What Women Want

I’ve been hearing a lot this past couple of years about how men don’t know what women want anymore.

I just thought it might be a good time to come right out and tell you what most women want to clear up the confusion. Here goes…

First and foremost, we want to be treated with the respect due to any human being on this planet. If this concept is foreign, then there is one basic question to ask yourself before interacting with any woman – would I do/say this to my mates? If the answer is no, then probably rethink your behaviour. I hesitate to use the comparison with ‘mates’ because I know men and women interact differently to each other in groups, but I’ll stick to it because I feel like if you wouldn’t pinch your mate on the arse or kiss your mate without asking, then this probably applies more so than a comparison to say, your Nan. Of course you would never do those things to your Nan, but I feel as if the mates thing might bring it home clearer. Besides, you shouldn’t have to have a ‘special’ relationship with a woman to have basic respect for us.

Secondly, we want to be heard! Don’t talk over us and explain things from your perspective. Just listen to our life experience and accept it as our experience. We don’t want you to fix anything. Just listen.

Thirdly, communicate! If you don’t know something, ask! Especially when it comes to sex!! It isn’t a sign of inexperience to ask a woman what she likes. In fact, it shows that you understand women enough to know we are all different and that you are interested in us as human beings and our pleasure enough to take the time to learn! There is strength in vulnerability here. Trust me, no one wins I’d you don’t take the time to talk about the stuff that really matters.

Another important thing to consider is that we don’t need your money, we need your support. Now, we can pretty much provide for ourselves financially, we are often rarely in situations where we need physical protection from animals or invading tribes and we can generally look after ourselves. What we really need is your love, your support when we aren’t feeling our best, and your help. If we are having a bad day, just listen (yes we covered this one already, but this is more about in a partnership than random interactions). You don’t need to fix anything. No one needs to be killed or punished. There is no vengeance needed here. Just let us cry on your shoulder, without judgement, and share our woes. We do the same for you.

Five: back to the help thing. This is again in relation to a partnership situation. You live in the house too, you helped create the children and presumably wanted them too. Do your share without being asked! This might mean you have a conversation with us about who does what, which is even better, because then we both have ownership over our roles!! For more help here, read Eve Rodsky’s book, Fair Play. It will explain terms such as ‘emotional labour’ and it even gives you a fun way to divide the jobs!

This is by no means an exhaustive list, but it is a start. I guess the nuances will come out if you follow the third suggestion.

What it really comes down to, if I nutshell it for you, is if you aren’t being respectful, supportive and cooperative, then you really need to rethink your approach.

My ‘Guilty Feminist’ Moments

I have recently started listening the the podcast, The Guilty Feminist, created and hosted by Deborah Frances-White, and since finished her book of the same name. Deborah and her co-host start each episode of the podcast (and chapter of the book) with the statement ‘I’m a Feminist but…’ and proceed to describe what they still do, and take pleasure in, that might be against the Feminist ideal.

Some of my favourites from the book are:

“I’m a Feminist, but I am perfectly capable of hearing a man shout, ‘Hey sexy,’ and thinking ‘That’s awful – still got it’ in one clear thought.”

“I’m a Feminist, but sometimes if I’m talking to another feminist I agree with her, even if I don’t think she’s right, because I want her to like me”

“I’m a Feminist, but once I drove an hour and a half out of my way to drop someone at a train station because when I explained how far it was and how tired I was , I thought she’d tell me not to worry, but she said, ‘it’s fine!’ and caught me off guard, so there was no way I could say no. I need time to plan a ‘no’”

These are just a few of the more memorable ones, perhaps because I have been there or perhaps I would like to have been. It has got me thinking of all the ways I am a ‘Guilty Feminist’.

How I am a Guilty Feminist

• I’m a feminist but, I really enjoy the feeling of freshly shaved legs and vagina.
• I’m a feminist but, I feel sometimes that it would be nice to be validated by a catcall.
• I’m a feminist but, I really like wearing dresses and skirts… like a lot…
• I’m a feminist but, I really like it when my boyfriend pays for dinner.
• I’m a feminist but, I really like my new sparkly jewellery. It makes me feel flash and pretty.

I’m sure there’ll be more from this, especially as I evolve and read more.

How are you a guilty feminist?

7 Things they don’t tell you about pregnancy

Today I am 28 weeks pregnant and apparently one of those people where were built for growing babies.

When I first started my IVF journey, people would always tell me about the aches and pains and the incessant nausea and vomiting. I felt prepared for that, even though I have an intense dislike, even a fear, of vomiting, I was ready. I had come this far, spent all of this money and put my body through hormonal hell, I was ready!

But, none of the nausea, aches and pains have occurred. What I am left with is something completely different to what I had read and heard about and I am quite honestly a little flabbergasted. And a little intrigued.

This post if for those women who don’t get the stereotypical pregnancy symptoms and will hopefully make what you do feel a little more real and ‘normal’.

Extreme Exhaustion

This one has been hard for me to accept, as a naturally energetic person. A friend of mine had said she was so tired during her first trimester, all she could do was work and sleep, much to her partner’s frustrations (neither of them knew at this point she was pregnant), so I expected to be tired during the first trimester. I was not ready for the reality of this lethargy. I wasn’t ready for the depths of tiredness I am experiencing. Even my bone marrow is exhausted. I sleep about 10 hours a day (this being my first baby, this is a luxury) and am still be bone tired.

