In today's episode, we cover the perfect storm brewing in uterine healthcare, the vagina obscura, and ending on a high note that will leave you searching for your closest Apple store! Thanks for listening Uterinekind!
With Uterinekind’s rights surrounding our bodies and healthcare being constantly attacked, it can seem so easy to give up, but that is the last thing we will do here at Hello Uterus. We’re transforming our frustration and anger into something meaningful and productive. Organize and educate each other Uterinekind! We will continue to fight for our rights.
There is a perfect storm brewing. When the current state of our rights interfere with uterine healthcare to the point where doctors are calling lawyers, people are going to start questioning their career paths. Combine that with a shortage of doctors and other problems, well buckle in Uterinekind! Don’t stress though, we’re telling you what you can do to ensure you’ll have the healthcare you need even in times like these.
Looking for a new book? We're discussing Vagina Obscura: An Anatomical Voyage, a non-fiction book written by science journalist Rachel E. Gross. Listen in to Rachel's telling of Linda Griffin's battle with breast cancer, endo, and doctors' shocking inability to understand and treat the mystical organ that is the vagina.
Need a pad? Lastly, we end on a high note that might have you searching for your nearest Apple store for Aunt Flow!
Thanks for listening, learning, and being you. And join us back here every Tuesday for all things uterus, in service to you, uterinekind.
Carol:
When we said they're coming for birth control, we meant it. When you need a gynecologist, good luck finding one. Uterine healthcare is under siege, and those elected to protect our rights are instead stripping our rights away. So why even show up is we're going to do it. We're going to claw back our rights and power and stand in our strength out loud about our intelligence and crystal clear about our lived experiences. Our power comes from being informed of our rights and in control of our uterine health. On this week's episode, the state of Gynecology and Unraveling how it goes so wrong. I'm Carol Johnson, and this is Hello Uterus.
The Right to Contraception Act would have enshrined that understanding into federal statutory law. It would ban states from restricting access to the pill IUDs and emergency contraceptives while also giving both the Attorney General and medical providers the authority to bring civil lawsuits against governments that restrict contraception access. Only eight Republican members of the House voting in favor of the bill, even though they said, oh, don't worry, we're not coming for your contraception. Well, then how come y'all didn't step up and vote yes on the Right to Contraception Act? Do you think we fall for this stuff? Like, your words are meaningless. They don't hold any weight. When you say you're going to do something, we basically assume you're going to do the opposite. Here's the reason why they voted against it because they said it's unnecessary and that there's no threat that the court will overturn the right to contraception. This is just a maddening time to be alive. Whether you're a woman man, trans nonbinary, the patriarchal stew we are steeped in is hot and oppressive, but we're not the ones consumed with hate and rage and the desperate desire for power. So I'm confident that we can focus on solutions, that we can work together to support each other. We can bring obscene amounts of pressure to the ignorant nonclinicians that fancy themselves as doctors and lawmakers when they're simply in it for the cash, the pension, the perks, and the power. They daydream about the good old days when uterine kind had no rights, when science didn't get in the way of their magical religious thinking. And we take action in these present modern times, securing equal rights for all. To be effective at doing that, we have to understand the climate that we live in. I wish that we didn't have to know these things, because, like an onion, peeling back the layers makes me want to cry. Might make you want to cry, but now is not the time. We can't run away from it all, go raise kittens on a mountain in the middle of nowhere, because we are going to take back our rights, and it's going to feel so good when we do it, and we're going to change the way people experience uterine care. So let's get clear on what we're dealing with. We'll be right back after this break. With the state of gynecology,
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Carol: The perfect storm is brewing. Proximity, an online physician network, conducted a study, and we need to know the findings on the looming shortage of OB GYNs. They report major metropolitan areas such as Las Vegas, Orlando, Los Angeles and Miami are at the highest risk of an OBGYN shortage. There's also a shortage of younger doctors. Get this only 14% of all OBGYNs in the United States are 40 years or younger. 14%. That suggests that nobody wants to practice gynecology. Gee, I can't understand why. The average age of a gynecologist is 51, which is super concerning because most OBGYNs begin to retire at 59. So now we're looking at only 14% of all OBGYNs younger than 40. The average age is 51. Most of them are going to start retiring at 59. We're going to have a really hard time finding a gynecologist. And then you factor in the workload that OBGYNs carry. We've talked before about the workload that OBGYNs carry. Nationally, they deliver an average of 105 births each year in areas where physicians already carry a larger workload. An increase in retirements could significantly challenge local OB GYNs to keep up with the demand for women's health services. It's a perfect storm. And here we are complaining that there are only 150 endo specialists in the US. Who are trained in the gold standard treatment for endo excision surgery. 