I have spent a long time trying to quench a thirst that makes me feel deserted. It is a thirst for knowledge. Knowledge of getting to know myself and understand how my body works. I have spent a long time in search of answers and balance. And it’s not until very recently that I think I’m finding the answers I need to create an oasis of myself.

Answers… one thing I have learnt working in research is the importance of a well formulated question. The way you ask the question will determine its answer. From the get-go, forming the question can be a complex task, and even confusing if you’re missing information. Sometimes I wonder if that is what life is; a recurring process of asking questions and finding answers. Or finding answers and realising that you had questions, or worries, or thirst.

In that search for answers, I have been finding resources that little by little have helped me, like the pieces of a puzzle, to create a more complete and integrated vision of how I function, of how I am. I get the impression that the idea of self-knowledge, of learning how each of us function and exist, is applied particularly to our psychology, to personality and emotions, to the mind, but not so much to understanding our physical side. It’s as if we had left this task exclusively to doctors. And I think that we therefore live largely disconnected from our bodies. We don’t listen to them. We let them suffer more than necessary and only come to the rescue when we find ourselves in an advanced state of suffering. I also think that I, and lots of other women, when it comes to the ailments of our private parts, let ourselves suffer more than necessary because of social and cultural prejudices, because of taboos, false myths, and misinformation. Out of fear. Fear of that rejection which I have already spoken about (Rejection).

I remember when I went to the gynaecologist for one of the first times with my mum, or maybe it was the first time, I don’t have a good memory for these things, but I was around 16 years old. I had an ultrasound as part of the visit and the doctor told us that I had polycystic ovaries. I remember my mum asked him whether that implied any fertility problems and the doctor told her no, not any more now, that we weren’t to worry. I didn’t ask anything nor make any comments, but I retained that information as if it were something valuable. At that time there wasn’t the internet to search for and find answers. The information was simply absent from my surroundings.

I have always had irregular periods and I have never had a cycle of 28 days. I used to have a boyfriend who worried so much every time my period arrived late, despite us using condoms. He got in bad moods because of the burden and blamed me, as if it were something I could control. I didn’t feel bad, but I felt weird. I didn’t know anyone else who had an irregular cycle or longer than four weeks, but nor did I talk to anyone else about it.

At some point, later on, with the internet now more present in our lives and information beginning to be within reach, I read that there was a thing called polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) and that the majority of women who suffered from it, had a tendency to gain weight. As this wasn’t happening to me, I interpreted it as if I didn’t have it, even though my periods were irregular, and the gynaecologist had told me that my ovaries were polycystic.

Later, I went searching for information again because I carried on feeling weird. What was happening to me wasn’t happening to anyone else. But I wasn’t talking to anyone else about it. I found that women with PCOS, as well as a tendency to gain weight which I don’t have, often had hair on typically masculine parts of the body. By then, some hairs had started to grow on my chin and around my nipples. But as I didn’t tend to gain weight, I denied to myself that I had PCOS.

My experience with gynaecologists hadn’t been very positive and I preferred to look for information myself than to go to them with my questions in search of help. One time I went back to the gynaecologist that did my ultrasound, he asked if my periods were regular yet and when I told him they weren’t, he suggested that I take contraceptive pills, that they would regulate my period. In the environment where I grew up, the use of contraceptive pills was normalised and even considered as a good thing, so I started to take them. All of this being more than 15 years ago.

It was a mistake. The pill caused chaos for me in many ways; I started to bleed more and to have horrible, recurring yeast infections. In addition, if I think about it now, I don’t think I was informed correctly about what the pills were, how they would work and their side effects. I now know all of this thanks to the resources I have been finding that have empowered me because I have been able to observe myself, understand, and help myself get better. I now know that I have PCOS, that there are four types, that cycles up to 35 days are also healthy, that contraceptive pills don’t contain hormones but instead synthetic molecules, so not the natural hormones that we produce ourselves. And worst of all, they interfere enormously with our physical and mental health. And when you lose your mind, you can become extremely vulnerable.

The pill isn’t the miracle cure for everything, and I feel a sense of anger and injustice when I see so many doctors continuing to adopt this approach. I understand that in certain situations someone can benefit from taking them, but it can’t be the solution for each and every problem. If we knew more about our bodies, we would be able to speak up and say NO, having confidence in ourselves and the decision we are making, an informed decision instead of a blind one.

I think the miracle cure often lies in the perspective that emphasises the ability of life’s own self-regulating mechanisms, and in helping our bodies to recover that ability. Of course, there are occasions where the body’s own mechanisms are no longer enough to restore the balance and we then need to act more invasively towards improvement. In these cases, it is when we haven’t listened to ourselves, when we have let ourselves suffer for too long. For me, this is what has happened with my fibroids. I let myself suffer for too long, without listening to myself, and without having the information I needed to be able to help myself, to the point where an operation has been necessary (Pre-operation).

I think that for a book or other type of resource to be able to empower you, it not only has to give you information but also tools or a type of knowledge that can be put into practice and pave the way for a change. Information without action doesn’t give results.

I would like to use this space to make a stand and ask to those who look after us and reveal tools to empower us, to calm the thirst, that they share the focal point of self-knowledge and also tell us about our bodies. I feel that, as an individual, as a woman, my time has come to take initiative and start taking responsibility for my body in a more proactive and conscious way. The time has come to not go back to letting myself suffer, to listen and begin to understand myself.

I feel that, often, life engulfs us in a daily, routine whirlwind that doesn’t let us take care of ourselves, that weakens us. A whirlwind that we feed as a society, that grows incessantly to become a hurricane. I think, I wish we could all stop turning, even if only for an instant to find that calm that brings clarity, and consequently get back the energy to return to the movement in a more aware, more beautiful, and happier way. This journey to reconnection with my female self forms part of a bigger journey, a journey to leave that whirlwind and escape from the hurricane.