Saturday, October 27, 2007

Calling All Sistas

Had a long chat with a sista yesterday and realized that we (the sistas) let each other down by all too often by not discussing our journey into and through womanhood.

When things go wrong or get hard (we lose a baby, have an unexpected pregnancy, have trouble with the woman-works, have concerns about our ability to mother, question sexuality, question our roles in society, the list goes on) we so often feel alone - we feel we are the only one in our circle that has gone through this, and that adds to our isolation and confusion and pain.

Yes this stuff is personal and isn't necessarily something we would broadcast from the rooftops but surely it is something that our sistas should know. If one in 3 women have suffered sexual abuse of one form or another why is there so much shame in talking about it. If only 1 in 4 pregnancies lead to a successful birth, why do we not discuss having a miscarriage more openly. If so many of us have trouble getting pregnant when we want to, why is that pain kept inside our respective houses. If 50% of women have trouble reaching orgasm through penile penetration alone so why are we are we still getting sex advice from magazines and not the sistahood.

We are really good about talking about our feelings, our relationships, our work, our communities. Why can't we just as easily discuss our womanhood?

3 comments:

Chelsea + Shiloh said...

Mmmm, I had a friend miscarriage, no-one but her husband knew. No I mean others knew the physical facts, but she had never shared the emotional impact of how it effected her.

So I think we do discuss things, but rarely the depth of what we feel. Sexual abuse, mmmm complex, perhaps if one has been through this, dealt with it and moved on, then going back and addressing it, by talking about it with friends, is an unnecessary trauma.

Abortion also is rarely discussed, Ive had g/f's talk of it, but only a few have acknowledged the impact of it on their life.

Perhaps it has to do with the fact woman are currently trying to do it all, mother, shop, maintain house, social connections, relationships, occupations...and we dont make time to be with our g/f's to talk. Maybe its something that needs to be formalized...dinner with 6 g/f's to talk womans 'stuff' a monthly sisterhood meeting perhaps. Just a an idea

Anonymous said...

It's pretty tragic reading all those statistics in one post.

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