150 of those and dwindling gynecology numbers. We're going to run out of doctors. It doesn't stop there. This perfect storm has bloomed into a cataclysmic, once in a lifetime event because of a lot of factors. People are delaying pregnancy. And while we don't understand the mechanism of action of many of the chronic uterine conditions that people deal with, we do know that there's some evidence that suggests that getting pregnant can actually help alleviate some of these conditions. Again, I say that loosely because we really don't have a clear understanding. Also, it's like, oh, great, get pregnant, but I can't get pregnant because I have 52 fibroids. Or I can't get pregnant because my entire pelvic cavity is covered in endometriosis. Is there a doctor I can go see about this? There isn't. Whoops. So now these patients have limited access to gynecologists. And then you layer on that there are no standards in the delivery of uterine healthcare. So what you experience at one doctor is going to be drastically different from what another person experiences at a different doctor. And now gynecologists have to have lawyers on retainer to help them avoid prison. Can you imagine what their insurance premiums are like now and what their day to day lives are like? Questioning every move they make, wondering if a police officer is going to show up at their practice? You'd have to be like, the most amazing physician to provide excellent care under these extreme conditions. So who's going to want to be a gynecologist and then frost that cake of hell with the common patient experience of being dismissed? Gasolt. Having your symptoms minimized by the people who are today gynecologists? Not all. We know that here, but still, it seems wild, right? It's kind of weird. It is like an onion or maybe pulling back a curtain because we don't think about these things. We don't connect the dots on the myriad of things that are going on in today's world that impact uterine care. Everything from just being able to get an appointment to getting listened to rather than gasoline, to understanding what your condition is all about and what the treatment options are like and getting a definitive diagnosis. The friction feels like lava, the problems snowball. The government steps in and attempts to legislate and regulate and control our bodies. And it's oppressive and it's offensive. But there's one thing that's going to upend all that. We are paying attention. We're observing, we're connecting the dots and taking action like never before, while also accepting no nonsense. We're coming together to support each other. We are reaching out to people that we've never reached out to before to get help. We're gathering steam. This will work. We will get our rights back. We will release the medical community from this ridiculous bondage that they've been placed in by the Supreme Court of the United States, Narrative Clinician among them, and get ourselves back on right footing. So even though we knew that this story wasn't going to be great, right? It's like you kind of know when you start saying there's a perfect storm brewing, it's not exactly going to be good news, but we can turn it around. So looking at this information from Docksimity, it's really important that you secure a gynecologist ASAP. If you don't have one, go find one. And make sure that you factor in good criteria in order to make your selection. Someone who reflects the way you look at your uterine health someone who cares about you, someone who believes your lived experience, someone who is a modern practitioner of gynecology, someone who follows the science and stays up to date on the science. Someone also and this is Key who has chosen to be trained in modern, minimally invasive treatments in order to address the root causes of chronic uterine conditions. That is super crucial. So get on that because the numbers are going to decline. It's going to get harder to find a gynecologist. Specialists are even more elusive. So get on it. And the other thing that I want to recommend is don't restrict yourself just to an MD. There are physician assistants out there who are practicing uterine health. And I have met with a handful, not a numerous amount, a small population of them. And what I have found to be consistent is that they went out on their own because they want to practice uterine care different from the way the practice that they belonged to practiced uterine care. A more evolved way of practicing uterine care, a more holistic way. So maybe there is a physician assistant in your community that you can go and see, and from there you can find a specialist, if you need a specialist to treat a chronic uterine condition. So it's not just the MDS that you can go see. You can go see a PA and get the care you need. But definitely don't delay on aligning yourself with the right doctor before this shortage becomes really, really painful. We're going to take a quick break. And when we come back, a mythical organ obscured.
Angel: Help bring an end to endometriosis by participating in the Rose study. The study of menstrual blood may hold the key to the why of endo. From there, treatments are born. Participate in the Rose Study today. Visit Heliotrous.com and click on the Rose Study blog for more information. Or simply google Rose Study for endometriosis. It's the first link. Please participate if you can. You could hold the key to the future for all uterine kind. Thank you. Now let's get back to the show.
