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Katy Forand

@kforand

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☕️Coffee loving cat 🐱 mom, PCOS Yogi🧘🏽‍♀️ /fitness pro👟 and preschool 👩🏻‍🏫teacher from Nova Scotia 🇨🇦

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🩵 As September and PMOS awareness month comes to an end, there’s one thing I really hope someone takes away from me sharing all of this.

You know your body.

And if something doesn’t feel right, it’s okay to ask questions.

I spent years thinking I just needed to try harder.

Work harder.

Exercise more.

Eat better.

Rest more.

I knew a lot about health, but I didn’t understand what was happening inside my own body.

It took a diagnosis for me to start putting some of those pieces together.

So if you’re exhausted and don’t understand why…

If you’re struggling with things that don’t seem to make sense…

If you feel like you’re doing everything you’re supposed to be doing and your body still isn’t responding the way you expect…

don’t be afraid to talk to someone about it.

Ask the questions.

Tell them what you’ve been experiencing.

And if you feel like you’re not being heard, it’s okay to keep asking.

I wish I had understood that sooner.

Not because there’s always a simple answer.

And not because every symptom has one explanation.

But because you deserve to understand what’s happening in your own body.

Getting my PMOS diagnosis didn’t fix everything.

I’m still figuring things out.

But having answers changed the way I see myself and my health.

And if sharing my story helps someone else feel a little less alone, ask a question they’ve been putting off, or realize they’re worth listening to…

then I’m really glad I shared it. 🩵

#PCOSAwarenessMonth #PMOS #PCOS #PCOSJourney #WomensHealth MetabolicHealth by @kforand

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10 days ago

🩵 One of the biggest changes since my diagnosis isn’t something you can see in a before-and-after photo.

I pay attention differently now.

Before my diagnosis, I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what my body “should” be doing.

How much I should eat.

How much I should exercise.

How much I should weigh.

How much energy I should have.

What I should be able to handle.

Now, I’m much more interested in what my body is actually telling me.

I pay attention to my energy.

To my blood sugar.

To how I feel after I eat.

To how my body responds to movement.

To what happens around my medication.

To the things that make me feel better — and the things that clearly don’t.

Sometimes that means making an adjustment.

Sometimes it means changing something I thought was working.

Sometimes it means admitting that something that works for someone else doesn’t work for me.

And sometimes it means not pushing through just because I think I should be able to.

I’m still figuring it out.

I still have questions.

I still have days when I don’t get it right.

But I don’t automatically see those things as failures anymore.

I’m learning to pay better attention to the information my body is giving me.

And after spending so many years trying to understand health from the outside, there’s something very different about finally learning to understand my own body from the inside. 🩵

#PCOSAwarenessMonth #PMOS #PCOS #PCOSJourney #MetabolicHealth WomensHealth by @kforand

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15 days ago

The exhaustion was one of the hardest parts for me to understand. 🩵

With my background in fitness and wellness, I’ve always understood the importance of energy, rest and recovery.

I knew how to take a rest day.

I knew when my body needed to slow down.

I knew the value of sleep, stretching, yoga and restorative movement.

And for most of my life, those things worked.

But somewhere along the way, my body stopped responding to rest the way it used to.

I could sleep.
I could take a slower day.
I could do something restorative.

And I would still wake up the next morning feeling just as exhausted.

The expectations of my day hadn’t changed.

Work.
Responsibilities.
People who needed me.
Things that needed to get done.

So I would get up and do them anyway.

I’d push through the day, even when I had very little energy to give.

And then I’d be even more exhausted afterward.

That was the part I couldn’t figure out.

I wasn’t ignoring my body.

I was listening to it. I just wasn’t getting the response I was used to.

When I was diagnosed with PMOS, I started looking back at these experiences differently.

I began to understand that my energy wasn’t happening in isolation. It was part of a much bigger picture of what was going on with my metabolism, hormones and overall health.

I still can’t say that PMOS was the sole reason I was constantly exhausted.

But my diagnosis finally gave me a reason to stop looking at my exhaustion as a failure to recover properly.

My body was telling me something. I just didn’t understand what it was saying yet. 🩵

#PCOSAwarenessMonth #PMOS #PCOS #PCOSJourney #MetabolicHealth WomensHealth by @kforand

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17 days ago

Movement has been part of my life for as long as I can remember. 🩵

I took swim lessons, did gymnastics, danced ballet and jazz, and played soccer, basketball and rugby growing up. My parents were physical education teachers, and our family owned a gym.

Fitness wasn’t something I discovered as an adult. It was part of my everyday life.