But then around 20 week mark, nothings looked up. I was sleeping less and feeling good, looking forward to the rest of my pregnancy as a vibrant, energetic woman!

But then, at week about 22, the lethargy set back in and hasn’t gone away. I get tired from driving. I get tired watching tv. I get tired reading. I get tired bathing and even getting into bed.

I have now accepted tired as my natural default and am not pushing myself any more. I rest when I need to rest and move when I need to. It has certainly slowed me down and oddly, has me feeling way more present in the moment and in the experience of pregnancy. This is probably what has lead to the awareness of the next few experiences on my list.

Flatulence Anticipation

Ok, this one is definitely weird and has received quite a few odd looks and nervous giggles, but I promise it’s a thing.

I know we have all felt those fart bubbles travel down our large intestine before being expelled, so I am sure you know what I’m talking about. It’s normal and completely natural.

What isn’t ‘natural’ is the bubble-like feeling I started getting in my belly at around 20 weeks. It took me a while to realise this was the first initial movements of the baby, and I may have even misinterpreted some of the early movements as fart bubbles, for they felt very similar, except the movements were somehow more solid. Anyway, my body hadn’t recognised this difference. So when the baby moved, my sphincter would enter a state of anticipation for the impending fart to come, only to be left confused when nothing happened. What it meant was, my butt was in a constant state of anticipation for about 4-6 weeks until the movements became more defined.

It certainly was a weird few weeks.

Skin pigmentation

This one is apparently also genetic, as my Mum experienced it. At about week 6, I noticed that the skin on my face was getting darker in places, but also lighter in others. I had this strip across my forehead that looked like freshly peeled sun burn! There was also this other part down across the centre of my left cheek that was darker than the rest, like hundreds of little freckles had materialised over night. I remember wiping at it for about a week thinking it was dirt, before I realised it was my new skin colour. I’ve always been freckly and moley, but this was something else.

I can’t say I’ve been super concerned about it, because I know it’s pregnancy related, but I have to say it has put a dint in my image of myself. I’m just trying to accept it and ride through it, happy in the knowledge that it isn’t permanent!

Kicks in areas other than the ribs

‘You wait until they kick you up under the ribs’ is pretty much what I’ve heard since my first reported movement. That and ‘wait until they kick your bladder,’ meh……

Well, I can tell you ladies, that the ribs might be painful (at 28 weeks, I’m yet to feel that pain) and the bladder a bit shocking, but the rest is just plain weird.

No one told me that the baby sometimes kicks right at the top of your anal canal and you can feel the reverberations all the way out of your butt hole.

No one told me the baby also kicks at the top of your vaginal canal, with similar reverberations down through the channel.

No one told me that the baby would move that much sometimes, and kick that randomly, that you would be in an almost constant state of seasickness.

Thanks for the heads up! Lol

Breathlessness

This one really hit me in my anxiety. The books mention breathlessness as a matter of course, but I assumed it was only when doing something. Again, I was mistaken.

Walking up stairs, cleaning the house, sometimes getting ready for work would all (and more) cause a little bit of breathlessness. What I wasn’t ready for was the breathlessness when sitting up in bed reading. I mean, I do get emotionally invested in my books, but this was ridiculous!

As the months have worn on, I even feel this breathlessness when lying down on my side, with my arm draped across my chest.

What it feels like to me is that I can get enough air in and out, it’s just that last bit of the exhale is a bit more constrained and I really have to concentrate to take the next breath in. It’s as if there is something holding my diaphragm at this point and I have to force it off by breathing in.

Needless to say there was a doctors visit in my future. I also feel like my existing anxiety made it worse because I would ‘worry’ about whether it was normal to feel it like this or not.

The doctor checked me over and I was perfectly healthy, I now relax into the breathlessness and move if I can to open my lungs up a bit more – posture certainly is important here. It was just the feeling of my lungs constricting and closing up and the need to force the next lot of breath in I wasn’t expecting.

Nipples the size of saucers

Over share time!

I have always has pretty small and pale nipples and areola compared to others I have seen. Now though, they have doubled in size and are so dark, they no longer look like mine. It is as if I went to sleep one night and a doctor broke into my house and gave me a non-consensual nipple transplant!

I totally understand the evolutionary need for this change, and again, was warned in the books, but the extent of the changes came as a shock.

Shrunken Stomach

Again, it’s like someone broke into my house and removed half of my stomach while I was sleeping! This morning I had my normal 2 pancakes with maple syrup and banana and I felt sick for hours after. The other day, I ate a handful of grapes and 2/3 of an apple and was done! Luckily this time I listened and didn’t force myself to finish it like the pancakes, but still! 2/3 of an Apple!! And it was only an average size Apple!

So, this coupled with my indigestion requires smaller, more frequent meals, or snacks.

Looks like it’ll be a while before I hit the all-you-can-eat restaurant again!

So, now I have half an indigestion afflicted stomach, someone else’s nipples and a confused sphincter…

At a time to be alive!!