I am a mother figure to so many even though I am only 23. Friends lovingly refer to me as "mama bear" and I find people coming to me in times of turmoil for comfort and soft words of reassurance. And I absolutely love to give out love to others. I am so full of it that sometimes I want to cry because I have nobody to throw my love onto at the moment. But I may never be able to love my own children.

When I was 14, it started with extreme pain. I thought I was dying. I remember calling out to my mom from my basement bedroom thinking that I had been stabbed in the back the pain was so intense. Going to my usual doctor revealed nothing and I was sent home with pain medications. Almost a year later, it happened again. The most intense pain radiating out of my lower back and out across my abdomen. Crying in my moms arms in the middle of the night with no hope to fight the pain. Just waiting for it to be over. After that it started happening more frequently, every couple of months or so until I finally started menstruating. I was a "late bloomer" in the way that I didn't start my period until I was 16, but had hit puberty in all other ways. This brought a whole new pain. Intense cramps and migraines to the point where I was barely able to walk to the bathroom to throw up. I gained almost 60 pounds in an 8 month period even when I had made no dietary changes. Hard stuff for a high-schooler.

"This can't be normal" I kept thinking to myself.

My family doctor put me on my first birth control pills to help ease the cramps and regulate the migraines. It helped to a degree but I was still unable to function for a week every month. When I turned 16 my mom helped me set up my first OBGYN appointment. After a long talk, blood work, and a sonogram, he sent me home with the promise of a follow up appointment the next week. I never expected an actual diagnosis. Maybe just some irregular hormones or something. What he served me with was Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome.

My OB broke it down for me: This is a condition that isn't well understood or researched. It causes small cysts to grow in and on the ovaries that cause drastic hormone imbalances, like producing too much testosterone. These hormone imbalances can change the way you look in ways like abundant acne, weight gain, hair loss, and excess body hair growth. It makes one more prone to heart disease and diabetes. Irregular periods are common along with extreme pain when they are happening. And can make it difficult to get pregnant or cause infertility.

At least I knew why my face was breaking out so bad right? So they will just put me on a stronger birth control and it will make everything better, yeah?

Well, not so much.

That pain that I kept having? That repeated stabbing? Turns out that those tiny cysts inside my ovaries were bursting when my body was trying to ovulate. And all that bursting had caused a lot of damage.

I wish I had asked my mom to come back with me on this appointment.

He told me that I had a very small chance of ever being able to have my own children. That there was quite a bit of damage and my chances sat at about 2% of me ever being able to get pregnant.

I was quiet. Maybe in shock? I don't quite recall.

I was only 16. What do you do with that information?

He put me on the first of what would be many trial-and-error birth controls to see what worked with my body the best. I think at this point I have tried 7 or 8. Somewhere in that trial and error I just stopped taking it. What was the point I thought? The pain came roaring back when my poor broken uterus did decide to do what it's supposed to do. But that would only happen every 6 months or so until I was fed up again and started more trial-and-error.

At one point, I started trying desperately to lose weight. Everything that I read said that it would get better if you lost a few pounds. But with PCOS it is so incredibly hard to lose anything. The hormones make it latch on and stay there.

I gave up. All I had ever wanted was to be a mom. To share all this love that I have bubbling up inside with my own little pumpkins. But that was gone. That hope. I started telling myself that kids are just noisy and kind of gross. That you can't handle kids because you can barely handle yourself. You don't actually want them, it's just some hormonal fluke that makes you feel like you want kids.

You can find another outlet for this love.

For a couple years, I was desolate inside. Devoid of emotions and feelings that used to come so naturally to me. I had graduated High School and started at a community college. Started meeting people in classes and online who had PCOS too. Jokingly calling ourselves "cysters" helped to alleviate some of the hurt. I started to grow back from the bush fire that had passed inside of my heart. Those friends that call me "mama bear" tumbled into my life and let me pour my love onto them. I started to realize that PCOS wasn't the end of the line for me.

I started to love myself again.

And I learned a lot about who I am and what I believe in since that diagnosis.

The belief that you can only be a woman if you bear your own children has been washed clean from my mind. Those who choose not to have children are still women. Those of us who can't are still women. I know that I am a woman because I say that I am. I stand strong in my knowledge that I am a woman. And I believe that if someone want's to be a woman, they should be allowed to be the glorious creatures that we are. They know they are women because they say they are. Whether they were born with a uterus or not, I stand proud beside them.

I learned that just because you don't give birth doesn't mean you aren't a mama. Those who adopt are mothers who reach out their arms to children who need them. They spread the love inside their hearts to those who need a home filled with joy and laughter. There are mothers who have lost their babies and carry them close to their hearts. They keep those tiny rosebuds near and dear, and they are still mothers. Even pet mamas who take in furbabies are still mamas. They give their love through cuddles, treats, and long walks to the park.

I learned that I am vehemently Pro-Choice. Because my choice has been taken away from me by my own body. And that was a pain I never expected to bear. Nobody should have to go through the pains that I have and NOBODY has the right to make that decision for anyone else.

Even though I have grown through that burnt out underbrush, there are some places that are still tender. Every time another friend announces that they are expecting, or shares photos of their adorable kiddos on facebook I get depressed for a while. Because that will probably never be me. My hair will fall out in huge clumps and it makes me want to sit and cry because I feel that it is the one thing that I have going for me sometimes. It makes me scared that one day the damage will be so great that they will have to take my ovaries and then there will be no chance. 0%.

But then I remember the wonderful people around me that need love too. My family and friends. My dogs and my rats. They all need love. Everyone does. I can spread little acts of love and kindness wherever I go to ease some of this heartache on the days when I get caught up in it.

PCOS isn't the end of the road for me.