I went on to spend 20 years working in the fitness industry, teaching, training and helping other people feel stronger in their bodies.

So when movement stopped feeling good in my own body, it was hard to understand.

I was moving in a body that hurt.

My body constantly felt inflamed and achy. I was exhausted. Even movement I genuinely enjoyed came with a layer of pain that hadn’t always been there.

And I was doing all the things I knew to do to help my body recover.

Stretching.
Yoga.
Massage.
Epsom salt baths.
Hot tub soaks.
Foam rolling.
The list goes on...

I was constantly trying to help my body feel better.
But the list of things I was doing to recover just kept getting longer.

That was hard to understand because I knew how to move. I knew how to modify. I knew how important recovery was.

But I couldn’t exercise my way out of what was happening inside my own body.

I understand now that PMOS is a chronic condition that can affect much more than reproductive health. And for me, part of living with it has been realizing that pain, inflammation and exhaustion had become so normal that I had stopped questioning them.

I still love movement.

I still want to be strong.

But I want to find my way back to movement that feels good. 🩵

#PCOSAwarenessMonth #PMOS #PCOS #PCOSJourney #MovementMatters WomensHealth MetabolicHealth by @kforand

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22 days ago

🩵 I knew getting my health back on track was going to take time.

Once I understood that PMOS was affecting more than my reproductive health, my conversations with my doctor changed.

We weren’t just talking about periods or weight.

We were talking about blood sugar, metabolism, appetite, hormones and insulin resistance — and what was actually happening inside my body.

That’s where a GLP-1 became part of my treatment.

I started metformin, and about a month later, I started Ozempic.

Because insulin resistance and appetite regulation were part of what I was dealing with, a GLP-1 made sense to explore.

And then something happened that I hadn’t expected.

The food noise became quiet. Almost immediately.

For years, I had constantly thought about food and rarely felt truly satisfied.

Suddenly, I knew what it felt like when that noise wasn’t taking up so much space.

Ozempic wasn’t always easy. There were side effects, but I knew the benefits I was seeing were worth it. I also learned that what I ate — and when I ate it — could make a big difference in how I felt, especially around shot day.

Eventually, I reached the highest Ozempic dose my coverage allowed, and my doctor and I switched to Mounjaro.

So far, Mounjaro has been easier on me, but the food noise has been a little louder.

We’re still figuring out the dosage that works best for me.

This is where I am right now — paying attention, making adjustments, and figuring out what works for my body. 🩵
#PCOSAwarenessMonth #PMOS #PCOS #PCOSJourney #MetabolicHealth WomensHealth by @kforand

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25 days ago

🩵 There’s something I want to talk about this month that goes beyond my own story.

The name has changed.

For decades, this condition was called PCOS — Polycystic Ovary Syndrome.

In 2026, it was renamed PMOS — Polyendocrine Metabolic Ovarian Syndrome.

And I think that change matters.

Because the old name made it sound like this condition was primarily about periods, fertility and having cysts on your ovaries.

But that isn’t the whole picture.

In fact, when I first started wondering if PCOS could explain some of what I was experiencing, back in 2019 and 2020, I was told I had many of the markers associated with PCOS — but I didn’t have cysts on my ovaries.

So I was told I must not have PCOS.

I kept searching for answers.

I wasn’t diagnosed until 2025.

Looking back, that experience makes the name change feel very personal.

Polyendocrine. Metabolic. Ovarian.

The new name reflects a condition that involves much more than the ovaries.

It can affect hormones, metabolism, blood sugar, insulin regulation, reproductive health, weight, skin, hair, mental health and so much more.

And that matters for countless women.

Because when the name focuses on one part of the body, it can be easy to miss the rest of the picture.

It can mean symptoms get treated as separate problems instead of being recognized as connected.

It can mean people spend years wondering what’s wrong with them.

And it can mean women like me are left thinking, “If I don’t have cysts, then this can’t be PCOS.”

I wish I’d known then what I know now.

The condition was never just about cysts.

And it was never just about our ovaries.

That’s why I’m going to start using the name PMOS throughout the rest of this series.

I was diagnosed with PCOS.

But now I know it as PMOS.

And I think this change is more than a change in words.
It’s a change in how we understand the condition — and hopefully, how we recognize, diagnose and care for the women living with it. 🩵

#PMOS #PMOSAwareness #PCOS #PCOSAwarenessMonth #PMOSJourney WomensHealth by @kforand

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a month ago

🩵 I’ve struggled with weight since puberty.

But looking back now, I realize my relationship with weight was much more complicated than I understood at the time.

