 5-alpha-reductase, like green tea, reducing the amount of testosterone that gets converted into DHT. I like to put some reishi mushroom powder into smoothies.