The best piece of advice I’ve ever been given, received in a moment when I didn’t know how to go on simply because of how broken hearted I was: The way forward is with a broken heart.

Since that day, I have noticed how many “broken-hearted but still moving” people I know. Living is hard and very few of us are not carrying wounds of some kind. But here we all are…just out here, walking around with broken hearts…but busy hands, and feet that keep moving forward.

Thank you for reading my poem.

And yet, if anything has changed at all it’s because they’re getting worse.

Yes, a little louder for the American’s in the room! Religious conservatism is spread the world over and is a danger to us all no matter what religion takes it up.

We cannot turn our backs on it. It cannot be contained to certain areas. It must be eradicated the world over. Women’s rights are human rights. No ideology that seeks to degrade women or deny them rights, even if the women of that culture have internalized the lie of that ideology and seek to live it out, should be tolerated anywhere in the world.

The name of the religion matters little if at all. The ideology is the same. It is a man’s fist gripping a woman such that she moves, breathes, even thinks at his will and whim. It makes women things to be possessed. Fuck that.

My god, the horror of this excerpt.

I tried hormonal IUDs and wasn’t a great fit for them (hormones have always been really difficult for my body to handle) but I LOVED copper IUDs for many years. I’ve known so many women who raved about hormonal IUDs…lighter periods, reliable birth control–what’s not to love!?

So happy your IUD works for you. I shout from the rooftops any time I’m able to about IUDs. Best birth control ever!

I’m glad to hear that your medication is so helpful for you! I am also (mostly) estranged from my mother and understand what it is like to navigate all of this without a mom. It’s so strange, trying to piece together clues from what I know of her experience and then match them up to my own to see if we are the same, if I’m her daughter in the way I experience perimenopause while not really being her daughter in so many other ways.

I’m sorry menopause caused your mother to take such a turn. I bet she’s really far from alone in that. It seems to have such profound emotional and mental health effects on some women. I’m lucky that age dulled my mother’s edges, even if our past and the person she used to be makes it impossible for me to trust or be close with her now. At least she settled into something more peaceful with age–your mother sounds so miserable and emotionally dangerous.

Thanks again for sharing your experience. I’m so proud to take part in these conversations! We are not alone and what’s happening to our bodies is not strange or bad. We deserve care when we are struggling and camaraderie as we adjust to new seasons of life. I’m so happy for all women who feel comfortable sharing, and for those who lurk and learn and feel less alone because of the women who share!

<3 <3 <3 <3

I’m so happy for your breezy menopause, but happier still that I’ve been hearing about and having so many conversations about peri and menopause in recent times. We’ve come along way from “The Change” being some spooky, hidden thing that women shoulder alone…it makes me so happy that women are discussing their experiences with one another and demanding/finding good care when they need it.

I’m not there yet, though I believe I have entered peri. I had an ablation last fall due to pretty severe, chronic cycle-related anemia and it changed my life. I definitely understand how you feel about not missing the leaking, middle of the night surprises, etc. That part of having a period being (mostly) gone for me has truly been a game changer.

Question for you, please only answer if you’re comfortable: is the mood medication you are taking hormonal, like specifically for hormonal mood issues? Or traditional psychiatric medication?

I’ve definitely known several women who said menopause was very easy and wonderful for them. My own mother suffered pretty terribly with it, but I also know she received no care and didn’t take anything to try and ease things…so I’m trying to gather as much information as I can on what is working for others. I’m hopeful that I will have an easier time of it than my mother.

Congratulations again. I wish you a continued easy breezy path. Thank you so much for sharing this with others, it’s so vital that women run into conversations like this. Some women still don’t know that we’re out here, talking about all of this!

This needs to exist. Every young warrior needs these tales.

Anyone who wants to come is more than welcome to 🥰 It’s not terribly active at the moment. I would love for more people to come and participate in whatever conversations people find valuable.

I would argue a bit with your first paragraph, though I find the whole of your sentiments well stated.

I think the question posed by OP is actually a critically important one to answer for each of us, within ourselves, and for all of us together (human race). The question really means “what do you feel entitled to, and what do you expect from yourself and others?”

Expectations and entitlements come to form the foundation of the relationship(s) we have with ourselves and others.

When you observe the “typically considered masculine” traits and activities, what would they lead you to believe “men” feel/are “supposed to feel” entitled to? Taking up space? Aggression? Leadership? And are these things typically expected of men?

For “typically considered feminine” traits and activities, what would we probably agree they lend themselves to, in terms of entitlements? Being entitled to nurturing others? Entitled to protection? Objectification/entitled to being an object? To being vulnerable? And are these things typically expected of women?

