Our Womanity

As an obstetrician/gynecologist, I’ve been able to witness some of the most intimate and important moments of women’s lives. One of the most amazing things I’ve witnessed multiple times in my life, even beyond some of the most magical of births, is something you may not guess. My favorite moments are when a young woman who’s been living for years socially isolated, full of self shame because of leaking urine and sometimes stool after a birth injury called an obstetric fistula (which we will talk about in another blog or you can read about at whatisobstetricfistula.com), walks into a Fistula hospital and sees 30 other women just like her. When she realizes that this entire hospital is devoted to women who are just like her and that her problem is manageable– the healing begins.

I continue to see this phenomenon in other areas of ob/gyn as well. I see it in my post menopausal patients, when they share or learn that other women are having the same issues with sex, I see it in my patients who are post partum and not sure if their body will ever be the same again. These moments are part of culture that we miss out on unfortunately in our independent and isolated lives in North America. We would never have a shared hospital room with 30 other women going through the same thing as we are. We probably won’t witness another woman giving birth and we probably won’t hear about that new mother’s fears about her perineum and vagina. What we miss is learning that we are not alone and that so much of what we experience is part of the female experience that the patriarchy would rather keep quiet.

This is why I’m starting this blog. I want to share the lived experiences of women that many of us are afraid to talk about to even our best of friends. I will have more blog posts and more podcasts to share about as many cis-women and trans-women’s experiences of life. This is our womanity.