Living as a woman

[MissScarletInTheBallroom]

This is a thread for people to give examples of experiences which constitute "living as a woman".

I'll go first.

Peeing on a pregnant test and waiting anxiously to see whether a second line appears.

Thank you. I've mainly worked through things on my own as a lot of other stuff happened too; it's all so complex that I simply wouldn't know where to begin in therapy, but my husband is my rock and I have some lovely women friends and wider family members to talk to.

On a lighter note...

In my grandparent's car, grandma in the front, me and my two brothers in the back. I was about five. Grandpa had gone to talk to someone in a business and we were waiting for him. To occupy us, Grandma gave us each an apple and when she gave me mine she said, 'You can have the little one, Amazed, because you're a girl'. We were being brought up by my dad to 'share and share alike' and my brothers howled and jeered at that little apple. I was furious and knew it was wrong and couldn't articulate my feelings but it felt like 'Fuck you, lady!'.

The fear that comes from being stared at by a stranger. Wondering what they are going to do when they have finished staring, and what you are going to do to get away from them.

Being bullied by other road users on my bike, in my car, and being expected to be the one who steps aside on the pavement, because I am smaller and man is bigger.

In my early 20s, getting off a train in a random suburb of Paris and waiting for the next one, because two middle aged men had followed me into an almost empty carriage and taken the seats immediately next to and opposite me, and wouldn't stop pestering me despite my silent pleas for help to the few other people in the carriage, who pretended not to notice.

When one of them put his hand on my thigh I decided it was time to get off the train.

And the worst thing was, I felt compelled to be POLlTE to them.

It wouldn't happen now because they'd see my death stare from a thousand yards away.

Which reminds me that I really ought to keep an eye out for young women who might need help in a similar situation now.

This.
Oh and having post-partum haemorrhages after both babies and being unable to sit up without feeling like I was going to pass out for days afterwards.

It wouldn't happen now because they'd see my death stare from a thousand yards away.

That's a good one: living as a woman means having to perfect a death stare. And a "don't fuck with me" walk.

I can death stare for England and have even startled myself when catching my reflection 😅

Nomononomoniated this for Classics. I can't think of a thread that's more relevant to Mumsnet, really.

@ChangedBeing

A similar thing happened to my Mum on the tube when she was young. A man got on her empty carriage and sat next to her. She said she was scared but turned and stared at him until he got up and moved to another carriage.

I’ve been on the end of that stare so know why he moved!

Feeling bloated and then finding out I had ovarian cancer. And it’s a cancer that a woman dies from every 2 hours in the UK and unlike prostate cancer there is NO FUCKING TEST for ovarian cancer so most women only find out they have it when it has frolicked all around.

Comparing funding for cancers that only affect men (like prostate and testicular cancer) with those that only affect women (like ovarian, cervical, uterine, vulval, and vaginal cancers), there is a clear gap.
–Male specific cancers: Average survival rate of 79% and £1,450 per case in funding.
-female specific cancers: Average survival rate of 58% and £1,203 per case in funding.

Specifically Prostate cancer, with a 78% survival rate, receives £1,288 per case but ovarian cancer, where survival is just 35%, only gets £1,132 per case.

Spidey feelings knowing when something is not quite right

Having cervical exams during labour and being amazed by how painful they were - worse than the strongest contractions.

After the birth, letting different maternity nurses painfully squeeze my nipples to extract tiny amounts of colostrum and wondering where my dignity had gone.

I've been such a young woman in a slightly different situation (crazy man calling me a whore and all sorts of things but not touching me... Yet). And indeed a couple of 40 something women grabbed me at some point just before the sub doors closed and hauled me onto the platform. Bless them.

At a second round interview when I was 31 back in 1998, hearing the interviewer and company boss say, ‘I shouldn’t really ask you this but you’re not planning on getting married or having children in the next couple of years are you?’ I had no plans for marriage and children so I said, ‘I’ve no idea’ but my vagueness was enough to ensure they played safe and gave the job to a less qualified male who, I later found out, was due to get married to his pregnant girlfriend in a few week’s time.

Miscarrying a much wanted pregnancy and having my male GP tell me that I shouldn’t worry as it was ’very common’.

Being screamed at and pushed around and sexually assaulted by men, in the street and at work. All the time.

Men are not and never can be women. Fuck off.

You poor love x

Having stretchmarks which I 'wear' with pride as a mark of my two pregnancies.
Being asked in a job interview (didn't get job) what would happen if either of my children were ill. What would I do about work?!
Bet the men didn't get asked that. I kick myself even now for not replying that my husband would just as likely take the day off as me.

24 hours in labour and nearly dying when I had my son.

Doubled over with pain and sometimes passing out every single month with my period.

A lifetime of subconsciously wondering whether the man walking behind me, or sitting in the same rail carriage, or the stranger at the door is going to rape and/or kill me.

Being belittled, humiliated and treated as a lesser entity by men on some level my entire life.

Being catcalled with vile, sexualised comments even as an 11 year old in school uniform. At the age of 12 a builder screaming from a rooftop that what I needed was "thirteen inches of throbbing wet dick".

The list is endless. No, men cannot be women.

It's almost like a weird sisterhood where by tacit agreement you don't give women all the gory details before they give birth for the first time because you don't want to make them worry unnecessarily, but after they've given birth you want to reassure them that it rarely goes completely according to plan and they're not the only one to feel a little traumatised after the event.

this is very true.

Being asked “will you continue working after you get married?” (1990s!)

Not being allowed to study engineering science at school “we can’t run the course this year because there are only three students and one of them’s a girl!”

45 (& counting) years of periods. 20 (& counting) years of abattoir ones that dominate at least a third of each month.

Having our team coach at uni respond to me having opinions by saying that I just needed a good fucking and many of my (male) team mates sniggering. Never mind that my opinions were both reasonable and turned out to be right.

Having my voice drowned out in meetings by lower-pitched male colleagues.

Being expected to be feminine, when I am very much not. And being mocked when I fought against stereotypes.

Being passed over in favour of male colleagues - or more fitting feminine ones.

Fibroids of various sizes, equating to a substantial fruit bowl and making me look pregnant but being told “they might go away naturally so we will just leave them for a few years and see if they do” (no matter that they were making a serious negative impact on my life). All part of a wider theme of pain dismissed.

Stupidly big norks that I hate and that require complex engineering in the bra department.

The humiliation (NB not validation) of having my breast bud groped by a random passer by while walking along the street with my parents. Age 10.

🌺🌺🌼🌼 to everyone for sharing their stories on this thread, and thank you Miss Scarlett for starting it.

When I was a child I answered our house phone and an unknown man said "Suck my dick". Didn't really know what it meant but it was extremely disturbing.