Hi Stefy90, I'm a 53 year old female & I've been dealing with this in some form since I was around your age. I was officially diagnosed 5 years ago. Have you tried taking Cabergoline? I've never taken Bromocriptine, but from what I hear Cabergoline is more effective and easier to take that what you're on. I take .25 mg 2 times a week. If you can get your prolactin levels to stay at normal levels, it should help elevate your Progesterone & Estrogen levels. This should in turn lower the testosterone levels that have gone unopposed. As for the facial hair, I've had laser treatment to remove mine. I don't know if it would just go away on it's own.
Are you seeing an Endocrinologist, Gynogcologist or Primary MD for treatment? I'm just curious...

Hello Memphis483,
Nice to speak to you! See at first my doctor made it seem like it would go away in a year or so since its 4mm and i was looking forward to it, but it grew and I would like to know more about other peoples experiences. I've never taken cabergoline. I have a gynecologist who diagnosed me with PCOS, and referrerd me to an endocrinologist. The gynocologisy took me off the birth control to let the endo start bromo every night, but soon ill be on birth control also because my periods are sparse. Btw, hows ur moods?

I'm sorry i've not gotten back, I don't think I've been receiving notices that I've got messages.
I've not really had issues with my moods. Were your mood swings an issue before you started the Bromocryptine? I did have mood swing issues when I had a gynocologist put me on high doses of progesterone for a couple of months to try to get my periods to start back up. I had many many years of gynocologists treating my lack of menstration / early onset menopause and NOT addressing the underlying issue, which was the pitutiary tumor. I have to say that it may be that your gyno is about to make the same mistake.

You may know all of this, BUT just incase you don't realize the sequence of events.... if you have a prolactin secreting pituitary tumor and your levels of Prolactin are above normal, (in the U.S around 3-23ng) this will naturally lower your levels of estrogen & progesterone. Hence, you will NOT have normal monthly cycles. My levels got to 324ng before I was properly diagnosed. Please, Please don't take any hormones until you've got your prolactin under control for AT LEAST 3 months. See if that alone will get your monthly periods back on track.

I was also told that I had PCOS. But, now I think all of the symptoms were just a by-product of the tumor and the impact that it had on my hormones. If they can get your hormones back where they should be, I'm going to predict that the symptoms of PCOS will gradually disappear. The key is to NOT let the primary focus go away from the fact that you have a TUMOR on the HORMONE CONTROL CENTER in your brain. Gynocologist want to treat your gyno issues. But you likely don't really have gyno issues... you have a BRAIN issue. Treat the pituitary issue and the rest should fall into place. I have a thousand questions....
Do you live in the US?
Are you over-weight? (usually women will PCOS struggle with obesity)
What lead to your diagnoses of a tumor?
Do you struggle with fatigue?
I look forward to hearing from you!

Hello! No worries, we are all busy. It's crazy how long it took for them to properly diagnose you. My moods started in the military when I went on the depo shot at 19, like every other female. Prior to that, I did have my period but they lasted 2-3 days max. The depo shot made me super emotional and have super emotional mood swing and alot of crying. After 3 months, I told them it was unbearable and I was reassured the symptoms would go away. After the second time, I refused to ever again get depo and opted for the birth control pills which was bad but not like with depo. Eventually, I stopped taking any birth control altogether. After that the gyno was just regular check ups.

