Have you ever ... ? (Things women have to deal with, that men don't)

[EssenceOfDittany]

I had a conversation with a naive "be kind" sort of person (male) the other day at work, who casually came out with something about sex being basically irrelevant next to gender identity. I reminded him that the sole reason for women's oppression throughout history is biology, i.e. sex. Thankfully he revised his position pretty quickly and looked like he felt a bit silly for having said it in the first place. (I think he is also blissfully unaware of how controversial such a "belief" is these days, and was only parroting the thing about gender because he'd heard lots of other people say it.)

This got me thinking, I'd like to compile a list of some of the crappy things girls/women have to deal with in their everyday lives that men never/rarely do, so that when someone more set in their opinions says "sex is irrelevant", I can say "really? So, have you ever ... ?"

A few to start us off:

… spent the entire day with a jumper tied around your waste to hide the blood stain on your trousers when your period caught you off-guard?

… left a social gathering earlier than you wanted because you realised you didn’t have enough sanpro to get you through the evening?

… made an excuse to not go swimming when you’d like to, because you realise you haven’t done the requisite bikini/leg/armpit maintenance?

… spent hours painfully removing your pubic hair when you didn’t want to, because an intimate male partner told you it was disgusting and you didn't have the confidence to tell him to sod off?

… endlessly plucked/waxed/obsessed over your upper lip hair because it would be a disaster if someone realised that was your natural state?

… taken the route three times as long, just to avoid going down a short alley alone in the dark?

… clutched your keys between your fingers with the “blade” sticking outwards to make you feel like you might stand a chance if attacked by a man, since you know you’ll have no chance based on strength alone?

… asked a family member to track your location when you’re out alone, and told them exactly where they should expect you to be every step of the journey, so they can raise the alarm if something happens to you?

… felt relieved when your company moved to WFH, because you could finally stop putting on a brave face at your desk while in agony on your period?

… worried about judgement from your colleagues when you say you're “feeling ill” a day or two every month?

... had a constant sick feeling in your stomach when out alone in your local area after dark, because you're afraid of being assaulted/mugged?

Please help me flesh out the list further! I’ve only scratched the surface, and I know there are so many more examples, relating to motherhood, career progression, DV, women’s health, general safety, all sorts. I want to rattle off this list next time someone dares suggest that “sex is irrelevant”.

Did anyone see the Dr on channel4 news last night? Can't remember who she was, but it was about cv and pregnancy and she came right out and said women's health has nowhere near as much research as men's. Not sure she'd meant it to go that way, but she got quite politely angry. Was surprised it wasn't picked up on by the presenter.

Been sick at wirk due to blood loss from heavy periods.
Been in trouble at work due to having too many sick days due to heavy periods and pain associated with them

Been called a c* because a male friend gave me a lift home, and repeatedly tried to put his hand down my jeans and i kept moving him away.

Had to cope with the discomfort of underwired bras

Felt so tired in a meeting at work i feel asleep in my hands as i was in early stages of pregnancy and had a toddler that refused to sleep

Told you are lucky to have big breasts because it means boys and men will like you.

Not taken seriously in an important meeting because you are heavily pregnant. And told that your factually correct to-the-point comments were amusingly harsh because you had pregnancy rage.

Being told someone was glad they didn't give you a job a year before because now you were pregnant it would have been inconvenient for them.

Having to laugh off being groped aggressively in a club because it could have got worse.

Being asked not to take so many toilet breaks on a 4 hour call centre shift - heavy period making this a choice between upsetting manager or bleeding through sanpro.

Bikes being designed for male anatomy. And men not understanding the issue (numb parts)

Being asked if I was the student when starting a new job....I was 36.
Being told I probably had a UTI when complaining of pain during early pregnancy. Turned out it was an ectopic pregnancy and it then ruptured and I had to have emergency, life saving, surgery.
Being dismissed as ‘just a new mum’ when discussing medical issues with my baby only to have my husband taken seriously when I made him go and explain the exact same issue.
Had a nurse stand with her hand inside my cervix for a ridiculously long time because I didn’t want to take medication to help the placenta come out. Turns out she could have just waited and asked me to go to the loo and gravity could have helped the situation.
Had a male colleague ask me to pose for underwear only photos.
Been flashed at.

