this week — Eyes + Ears

In my ideal world, I'd like to get you a weekly roundup of great articles I think you should read, podcast episodes you should listen to, documentaries you should watch. Alas, we do not live in my ideal world (yet), and there are so many hours in the day/week.

But for this week, I came across three particularly good, thought-provoking articles I think you should read.

For my endo sisters (or anyone who has one or more females in their lives whom they love and cherish)...

Clue

Not familiar with Clue? It's truly the most bomb-ass period-tracking app out there (it gives me a hearty chuckle whenever it tells me "PMS is coming up" as if I didn't already feel like punching other drivers on the road or crying over stray cats. Anyway, it is great for tracking anything related to your reproductive cycle -- fertility, hormonal changes, and you guessed it, endo symptoms! It's very easy to use and well designed, and it adapts and analyzes your cycle as you enter more and more data (my temporary menopause really threw my averages out of whack). Also gotta tell you, I am very impressed with how they've expanded beyond the app and put some really top-notch content on the site. You know I am a stickler for endo articles that are of the highest evidence-based quality, and it is clear the team at Clue is working to make sure they aren't spreading any fake news.

My bestie learned about "Endo What?" through her Clue newsletter and sent me the link. My surgeon assisted with this documentary, and though I haven't seen it yet, I am SO happy it's out there. Not wanting her daughter to face similar struggles she faced with endometriosis, filmmaker Shannon Cohn is doing an amazing job changing the dialogue around endo and promoting strong, evidence-based education about the disease. Even better -- along with the film, there's an initiative to get better education to school nurses, which is such a seemingly obvious, yet incredibly innovative solution to getting girls the right treatment they need early on.

For anyone who has gone to a doctor or will ever go to a doctor...

The Atlantic

Woof. Look, I'll be honest with you, this one is hard to swallow (yet so easy to read, great writing!).

Due to my endo and a slew of other bizarro maladies that no one my age should really have to deal with, I've probably seen more doctors and specialists than most, and I'll be the first to sing the praises of the ones who are amazing. But TBH, they are few and far between. In this well-done Atlantic article, Meghan O'Rourke draws from her own experience of years with undiagnosed Lyme disease and puts it into the context of several new books done by doctors who are pointing out the flaws in our healthcare system.

As a patient, it is really hard to step outside of my own experience and think critically about what doctors are up against. Most of the time, I'm just over here hashing out my anger with my therapist over how few satisfying answers I get, how little I feel heard even though *I'm* the expert on my own body, how I've been harmed by the decisions of doctors I once trusted, how I'm tired of being tired. But this article gave me a better understanding into the other side and how our system got to be the way it is (hint: insurance companies are truly the root of all evil, and the road to hell is paved with good intentions).

For anyone who has ever read the work of a male author...

Electric Literature

OK, so I suppose this is really more about the story, which is a Twitter thread, rather than the article itself, but the story is truly fascinating to me. This week, a thread went viral asking women to "describe yourself like a male author would."

Most are super funny, largely because they're spot-on ("booby boobs"). Some are a bit devastating...also because they're spot-on ("I'm old/fat/a woman of color so a male author wouldn't even see me"). As an avid reader of both men and women, I find this to be a really interesting discussion, particularly in the moment we're living through right now.