You're exactly right. Eventually, my periods stopped and I went to a gynecologist. After blood work and my testosterone being high, he was treating my gyno issue with birth control and not addressing the rest. He led me to my first and current endo was very curious and asked if I would allow her to do an MRI since she wasn't convinced I had PCOS. That's when my 4mm prolactamina showed up.
This month my cycle did arrive on time and I am very happy. My health care is through the veterans clinic so my gyno and endo are closely in contact to give me the best treatment. They both agree that I need to have a 28 days cycle to shed my lining so I'm waiting for that next appointment. Currently my testosterone and my Prolactin levels are in range. I did go off of bromocriptine for one month in December as a test to see if I can go off of it and It threw my levels off, but they are back in range. My endo has mentioned I may still have PCOS, but says I don't look like I have it.
Fatigue, describes me currently, I am so exhausted in the mornings that I go to school at night and sometimes rest for full days. Other days I can work out all day long, and stay active. Eventually,it catches up to me and I need a days worth of rest. Fortunately, my internship days are only 2x a week on non school days.
I am overweight, 5 foot flat and I'm now 147. I just recently lost 10 pounds on Metformin since my weight wasn't budging. I'm intermittent fasting and I eat a lot of salads and mainly gluten-free meals. My goal is 130. PCOS- like: I have a deep voice and I am pretty hairy but i"m also Hispanic, and i'm equally hairy to my sibling. A previous doctor asked me if I was Italian. I dont actually know if i have PCOS.
Yes, U.S, I live in New York City. Thank you for making sure fully understand the events that happen with a pituitary tumor and high prolactin levels. I research a lot and I feel like it makes me a hypochondriac at times.

Hello again!
I have 2 daughters and 2 nieces. None of them have done well taking birth control, it makes them all hyper emotional. That may just be something that your body doesn't like to deal with. You might try a low dose Nuvaring. One of my daughters has been able to use that without too much trouble.

I am also 5 ft & when I started taking Cabergoline 5 yrs ago, I weighed 146 lbs. I was able to loose 30 lbs in the first year that I started medication. I wasn't able to loose weight before that.

The fatigue!!! I woke up tired, I was tired all day, tired when I went to bed... I couldn't sit down & watch a movie with my family. I would fall asleep if I sat down. I still struggle with it, but not anything like it was. It just became part of my life. I don't think that I realized how abnormal it was until I had someone at work tell me that she loved it when she woke up "feeling so refreshed". I just stared at her. I told her I couldn't remember ever waking up feeling refreshed. Ever.

Do you have a lot of headaches? That's another thing that I would talk to different doctors about. I was completely ignored. I lived with a headache. It never went away. Now, I rarely have one.

It is highly unlikely that you'll be able to come off of the Bromocriptineor some medication for quite a long time. The tumor will need to shrink or something change to keep you from becoming symptomatic. Even though I'm now 54, I've still not gone through menopause yet. Although, now my cycles are only coming every 3 or 4 months. When I tried to stop taking it early this year, it threw my into instant menopause. I started having intense hot flashes & night sweats. I'm not talking about a few times a day. I'm talking all day & all night. I couldn't sleep. So I went back on the Cabergoline.

Have you looked up the difference in our medications? I'm asking because you are on one that is really much harder to take for most people. Cabergoline usually is only taken 2 times a week. Plus, Cabergoline often has the benefit of being a mood elevator. It has been for me. In addition to the fact that it gave me a serious boost in my sex drive, which was very. very low for years.
I don't think there is such a thing as too much research, I think that doing a lot of research is the right thing to do! I still read up on the latest & I love reading about issues that other people are dealing with. I have "cold flashes" every once in a while. It's like my body wont regulate my body temperature. I asked my Endo about it, he told me that it didn't have anything to do with my tumor or the medication. But after reading different discussions on this between people, I've found out that I'm definitely not the only one that has this problem. (It's seem to one thing or another, I'm having hot-flashes or cold flashes)

If you've been on Bromocryptine for over 2 years now & you're still not feeling like your body it close to "normal", I would definitely talk to the doctor about changing the medication to Cabergoline. After only taking it for 3 months, I started having cycles again. I hadn't had a period in 9 years! I've had a monthly cycle almost every month since, until this last year. Now, menopause is going to catch up to me, I'm not happy about it. :) You can email me directly. I don't check this very often. lajuana483@yahoo.com
LaJuana Miller

Memphis 483. thanks for the post. I am also dealing with a Pituitary tumor and supposedly early Menopause.

I have been dealing with it for 10 Years now since they found it in 2010 when I injured my neck.