The implications of these entitlements are infinitely complex and include every commentary that can be made about society. Really look back at my last paragraph–women are entitled to vulnerability. We often call it an expectation that women are weaker, and that sucks, but it is also an expectation that women are naturally more vulnerable. What a crime, that we actively cut boys and men off from this, that it is so engrained in many cultures that men should avoid appearing or being vulnerable.

Figuring out what you feel entitled to, and what you don’t, and how those perceived entitlements/lack thereof jive with who you are and how you actually wish to live on planet earth is critical to healing from, well, the trauma of living on planet earth. As is better understanding what you expect of others, and why.

A lot of our worst tendencies are born out of how we cope with the discrepancies between what we feel entitled to/what’s expected of us versus how we actually want to live in the world. Or, what we feel entitled to versus how others want to live in the world.

I see the massive cultural focus on these kinds of questions not as boring, but as evidence that humans are figuring out how to move beyond these entitlements and expectations that chain us. We’re shaking the shackles of primal social structure to make way for something else, new expectations of ourselves and others.

It took me a long time to understand the implications for me as a person of feeling entitled to objectification, for instance. Being a man’s highly valued object is something many women strive for, unknowingly in many cases. Deeply internalized patriarchy will definitely do that to you. It takes a lot of introspection to see that in yourself and untangle it from your being. It’s a scary process and there’s a lot of shame involved, but beginning to be able to regard myself as just a person, to see myself as a beautiful, worthy creature, and love myself thusly, has made it worth the pursuit.

Similarly, I’ve known men who have struggled with masculinity and coming to terms with the fact that there are traits and activities that they simply do not feel entitled to because they are seen as feminine and, therefore, only women are entitled to them. I’m recalling in this moment a man I know who is terrified of becoming a father, because he is afraid of nurturing. He has never felt entitled to nurturing or to being a nurturer. He has focused all of his emotional energy on attempting to perfect male assertiveness, a general aloofness and air of “manly stoicism”–much like his father–and doesn’t know how to give himself permission to nurture. He struggles to really be vulnerable with his wife because “he’s supposed to know, supposed to care for her and make her feel safe”–what a web of sadness. Nothing to do with sexuality, everything to do with what all the world, including himself, has expected of him all his life (masculinity) because he was born with a penis.

Identifying what we feel entitled to “by birthright” is the beginning of untangling the falseness of gender expectations that we have for ourselves and others. “Who do I think am I supposed to be, and why do I think that?” is a good question to ask. “What does femininity or masculinity mean to you” is a great way to needle ones way inward, toward that question.

To me, answering that question in ourselves is the beginning of personal freedom and just being, of self loving. And if you love yourself, truly, I think it’s pretty hard to get in the way of anyone else loving themselves, regardless of how they identify, or whether they “fit the mold” they were supposedly cast from.

I love this! Thank you for posting!

First, “Medical anthropologist”—what a fascinating field of study! I feel like we need more of these people!

Second, a heartbreaking read. Nowhere is institutional racism more evidently harmful than it is in the institution of medicine. It’s shocking and disappointing that with the mountains of evidence that this is happening, nothing is being done.

Follow-up thought, regarding your comment about faces: as a mother, I always wonder what the impact is on children of having a mother who is sometimes allowed to move about freely/uncovered, and other times is completely covered. To cover someone’s face even to their own children. That’s something.

Yes, all of this…you’ve put an interesting thought in my head, re: a blank slate for others to project on. I’m a “movie person” and love watching on a projector/screen. Obviously people project onto others all the time in a figurative sense, but it’s a pretty poignant remark to note that completely covered women could literally be projected onto. The level of erasure is pretty stunning, but the idea that you could not only erase but literally protect anything you wanted onto these women. Wow.

I need some really talented artist to create an art installation where different things are being projected onto covered women.

Looks like it is compromised once again? It was fine for me and just a minute ago went back to “Israel” and porn.

This is a movie I could really get behind!

How fun to wonder about her story…so so long ago.

This kind of information makes me simultaneously so happy that I have had all the children I will have…and terrified at the fact that three of my four children are girls.

The USA has been fully revealed at this point to be a shareholder value driven state. Human lives, human happiness, human understanding do not matter here…only the bottom line for shareholders.

The ways in which shareholder capitalism impact medical care are tragic and deeply systemic at this point. We need a complete shakeup from the culture up in medicine and science (and finance, and education, and and and…etc).

Yeah, rogue police officers taking it upon themselves to start acting like overseers tasked with capturing women seeking healthcare in other states is a huge problem. Women’s Healthcare destination states need to start cracking down on that kind of behavior very hard.

Right? I’ve had my kids and am now horrified to watch them (three of them girls) growing up in this new, terrifying world.

Exactly.