NHS staff invitation to menopause workshop to people who menstruate!

[sunshineandhappy]

I received a generic email from the well being team at the nhs trust I am employed by inviting me to a managing menopause workshop which was open to 'people who menstruate or people who will go through the menopause'.
This was my reply I was disappointed to see the following phrase ‘those who menstruate or those who will go through the menopause ‘ in the below email. The correct phrase for the target audience should surely include the word women, even if the other phrasing needs to be used as well, as this clumsy phrasing, whilst appearing to be inclusive to a minority, is actually exclusive to the way the vast majority of the target audience for this seminar may feel. I do not want to be reduced to being a person who menstruates or a person who will go through the menopause, I am a woman, an adult human female. I hope my opinion will be considered in the spirit in which it is meant, as all groups matter, and all relevant individuals should be considered when generic emails are being sent to a large number of staff.'
We will wait to see whether I receive any response

Very interesting thread. I wonder if there have been any petitions yet on changing This type of wording..

N*iceGerbil
*
I can't really name the specific one, but a civil service department. To be fair to them, it wasn't the department but a volunteer-led women's network that said it. I don't think the departmental leadership would have seen it before it went out (at least I sincerely hope not!).

On "what were they thinking", honestly I think it's similar to what you wrote earlier: they want to be inclusive, they strongly believe we're a very 'good', 'caring', 'values-led' organisation, and they don't want to cause offence to anyone, but they don't think critically or deeply about exactly what any of that means and where conflicts might exist. So I can imagine there might have been a discussion about "we should acknowledge our male allies" (all our networks are very big on allies) with a bit of "we're all nice people in this department, there can't possibly be any rapists/harassers/domestic abusers here!" naivety.

This thread has prompted me to have a discussion about it. I'll come back if there's anything worth following up on.

@ASugarr When it comes to biological medical needs it’s really important to be honest about your biological sex. You could end up missing some serious sex based health complications if not (I.e a non binary person of a male sex not having check ups for prostate cancer, or a non binary person of the female sex not going for smear tests). Sex based medical care should be clearly labelled so people can identify which services they need based on their sex. This shouldn’t be about being inclusive or excluding, it should be about directly targeting biological male or females

As a perimenopausal woman I'm not sure if my last period was actually my last period. Am I a "person who menstruates"? I'm not sure. Is this event for me? I'm not sure

If it was a talk for women to learn more about the menopause, that definitely something I'd be interested in and I know was directed at me.

Language matters. Clarity matters.

@sunshineandhappy

I received a generic email from the well being team at the nhs trust I am employed by inviting me to a managing menopause workshop which was open to 'people who menstruate or people who will go through the menopause'. This was my reply I was disappointed to see the following phrase ‘those who menstruate or those who will go through the menopause ‘ in the below email. The correct phrase for the target audience should surely include the word women, even if the other phrasing needs to be used as well, as this clumsy phrasing, whilst appearing to be inclusive to a minority, is actually exclusive to the way the vast majority of the target audience for this seminar may feel. I do not want to be reduced to being a person who menstruates or a person who will go through the menopause, I am a woman, an adult human female. I hope my opinion will be considered in the spirit in which it is meant, as all groups matter, and all relevant individuals should be considered when generic emails are being sent to a large number of staff.' We will wait to see whether I receive any response

Remind me again, why do you want trans men to suffer during the menopause?

Remind me again, why do you want trans men to suffer during the menopause?

Why don’t you remind us why you want women who have poor literacy (we have 7.1 million people in the U.K. who are deemed functionally illiterate) and don’t understand medical terminology to suffer during the menopause?

@PumpkinSpiceWoman

Settle in with your favourite tipple, calm down, and have a nice read through the whole thread.

🦡🌈🤍

""Maybe we do need to have words that emphasise biology more. For example, a word for a woman who has not given birth (childfree and childless are both ungreat in my opinion because of mothers whose children have died). Or women who have not yet been through menopause. There used to be words like barren, spinster and crone but they were offensive. Is that because the ideas themselves are offensive?""

There are already words.
Nulliparous is a women who has never given birth. Primiparous is a woman who has given birth to one child, multiparous is a woman who has given birth to more than one child.
They can mean slightly different things if you look into the exact definitions but this is broadly how it is described in medical terms.

However I'm sure it will offend someone, somewhere, for some reason.

Good point GCAcademic
The NHS guidelines, so kindly linked for us earlier, which I understand are to be followed, says this

“Inclusive, accessible services are better for everyone. For example, using simple words helps people who are sick or stressed as well as people who have a learning disability.”

Inclusive meaning to take into account various different groups e.g. people for whom English is not their first language, people with poor literacy

It also says
“avoid making any groups of people feel excluded”

This all comes under the heading of

NHS service standard -

1. Make sure everyone can use the service

Where it goes on to say:

Make sure people with different physical, mental health, social, cultural or learning needs can use your service, whether it's for the public or staff.

Also people who do not have access to the internet or lack the skills or confidence to use it.

service-manual.nhs.uk/service-standard/5-make-sure-everyone-can-use-the-service

There are many examples on the NHS website, where you can find this put into practice.

For example
“The menopause is when a woman stops having periods”
www.nhs.uk/conditions/menopause/

Early menopause happens when a woman's periods stop before the age of 45
www.nhs.uk/conditions/early-menopause/
Page last reviewed: 02 February 2021

The latter example having been updated only a couple of months ago so definitely showing the current thinking

🕳🐗📆

'Nulliparous is a women who has never given birth. Primiparous is a woman who has given birth to one child, multiparous is a woman who has given birth to more than one child.
They can mean slightly different things if you look into the exact definitions but this is broadly how it is described in medical terms.'

Cool.

Note up in library.