Carol: In March of this year, Vagina Obscura was released. What a great title. The book is written by Rachel E. Gross, an awardwinning science journalist based in Brooklyn, a former Night Science Journalism Fellow and digital science editor of Smithsonian Magazine. She writes for BBC Future, the New York Times and Scientific American. She's got brains. We like the science. And I just found this book and holy I want to actually pause the podcast and read the entire thing to you right now, which I think we need to do at some point, actually, but live. I love to read books to people. Is that weird? And I also found myself just my eyes bulging out of my head reading this. And I want other people there so I can see your eyes bulge, too. And then we can all roll our eyes together. And soak in the knowledge because there's a lot of knowledge in here and allow this book to inspire us. So we're not going to read the whole thing right now. I really want to, but what we are going to do is ponder this point she makes in a story about a person, a very special person, who experienced endometriosis that kicked in with puberty, followed by breast cancer as an adult. It was 2010 and 49 year old bioengineer Linda Griffith felt a lump in her breast. A worst case scenario. She was diagnosed with the aptly named triple negative breast cancer. Her family, friends, neighbors, doctors, nurses, colleagues, staff, all rushed to support and assist her as she navigated breast cancer. Any need that she had was tended to with speed and care. She felt loved. She felt strong and capable of taking on breast cancer. Because of all of this support, the biopsy was immediate, followed by a detailed care plan that was executed flawlessly as compared to her experience with endo. She was using three super tampons at the same time, which is MacGyvering, a period like I have never heard, and I kind of want to know how that how do you three wow. She also took 30 Advil tablets a day. Instead of getting to the root cause of her horrifying situation, doctors were instead only curious about how her stomach could handle that amount of Advil. I mean, it is seriously like we are animals in a zoo to them, just fascinating little creatures to stare at and ponder like, gosh, how can they consume all of those pain meds? And why are they so hysterical all the time? Have you seen a therapist? I mean, it's so ridiculous. Get this, one physician suggested that she was rejecting her femininity and that's why she was in such a state of affairs with endo, rejecting her femininity. Endo was, after all, referred to as the working woman's disease. At one point in time, they will do anything to get us pregnant and back home. I swear I need a glass and a bat. I need to make noise and break things when I read stuff like that. Because nobody had taken her pain seriously enough to examine her, griffith's disease was particularly advanced when it was accidentally discovered during an outpatient procedure for the draining of Assist on her ovary, jeez. Boy, oh, boy. She woke up the next day in the hospital and looked down. She had a giant scar like, what? Wait a second, where am I? What happened? What happened was her endowead progressed so much that her ovaries, bladder and intestines were all fused together with a sticky speckled tissue that resembled the lining of her uterus endo. She was relieved, not because she had the surgery, but because everything that she had felt and said in the years since the onset of endo. And remember, this happened at puberty, right? So 1211 13. From that point in time until years later, she was an adult and married. Everything that she felt and said in those years was validated by this surgery. And so she was relieved. She didn't have to think she was crazy anymore. She didn't have to think that it was because she went to work. She chose to become a researcher, and her womb was punishing her for it. It's just wild. But listen to this quote from Vagina Obscura and from Dr. Griffith directly compared to endometriosis. She likes to say it was a walk in the park, meaning cancer. Not like a super beautiful day, like a stormy day walk in the park. But it was like people understood. People understood. They understood breast cancer. But gosh, that mysterious endometriosis. I wonder why we're dealing with such nonsense there. Could it have anything to do with the fact that it was once called a working woman's disease? Or that people are constantly told that it's in their head and sent to therapists? Or that your bad period pain just so happens to be here on the period pain bell curve? One more quote, because this is packed with truth that must be heard. Dr. Griffith was sick of hearing doctors describe endometriosis in terms of myth rather than science. She knew her disease could be explained in terms of data and biology. It just required viewing the uterus for what it was, not some mythical center of womanhood, but an organ like any other, deeply connected to everything around it, trading in immune cells, stem cells, and vital fluids. In other words, it was part of a complex biological system, not a womb. A complex biological system, one that has been dismantled millions of times, causing a flood of side effects. But who cares? It's just a womb, a dormant organ disposable. Why aren't you pregnant? Are you going to get pregnant? Are you guys going to have babies? Why aren't you pregnant? It's like, Holy cow. The uterus doesn't sit there doing nothing, just waiting for a blastocyte. Is that what it is to implant in the uterine wall? It is part of a complex biological system. It requires healthcare, it requires modern health care, and it requires people to stop dismissing symptoms, complaints, actual evidence. Like when a person shows up in the Er and they fainted because of pain and they're bleeding out on the table. Maybe there's something wrong, right? The other thing that's interesting is that endometriosis is not a woman's disease. And Dr. Griffith gets into this in both in this book as well as in her own writings. It's not uteruscentric. It's a full body chronic inflammation disease. Even when the uterus is removed, the disease remains and can thrive without the uterus. And as if we don't have enough to thank Dr. Griffith for, the other thing that she's done is she's shamed people into not calling it benign. Right? It's not benign. Fibroids are not benign. None of this stuff is benign. Oh, non cancerous, sure. Benign? Not a chance. We're going to have more on her research and hopefully we will even have Dr. Griffith join us at hello, uterus. Well, I mean, for an episode, not like she's going to quit her research. That would be great, but I don't think that's going to happen. Please don't let that happen. She has to stay there and research. Till then, we're going to just thank her for bringing a refreshing perspective to the science of endo and the uterus as an organ, as part of the complex system that is the human body. So. Thank you, Dr. Griffith. Your story is one people need to seek out and we would love to have you on this show. So let's hope for that. Stay tuned for ending on a high note.