I got my first period when I was 8. I developed early, and by the time I was a young teenager, I was already curvy — hips, breasts, a body that was changing before I really understood what was happening.

I learned pretty young that my body was something people noticed, and that there were expectations around what a body should look like.

And then came years of trying to change it.

For my entire life, I’ve been surrounded by fitness. My family owned a fitness club. My parents were physical education teachers, fitness instructors and personal trainers. Fitness was simply part of my life.

I went on to build my own career in fitness and wellness. I’ve spent years learning about exercise, nutrition and health, and helping other people work toward their goals.

So when my own weight kept going up, I took it personally.

I thought I should be able to figure it out.

I tried harder. I changed my food. I exercised. I started over.

And when things still weren’t working, I felt defeated.
Eventually, I stopped trying so hard.

Movement was no longer something I enjoyed. It became something I felt like I should be doing.

Food was no longer fuel for my body. It became something I overthought, restricted, felt guilty about, and eventually just stopped caring about.

What I didn’t understand was that PCOS could be part of this story.

PCOS can affect insulin regulation, appetite and satiety, hormones, and metabolism, which can make weight management more complicated for some people.

For me, my weight wasn’t happening in isolation. It was part of a bigger picture I didn’t understand yet.

I just knew I was trying, and it wasn’t working the way I thought it should.

My diagnosis didn’t suddenly make weight irrelevant. I still have weight-loss goals.

But I no longer see those struggles as a reflection of how hard I was trying or how much I cared about my health.

I was trying to take care of myself.

I just didn’t have the full picture. 🩵

#PCOSAwarenessMonth #PCOS #PCOSJourney #PCOSAw by @kforand

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a month ago

🩵 There are some numbers I’ll never forget.

November 4, 2025 — 14.8 mmol/L

That was my fasting blood glucose.

Seeing that number was a lot. After finally being diagnosed with PCOS, I was starting to see my health through a different lens. Things that I had spent years trying to explain suddenly started to make more sense.

Since then, I’ve watched those numbers change.

April 13, 2026 — 9.5 mmol/L

July 14, 2026 — 8.3 mmol/L

It’s still higher than it should be. I’m not at the finish line.

But it’s moving in the right direction.

And that matters.

PCOS has affected so much more than my periods or my weight. It has affected how my body handles blood sugar, my energy, my hunger, and my overall health.

For a long time, I was much better at noticing what still needed to change than recognizing what had already changed.

These numbers give me something tangible to look back on and say, okay… something is working.

There have been a lot of changes along the way — movement, nutrition, taking better care of myself, and medication. It hasn’t been one magic fix. It’s been a combination of things that have helped support my health.

My next bloodwork is in October. I have no idea what those numbers will say.

But I don’t want to look at them as a pass or fail.
They’re just part of the picture.

And right now, when I look at these numbers, I see progress. 🩵

#PCOSAwarenessMonth #PCOS #PCOSJourney #PCOSAwareness #WomensHealth by @kforand

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a month ago

Treatment isn’t giving up 🩵

For years, I tried to “fix myself” naturally.

I was never someone who loved the idea of medication. I believed there was a time and place for it, but I wanted to support my body as holistically and naturally as I could.

So I tried… a lot. Green smoothies, meditation, exercise, massage, dry brushing. Massage, chiropractor, osteopathy, acupuncture... Changing the products I used every day. The list goes on….

Some things helped!
But I was still struggling. More than I really let people know.

When I was diagnosed with PCOS, medication became part of the conversation.

My doctors listened to my concerns, talked through the risks and benefits, answered my questions, and gave me space to make informed decisions about my body.

One medication we discussed carried a potential risk of blood clots.

My dad had a clotting disorder and was on warfarin. I remember some scary moments surrounding his health when I was in high school. He later passed away from pancreatic cancer in 2012, but those memories stayed with me.

So hearing “blood clots” wasn’t just a statistic.

It was personal. And I think that’s important to share because sometimes people hear “take medication” and assume it’s a simple decision. It wasn’t for me.

Eventually, I started a slow release metformin. About a month later, I started a GLP-1: Ozempic.

And that’s when something changed.

The food noise got quiet. The constant cravings. The feeling that I could eat a full meal and still not feel satisfied.

I remember thinking, Is this really what it feels like to not constantly think about food?

I was relieved. Surprised. Emotional.

Because if something outside of my willpower could change something I had struggled with for so long…
Maybe I hadn’t been failing. Maybe my body needed more support than I could give it through diet and exercise alone.

I know that holistic care and medical treatment don’t have to be opposites.

Treatment wasn’t me giving up. It was me giving my body another tool.

