Hi everyone, you might remember me I posted about a week ago.

I couldn’t get my usual doc. because he is popular and was all booked up for ages so I went to see a different doctor from usual. I told her about the tiredness and the pains in my side and the dizzyness and the irregular periods and the body hair. She said did I have trouble with my weight, trying to keep it down and I said no, I find it hard to keep it up. She said I might have PCOS but she didn’t think so since normally people with PCOS put weight on easily, but she sent me for some blood tests anyway. I got the feeling she didn’t think anything was really wrong though.

They tested me for RBC count, LH, FSH, Prolactin, Oestradiol, Testosterone, SHB6 and Androstenedione. I went to the doctors today and the receptionist said all my results came back within normal range (but I’m not sure exactly how normal that makes me, I thought many of those hormones fluctuate at different points in the menstrual cycle?). But I’m still concerned that something isn’t quite right so I have an appointment with my normal doctor (whom I like better) tomorrow. I think they’re considering putting me on the pill to regulate my periods but I’d rather they found out what’s causing my problems.

I’m going to pursue this because I’m worried that only having periods every 3 months or so isn’t healthy, and I get ill all the time and fell rubbish and I’m just sick of it. Hopefully my normal doctor will listen better and take things more seriously. He’s more experienced than the other doc and also takes time to listen and explain because he knows that I am a biomedical student and have a good chance of understanding what he’s going on about.

While I’m here, I have some more questions. Above someone asked about pigmentation, and I replied that I didn’t have any unusual pigmentation, but I later realised that some of my skin has a darker, yellowish-brownish tint to it. The darker areas are all around my genitals, along the crease between my hips and thighs, a couple of inches down my inner thights and in the creases of my elbows. Is this relevant to anything or just normal?

Also, I feel really rubbish when I first get up in the morning. I generally feel very thirsty, and sometimes cold and sick. On occasion I have actually thrown up. I always end up feeling better once I have eaten and drunk something. Is this normal?

With regards to genitals I still can’t quite figure out what’s normal and what’s not. I certainly don’t look like the picture in my physiology textbook, but I don’t think anyone really does because it just looks unrealistic and idealised. I’m about to get detailed in describing genital bits, so if this offends anyone skip the rest of this paragraph. My vaginal opening is really small as it’s mostly obscured by irregular folds of skin. The opening is very asymmetrical. As far as I can tell, these folds are not labia or a hymen, I have no idea what they are. Best guess is they’re supposed to surround the vaginal opening, stretching to allow sexual intercourse and vaginal childbirth, whereas in my case they obscure it. I can use tampons but I don’t think I can have penetrative sex (unless the male partner is not very well endowned at all). I’m a virgin so I’ve never tried. My urethral opening is very close to my vaginal opening and buried within the same folds of skin. It took me a while to work out if they were at all seperate or not. They mostly are, but open into the same set of folds, which are maybe an couple of centimeters in length and very oddly shaped. The rest of my anatomy seems normal enough to me, although I’m not sure if my clitoris might be a little larger than average (I have very little idea what average is, though. Is little-fingernail size about normal). In short, I look like nothing on the prader scale, yet not normal either. This doesn’t bother me at the moment and won’t until I want to have sex but perhaps I should mention it to the doc anyway? I don’t know.

Thanks to our beautiful, blessed NHS I can afford to visit the doc again on wednesday. Should I suggest that the stabbing pains in my side might be connected to the adrenal glands? And is it worth mentioning weird genitals? He’s a male doctor so I’d find talking about that pretty embaressing. But it actually upsets me less than the hirsutism.

Thanks so much for all your reassurance and help. Even if I don’t have cah I still appreciate your advice and just being able to say what’s bothering me (even though it’s only on an internet message board).