@Shadysback

The one that boggled my mind was something I only realised recently, that men's bodies just are. Nothing starts to hurt, or bloats, or bleeds, etc etc, at certain times of the month. It must be lovely to be the same throughout the month, I can't imagine that.

I am now 57 and this is what being post-menopausal is like. It is lovely. No mood swings, no bloating, no sore and painful breasts. Just the same, all the time.

Experiencing awful side effects of hormonal contraceptives. Many years ago I would vomit repeatedly every single night for months, retching even when my stomach was empty. (Male) doctor said it definitely wasn't my pill. It was my pill.

@seeingdots

Experiencing awful side effects of hormonal contraceptives. Many years ago I would vomit repeatedly every single night for months, retching even when my stomach was empty. (Male) doctor said it definitely wasn't my pill. It was my pill.

I had wondered if it was only me who got nauseous. You're the first other woman I've ever seen mention it

Between that and other side-effects, I will never touch hormonal contraception again.

Fighting off a drunk, potential rapist at 18 in the back of the car, who is trying to pull my knickers and jeans down (which he already managed to unzip) and who has locked me in the back with him and whose mate sits blithely in the driver’s seat only to escape and hear the rumour the next day that I have said I’m pregnant by him. Did I think to report him? What good would that have done, he didn’t do anything did he? It was the late 80’s, see. And seeing as who he was, reporting him may have put my life in danger.

Being physically abused and bullied by my brother for being female. Including red traffic light stuff to demean me to be utterly undesirable, a a non female, wangling his dick in my face and calling me to come to him only to realise he was naked and stroking his erection to demean and destroy me.

Getting a position to be trained to departmental manager in a manufacturing company only to be relegated to coffee girl, secretary and copy typist.

Told almost 10 years ago I must have been depressed by a psychiatrist, who was supposed to assessing me for chronic fatigue as antidepressants had made it possible to live with the fact I couldn’t play with or look after my child and walking away from the medical profession because of it. And to come back in 3 months if not completely cured. Funnily enough never to darken his door and only to discover years later I had severe gynaecological issues requiring very intrusive major surgery, which were making me so ill, I was heading toward needing nursing care.

Treated as less than and the girl by both parents whilst mother doted on her golden child son and father lived vicariously through him with all number of really cool presents for him to play with - bought for his pleasure, not birthdays.

When on a French exchange and the girl’s boyfriend was allowed in the house from 7am to 11 pm whilst the parent’s weren’t there yet I had a curfew and couldn’t get away from him. He took a liking to me, pinned me against doors, locked me in the bathroom with him and so forth. My solution was to get a boyfriend, who was bigger than him and when I was talking about it to a friend, the female teacher, who hated me having heard the last few words came up to us and had a go at me for getting a boyfriend.

Came back to add another one - chatting to DH yesterday, he has never even considered the possibility (and never checked whether) there might be hidden cameras in the toilets. I always check as best I can, following an incident with a friend whose male housemate was filming her and their other female housemate for several weeks until he was caught. He was expelled from university (this was some years ago), but that footage is out there forever. Another reason why I hate the concept of mixed sex toilets.

Keep spare clothes at work. Case of leakage

Been expected to do something I don't remotely want to do because 'men have needs.'

Having to justify why you don't want to be poked in the cervix by anything because it's incredibly painful and causes a trauma response due to a badly fitted coil 14 years ago that made you go into shock. I can feel the pain just thinking about it.

Having the cervix poking aggressively marketed to you.

-Had an episiotomy when pushing your baby out face first.
-Torn your arse anyway.
-Given yourself an enema to allow an anorectal manometry test to be performed as a result of said birth causing so much damage (balloons and electrodes put up your bum).
-Leaked breast milk all over your top at a work lunch.
-Flooded your jeans with blood so badly in tesco that the blood was totally down your legs as well, necessitating cancelling the rest of the work day as had to drive home to shower and change.
-Been kicked in the legs at a club for declining to go have sex with a man.
-Vomited everyday for 35 weeks. Twice.
-Had your tits commented on at a dinner party.
-Hobbled around for a day taking co-codomal due to coil insertion being so painful
-Taken a half day off work to sit at a clinic when said coil began to fall out causing two weeks of heavy bleeding
-Milked yourself into a sink when away for a night and unable to breastfeed
-Been flashed and followed home when dog walking
-Been held against a wall by the wrists by a male bouncer who murmured "just so you know I'm stronger than you"
-Felt too afraid to tell the guy across the aisle on the night train to stop masturbating through his jeans because you felt you'd be in danger on your own with him in the carriage