Maybe I didn’t need to keep trying to fix myself.
Maybe I needed to understand and support my body instead. 🩵

#PCOSAwarenessMonth #PCOS #P by @kforand

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a month ago

One of the biggest things I learned after my PCOS diagnosis? It wasn’t just about my periods. 🩵

I already understood insulin, hormones, metabolism, nutrition and how they affect the body. After all, I’ve spent 20 years working in fitness and wellness.

But learning how insulin resistance was showing up in my own body was different.

My doctor explained it to me with an analogy that really stuck with me.

Imagine you’re at a huge concert. You’re trying to get someone’s attention, but it’s so loud that they can’t hear you. You keep trying to get their attention, but the message just isn’t getting through.

That’s kind of what can happen with insulin resistance.

My body is producing insulin, but my cells aren’t responding to that signal as effectively as they should. So the body has to work harder to get the message through.

Then my doctor explained my medication using the same analogy.

It’s like giving that person a megaphone.

You’re not creating a new message. You’re making the existing message louder and easier to hear.

That explanation made the science feel very different when I could finally connect it to what was happening inside my body.

I also learned more about GLP-1, a naturally occurring hormone involved in appetite regulation and satiety. That gave me another piece of the puzzle when it came to understanding the food noise and lack of satisfaction I talked about in my last post.

And then I started learning more about the bigger metabolic picture of PCOS—including the increased risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

There was a lot to take in.

Not because the science was completely new to me, but because this time, I was learning it through the lens of my own health.

Even after 20 years in fitness, there were still things about my own body I didn’t know.

And I’m still learning. 🩵

#PCOSAwarenessMonth #PCOS #PCOSJourney #PCOSAwareness #InsulinResistance WomensHealth by @kforand

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a month ago

Looking back, there were signs. I just didn’t know they were signs. 🩵

Before I was diagnosed with PCOS, there were so many things happening in my body that I couldn’t quite explain.

I was working out. I was eating well. I understood nutrition and exercise. And yet, I was still gaining weight.

My periods were all over the place. I would miss them completely, have incredibly painful periods, or sometimes bleed for months.

I started growing unwanted facial and body hair, while the hair on my head was thinning.

I was exhausted—even when I had gotten enough rest.

My body constantly felt inflamed and achy.

And then there was the food noise.

I could eat a well-rounded, nutritionally dense meal and still feel like I hadn’t eaten enough. I rarely felt truly satisfied. I was constantly thinking about food.

At the time, these things felt like separate problems.

A period problem.
A weight problem.
A hair problem.
A fatigue problem.
A hunger problem.

I didn’t know they could be pieces of a much bigger picture.

When I was diagnosed with PCOS in 2025, I finally had a name for something I had been experiencing for years.

Looking back now, I can see just how many signs were there.

I just didn’t know what I was looking at. 🩵

#PCOSAwarenessMonth #PCOS #PCOSJourney #PCOSAwareness #WomensHealth by @kforand

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a month ago

September is PCOS Awareness Month. 🩵

I’ve shared little pieces of my PCOS journey before, but I’ve never really opened up about the whole story.

So this month, I want to share some of my journey and let you in a little more.

For most of my adult life, I’ve been someone who knows a lot about health, movement, fitness and nutrition. I’ve spent 20 years working in the fitness industry and have completed more certifications in fitness, nutrition and wellness than I can probably count.

I wasn’t someone who knew nothing about health. I was someone who had spent years learning about it.

And yet…

there were things happening inside my own body that I didn’t understand.

In 2025, I was finally diagnosed with PCOS — something I now understand I had likely been living with for many years without knowing it.

That diagnosis made me look back at my health, my weight, my relationship with food and exercise, my hormones, my blood sugar, and even the way I’ve talked to myself for years — and see so many things differently.

There are things I blamed myself for.

Things I thought were a matter of willpower.

Things I thought I should have been able to “fix” because I know better.

And now I understand that the story was never quite that simple.

PCOS is so much more than irregular periods or fertility.

Over this past year, I’ve been learning what that actually means — not from a textbook, but by living it.

I’ve watched my health change. I’ve started treatment. I’ve had setbacks and victories. I’ve questioned things. I’ve learned things.

And I’m still figuring a lot of it out.

So throughout September, I’m going to share more of that journey — the things I wish I had understood sooner, the things I’m learning now, and the things I wish more people understood about PCOS.

This isn’t a before-and-after story.

It’s a learning to understand my body story.

And I’m only at the beginning. 🩵

#PCOSAwarenessMonth #PCOS #PCOSJourney #PCOSAwareness #WomensHealth MetabolicHealth by @kforand

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a month ago