Remember when

[mzteris]

women were just "high strung" or suffered "nervous breakdowns"

PMS and PMDD was just something women made up?

IBS was all in your head?

Post-partum depression was an excuse to get out of doing all the work of taking care of a baby?

When FIBROMYALGIA was an "imagined" illnes?

Every female of course became a little "depressed after her period because she wasn't pregnant"? After all, that's her purpose in life!

[virgogal]

1. My goodness,what brought this on?

[mzteris]

5. several things

See my post #4 for one.

All those Lyrica commercials for fibromyalgia. I knew a lady with that and people used to ridicule her. Roll their eyes, etc.

All those posts in here from people who "pooh-pooh" anything they don't understand. It couldn't possibly be "real" because they don't think it's real. Not just illnesses, but some cures, too.

[Curmudgeoness]

2. I remember when you couldn't go swimming or horseback riding

during "that time of month" when "your friend visited". Ah, the memories.

[mzteris]

6. oh god yes.

Couldn't even WASH YOUR HAIR. Water "bad" during "that time". . .

Remember the euphemisms?

"I fell off the roof"

"My aunt (or aunt flo) came to visit."

I've got "company".

"My friend's in town."

[Curmudgeoness]

7. There is a new one on me there.

I fell off the roof???? LOL, I don't even understand that one. Lucky I didn't move to your part of the country back then, I would have been truly confused----so is this an excuse for the headache you have?

[mzteris]

16. "fell off the roof"

was for having your period. It's a "south Georgia thang"... don't know where it came from or how wide spread it was.

[uppityperson]

10. Then they informed us you COULD go swimming so I figured out that being in water would block your

blood from coming out. I developed a plan to spend hours in the bath tub, get out and gush into the toilet, then back into the bath tub.

I was always envious because I never could play tennis, even when I wasn't having my period.

[Curmudgeoness]

11. Yep, those tampons didn't do a thing for my tennis game either.

I guess you are lucky that you used the bath tub instead of a public swimming pool if you didn't figure out you COULD go swimming, but only with that advertised product.

The things that we thought we had figured out but didn't could fill a book. The bath tub story is pretty funny.

[uppityperson]

12. Then there was hitch-hiking with a tampon in to prevent rape

good lord I was naive

[Curmudgeoness]

13. LOL. Until I had sex, I didn't understand

how to even use a tampon!

[mzteris]

17. my mother went into hysterics

when she found out I was using tampons. . .

"Now your husband will think you're not a VIRGIN!!!"

[uppityperson]

19. My mom was happy to have us use them but all she had were those extra strength super

tampex with the cardboard tube. Sitting in the bathroom with the directions on the sink next to me, trying, trying, trying, legs shaking, etc.

I was so glad when I found ones that weren't 3 feet long and 2 inches across in a cardboard tube.

[mzteris]

20. my poor cousin

didn't know she was supposed to take out the cardboard tube . . . .

I used "Pursettes" from the get go and found anything else pretty impossible to navigate.

[uppityperson]

21. Oh. My. eom

[pnwmom]

3. Asthma was another of those psychosomatic illnesses.

When I was a teen and had allergies and lungs that felt like they were filled with cotton candy, I didn't bother telling anybody -- why bother, when they'd just say it was stress.

[mzteris]

4. When I was younger

I thought migraines and cramps were made up...

Then I started having them!


Today, I had a mammogram. It's never ever HURT before, just a little uncomfortable. I used to wonder why everyone complained so much. Today - AGONY!!

[pnwmom]

9. Erma Bombeck said she'd rather

lie prone on her concrete garage floor and let the garage door close on her.

[no_hypocrisy]

8. It was a cultural system where women were being portrayed by misogyny.

In the Seventies, if you thumbed through periodicals for physicians, the ads for pharmaceuticals were marketed for women patients. More like women were targeted.

Women had a multitude of problems, mainly because . . . they were women. Hysterics (BTW, the root of the word, hysteria is Greek for uterus), PMS, vapors, post-partum depression, PTSD from a miscarriage or losing a child, etc.

One full page ad showed a female patient in distress, speaking to her white-coated male doctor, him looking bored and distracted. The ad copy came right out and advised the doctor that listening to this patient could take 40 minutes but writing a prescription at the outset could only take 4 minutes and get her out of his office. Yes, it was that blatant. And theme-and-variation for different new drugs, just for women. No wonder women nodded when Valley of the Dolls came out.

[virgogal]

14. It was in the early 80's that I got myself a female internist.

[mzteris]

18. I never ever have a male doctor

for gyno anymore!

I had one tell me, "it doesn't hurt! there are no nerves in your cervix! It's all in your head".

[Chemisse]

15. I remember when it was understood by all that a woman could never be president

because she becomes so "emotional" during periods.