You can tell a lot by a person's bathroom, what they stock, what they don't. But generally speaking, you can't tell squat from a bathroom. At a retail store, there's usually cleaning supplies, some stuff maybe we don't want to specify. Hopefully no hidden cameras. Are you like me anytime that I have to visit a public bathroom? I am totally looking for hidden cameras. But in an Apple store on Cape Cod, there was an unusual sighting. Free organic tampons. You have to wonder. Last week we did a story on sharks and how it's like it's more likely that you're going to get attacked by a shark than you are to get diagnosed with endometriosis. We can kind of back that up. Not really, but when I heard about this on Cape Cod, my first thought was, well, maybe it's only on Cape Cod because they're terrified that people will go and bleed in the ocean and then more sharks will come and they'll have to close down the beaches and stuff. I'm pretty sure that that's not real. That's just my own weird brain writing stories that don't make any sense. But anyway, back to the free organic tampons and the fact that they're organic. Actually, I'm not sure if they're tampons. They might be pads only, but I know that Aunt flow with a w on the end of flow makes organic tampons, and their tagline is people helping people, period. I just love that it's like, look, we're going to help out because we have to, and then also we're going to help you, period, because the way we period now is really problematic. It's so cool that they put that in their tagline because it will keep them on track, just like says it like it is. And apparently it gets companies like apple to take notice and stock their products. And these are free. Aunt Flow is the brainchild of Claire Cooder, who founded the company four years ago when she was 18. Lots to love here, especially that they don't cave on the type of products that they produce. Going all in on organic, the pads have no dyes, perfumes or other weird stuff. Do me a favor, if you have any tampons or pads that have perfumes or dyes that smell like lavender or whatever, throw them out. You don't know what is in the perfume. The fragrance. And fragrances are the most horrible offenders when it comes to endocrine disrupting chemicals. So get rid of them. Who cares? Nobody needs to smell a lavender, period. So thank you, Claire and team. Give them a high five at goantflow.com. Again, it's flowflow goantflow.com super cool that they did that. And super cool that they're showing up in stores and bathrooms where it's like that is where we need them. We don't need the boxes that we have at home. We do need them. But what we really need in those bathrooms that you have to race to before you bleed out over some store floor, stock them with free pads and tampons, please, and make it so that we don't create a bigger mess in your store. Be super helpful. That's people helping people, period. That's why I love that tagline. It's so great. So great. Well, I hope that today more ending on a high note. I hope that today you leave this episode episode with a sense that we are going to come together and pull this off. We will. I'm 100% confident we will be able to push back on these archaic, obscene, offensive regulations that are being forced upon us. We will support the healthcare community because they're dealing with it, too. And we'll also be really smart about securing a physician or a physician assistant to guide us on our uterine health, because the numbers, as we talked about, they don't look great. So it really does need to kind of be a group effort here. And I feel like that we are primed to do that. And I know that there are people in positions of power that want to help us. So in the coming weeks, we're going to regularly inject some things that we can do in our own lives in order to have an effect on how the business of uterine care changes, evolves and morphs. And one of those I mentioned, I believe I mentioned it in the podcast, I know I talked about it in a blog post that we just put up at Hello Uterus.com. Write to the CEOs of the hospitals in your local community and demand that they get agitated and activated in order to affect uterine care. That they don't sit behind a glass wall or sit in their office or sit on the golf course or wherever they are counting their money. That they know that we're watching and we're connecting the dots, and we empathize with the environment that they've had to live in, from Covet now to the repeal of Roe v. Wade, that we want to work together as a team united in order to affect the way uterine care is experienced by everyone. And I think if we do that, I really believe that we will get the results that we want the results that we're seeking, which is freedom. Freedom to live, freedom to access care, freedom to be well, freedom to not be pregnant, and equality. So write those letters. Let your local hospitals know that you care about this and that you're happy to be part of the solution. But you're certainly not going to let the problems continue to fester. It's going to be so good when we get our rights back. It's going to be so good. Well, have a great week. Thank you, angel producer extraordinaire, for making this podcast sound awesome. And thanks to the team at Uterine Kind designing and coding away. The app is getting so close. But the biggest thanks of all goes to you for being here, for caring, for listening, for fighting for your rights. We will not roll over. We are not going to roll over. Little housekeeping. Heads up at next week's show will be a few days delayed. We've got some traveling to do and no easy way to record that won't sound like so. Subscribe to the podcast wherever you get your podcast so you don't miss out when it launches. And remember, being informed is a giant leg up. Be well, stay cool, and come back for the next episode of Hello Uterus. We'll see you soon. Bye.
Angel: Hello Uterus Podcast Is For Informational Use Only The content shared here Is to not be used to diagnose or treat any medical Condition. Please speak with a physician about your health condition and call 911 if it's an emergency. And thank you. You are in Kind for listening. Thank you.