Have you changed from nulliparous to primiparous in the last 12 months?
Come along to our sessions on Wednesdays at 10 to meet other people in similar position!
If you are a member of this category you are welcome!

OTOH

Dad and baby session Wednesdays at 3! Meet other local dads. Free bacon sandwiches!!!

Interestingly my autocorrect knows primiparous etc! When I've heard it for the first time today.

And yet words I use often it still insists on changing...

Veeerrryyy interesting.

There's a lot of iffy medical terminology around female reproductive bits.

EG

Incompetent cervix
Geriatric mother
Failure to progress
Etc

Just waiting to see if they will be using OPs suggestion of “people with prostrates”

Isn’t it insane that by falling over yourself to be inclusive you end up excluding the main body of people effected. If you really were scared of upsetting or excluding groups then why couldn’t it be written in a way to not even touch on descriptions.
“Menopause awareness course - if you are facing the menopause then you’re not alone, join our session for advice and support”

Ok it’s shit they won’t just say woman or female but if they want to walk the middle line then that’s taking descriptions out of it in my opinion. I’d raise an eyebrow at such neutral and obviously timid phrasing but id understand the desire to walk the middle line. I’d certainly be a lot more fucked off at cervix haver / period person / individual with wangers / human with hairy muff and other women minimising phrases

@PumpkinSpiceWoman

Remind me again, why do you want trans men to suffer during the menopause

Do you say this because you think that by using the word “woman” in relation to something like a discussion on reproductive health or menopause would put a trans man off attending or trying to be part of that discussion?

This is a genuine question. Is that the objection to using woman rather than person?

In all honesty I would say.

That if a trans man has had hormones and/ or surgery then the last place they want to be is in a workshop full of women. Surely that would be immensely uncomfortable for pretty much everyone. There's also the issue of not wanting to out yourself at work. My understanding is this is for employees.
Additionally if a trans man has had surgery / hormones then they will be under medical care around all sorts of things to do with their reproductive biology. They will be getting specialist advice. Or they really should be. And if they aren't, a workshop like this will be inappropriate as they will have very different and individual needs.

If a trans man has had no hormones/ surgery then a different story. Similarly for non binary females. Again I would say that it would not be comfortable for them to go to a session that will inevitably be very woman heavy.

The genuinely inclusive approach, considering all needs, would be to run two sessions.

One for women who would like information about the menopause.

One for transmen and non binary people who would like to know more about the menopause.

In fact for the sake of privacy and knowing the numbers will likely be low. I would email out saying would anyone who is trans or non binary be interested in a session about menopause. And see if there was interest and if so, be discreet about where/ when. I would offer individual sessions for this reason as well (cost allowing) and if not look into reputable orgs to signpost to.

The idea that it would be anticipated that anyone with a non woman gender identity would be comfortable going to an open menopause session seems unlikely to me.

And anyway the needs of that group could be more specialised.

So no. I don't want to exclude trans men. I want to make sure that everyone who might need the session, understands that it's happening and what it's about. And that trans people who may be interested are considered with the utmost sensitivity and not just lumped in as people who menstruate which would be an incredibly insensitive approach that I doubt would get them engaged.

‘People who menstruate’ manages to offend both women and transmen. And, let’s be honest, transwomen, of course.

The entire target audience, and a further sub-set of humanity. That’s quite something.

@PumpkinSpiceWoman the OP clearly says "The correct phrase for the target audience should surely include the word women, even if the other phrasing needs to be used as well". Her issue, quite rightly, is not that the term woman is not used at all.

Make a poster/email announcement for a session which deliberately alienates the bulk of the audience in favour of appealing to a group who are low to non existent in numbers (middle aged transmen and non binary menstruators) in that organisation and would be unlikely to want to attend anyway. The sessions are then poorly attended, the conclusion is drawn that the sessions are not needed. The organisation can save money and not try to reach the audience of women going through menopause.

I absolutely don't understand the loathing to use the word trans in all this nonsense. What is wrong with calling a meeting for women and transmen going through the menopause? That is inclusive and unambiguous.

I am baffled that the use of 'trans' accurately and openly is so avoided, leading to the obfuscating mangled language. Do transmen not like to be called trans? Is trans as a term offensive in some way? Who to? What's wrong with it?

I think that when it is said “this session is for women and transmen” putting the two together highlights the similarities between them and the immutable nature of biology. I imagine that that is why it might be considered offensive to trans people. It could be offensive not only because women and transmen are categorised together but because of who isn’t explicitly included in the category ie transwomen however they often just use the term women to describe themselves and so may turn up anyway. As I understand it, some transwomen do believe that they experience periods and the menopause.

Happy to be corrected if I'm wrong about this, but wouldn't a transman coming up to menopausal age, or going through premature menopause as a result of surgery/hormone treatment, be likely to feel uncomfortable going to a workshop like this clearly targeted at people with female anatomy? Would Jon from accounts, who's always been Jon to all colleagues, but is actually female, really feel OK turning up to the workshop with Maggie from the sales department, who up to this point has only known Jon as a man? I imagine the numbers of transmen reaching menopausal age are rather small so running a special workshop for them is a non-starter for most employers, but perhaps that's an area where some of the charities supporting trans people could do a useful service and employers could refer staff there.

Oops, just seen that NiceGerbil has said much the same thing! Great minds ...

It could be offensive not only because women and transmen are categorised together but because of who isn’t explicitly included in the category ie transwomen

Unfortunately though the biological realities of 52% of the human race cannot be concealed in each and every way to avoid cause a very tiny group of the population possible offense at the cost of everyone else. No one is intolerant of those who would prefer to be referred to in other ways. It is necessary for them to be tolerant too. Equal expectations. Equality of values.

Trans men are men

So, if transmen are men, they will have no need of a workshop on menstruation or menopause.