Yeah yeah biology is meaningless

Not mine:
-Been told the baby inside you is no longer alive but you need to wait for it to come out, so walked around for 2 weeks with this knowledge only to miscarry on the toilet in horrendous pain
-Injected yourself with hormones day after day causing emotional distress and hormonal acne... because your partner is infertile
-Been groped on a bus
-Been unable to move for days every month due to pain from endometriosis, have no medical staff take it seriously for years

It really is no surprise at all that TRA men are the driving force saying biology is meaningless. Or young women yet to know the full gamut of female experience

A woman who has endured "years of back pain" and sores due to her breast size says she is fundraising for a reduction after being refused one on the NHS.

Kelly Michaud, 26, has 34H breasts, which she says causes her huge physical discomfort as well as mental distress.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-56114401

Not being taken seriously when ill. For 20 years. "Difficult woman!!!" written on notes. It turned out to be MS along with a rare arthritic condition.

Being punched by our male headmaster at primary school for refusing to get into the pool for swimming lessons as my period had started on the bus on the way there. I'd no doubt have been punched harder if I'd stained the pool. I was 9 at the time, the only girl to have started periods and had no idea how to cope with either the pain or the blood flow.

Being laughed at by other children for bleeding through my clothes.

Often feeling cold as my school jumper was around my waist instead of being worn normally in an effort to hide my period bloodstain.

Being told I couldn't take preferred subjects because I'm female (giving my age away now).

Being relieved when hearing that rape within marriage had been made illegal. My ex was too much of a coward to risk jail.

Being groped, cornered and forcibly kissed by male customers and being told by the boss to put up with it if I wanted to keep my job.

Being told by a gynaecologist that women only want HRT to make themselves more attractive to men and then refused it.

The list is depressingly endless.

How could I have forgotten being flashed several times through my life, a few times in women's toilets by men in skirts. The terror this caused me as I'd been groomed and sexually abused but know that I'd have been punished by my abuser for 'asking for it' had my abuser found out.

My distress that it has already happened to my young niece.

My disgust that we're expected to treat it as one big joke and laugh it off. Or worse, just accept it as a man's right. Because he feels like it.

Being grabbed by the crotch at 12 by a boy at school and when he was asked he said he was looking to see if I had an EPC 'Extra Padded Crotch' aka a sanitary pad. This was the late 1970s and sanitary pads were the massive Dr Whites ones. I was mortified...apparently the boys had decided they needed to know which girls were on their periods ( so they could take the piss) and when I complained to my teachers the response was ' boys will be boys'.....

8 years of appts and an A+E visit to sort out a botched episiotomy which stopped me being able to climb stairs without pain.

Being told by my (female) boss to try and make my (J cup) breasts “less prominent” because they would undermine my considerable work experience.

Lower back pain due to muscle and ligament damage done from having G+ cup boobs my whole adult life and then growing and delivering a 9lb baby.

Cost of bras.

Unreliable periods that turn up randomly and ruin clothes and furniture.

Leg pain from decades of heel wearing.

Being asked who the “boy racer” car belongs to when I’ve just got out of it and the private plate spells out my name.

Being told you probably are having a panic attack when showed up in the A&E with feeling faint, clammy and having low grade chest pain. The doctor suddenly got much more concerned after he managed to access the patient notes from the cardiology department.

I don’t think a male with those symptoms would have been dismissed as having a panic attach.

DicklessWonder you have the best username on MN.
Have you ever considered breast reduction ? I did it, it changed my life.
the neck & back pain gone, the (for me) body image loathing gone, able to dress in normal clothes, not feel like a circus freak at the beach, unacceptable & unkind embarrassing remarks forgotten...

Having a good portion of a job interview be about your childcare arrangements to

Getting a raise (yeah?) when you get an au pair (change from child minder) and your boss saying to you now you can come in early and leave late.