2018: Words from women

I challenged myself in 2018 to only read books by women*. It’s been  bloody fantastic. Here they are for your perusal (couple more to finish off before the end of the year and will add). Click on an image for a one sentence review.  I recommend giving the challenge a go!

A really lovely gentle book that encourages me to work out how I might me make a real difference without getting grumpy

Inspiring (and I don’t use that lightly).

Lamb is world class and this is sheds light on an ongoing situation that matters

St Mary’s Short story

Better than the film, natch

Changed my perspective. One to go to again and again

Malala – her story.

Every women should read this, and gift it to another woman

St Mary’s short story

Intriguing story, but it’s been done better

If you read one from this selection, make it this one. Couldn’t be more relevant as women’s rights start to slide backwards.

St Mary’s short

Mega Maya

Some very important bits, some bits I couldn’t get behind at all

Laugh out loud funny – so much I could relate to.

St Mary’s chronicle

Utterly beautiful. First of a trilogy.

A good one for the car and being introduced to women I should have heard of before now.

St Mary’s

A very simple, sad tale. Made me want to learn more about the occupation

Everyone should read this too

First half great, second half meh

Lots of chew over but not sre very accessible for women who don’t have the ability to just give up work in part or altogether

More nostalgia

One of my top books this year, haven’t stopped thinking about it since. Not just about that storm

St Mary’s short

Really glad I listened to Michelle read this on audio

The saddest book I’ve ever loved

Upsetting becaus eit s based on real life events and Blume remains as good as ever on creating a unvierse I totally enter

Only one of a handful of books to make me cry

Funny St Mary’s

Spectacular, the book the word exquisite was made for

Disappointingly meh. Simply doesn’t engage with the issues in any helpful way

LOVE Paula Gooder – this was really helpful this Lent

One of my top 5 – classic I should have read before now

Very sweet and funny

Anyone who was a bookworm kid should read this. Nosaligic.

Probably my favourite of the triology.

St Mary’s short

Sweet nostalgia

Did I mention I love Paula Gooder. Brilliant – a novel about Phoebe

A real surprise – and I probably shouldn’t have read this as a catastrophist!

Surprising – a sweet novel with very sad bits

Carolyn – fresh and insightful

A good thriller – love Kate’s writing

St Mary’s chronicle

Timely – post apocalyptic

St Mary’s short

Another moving book – sad but hopeful

An important book about the power of protest

Really enjoyed this – Kate writes simply about something she knows a lot about and I have made changes in my life as a result

Co-written by Christina Lamb, a must read to understand how people who have every-day illness become refugees too

Best of this series so far

My first Christie would you believe it

A rich story – I cared for all the characters

Judy is ace – this is a great book for women thinking about leadership

More Maya

A warm, sad novel

This was hard work. Billed as comedy – I found it sad

More LOLs and cheers. Caitlin is superb.

I haven’t read much poetry, but I engaged with this.

Laugh out loud funny and Celeste is fab

Historical fiction, not normally my thing but this was interesting

It really is completely differet

Loved this – Ive really developed a thing for nature books this year

Honest and captivating. For anyone who ever doubts

*I did read the latest in Ben Aaronovitch’s Rivers of London series to avoid spoilers 🙂

A quick post on #SmearforSmear

I won’t be doing #smearforsmear and not because I don’t think getting a smear is vitally important or that it isn’t important to increase the number of women who do but because once again I’m struggling with the damage that can be done by un-nuanced viral messaging.

If you don’t know, it is a campaign aimed at encouraging women to share photo and video selfies of themselves with their lipstick smeared. The idea is to draw attention to the fact that the number of women who aren’t getting regular tests is falling.

• A smear isn’t just 5 minutes and easy for many women. As a sufferer of vaginismus it far from easy and pain free. I bled for 3 days after my last smear and had to return for a second attempt which I yelled and sobbed through. It wasn’t the GP’s fault but it is what it is – next time I may have to be drugged to get through it – fun eh! 2 in 1000 women suffer from vaginismus , probably more, but, ironically, they don’t report because of shame.
• Any woman who has been assaulted or raped, doesn’t find it easy. I don’t think I need to elaborate
• If a woman is embarrassed about going for a smear it is because the patriarchy teaches her to be ashamed of her body which, for X reason today, doesn’t conform to whatever is currently correct and attractive to men.
• If a woman is embarrassed about being hairy in particular, it is recognised to be related to the prevalence of hair-free women in porn. Which is in no small way related to the attraction of some men to pre-pubescent. Shave, or don’t shave – but it is important to recognise why shaving is a thing.
• The survey on which #smearforsmear is based (although I can’t get a copy of the original questions asked) also suggests not being able to, or wanting to, take time off of work is a significant barrier to accessing a smear. Are women in a position that they can’t look after their health without fearing reprisal or risking their employment? Why isn’t this the news?
• The survey also suggests that 26% of women can’t get an appointment even if they want to. Surely a result of the defunding of the NHS. And that bit isn’t making the news either…
• Also, mustn’t forget PSH-education is still dismissed as unnecessary and too embarrassing to teach (the irony), so of course women don’t understand their own bodies, the risks they face and how to stay healthy.
• And, yeurgh, women and lipstick…. It is a bit like #nomakeupselfie isn’t it?  Let’s accept a stereotype while trying to fight something that is caused in no small part by stereotypes.

So yes, sharing a selfie might make a point to some women about how important detection is. But sadly can also trivialise the real reasons women don’t/can’t get smears by normalising the ‘they’re embarrassed because they’re vain’ or ‘lazy’ or ‘uneducated’.

There is so much good stuff in the work that has been done. I’m just once again disheartened that the messaging and ‘call to action’ is missing a huge opportunity, and could have focused more on the fact local heath services are not doing anything to improve access to smears, or educating women as to the reasons to have them.

So this all smacks of victim blaming.

Gaza: isolation

Family at Al Ahli hospital collecting food for their malnourished child

I’ve been in Gaza 36 hours but it feels like much longer and I am incredibly sad to be leaving tomorrow.

Yesterday I was numb I think, maybe even purposely. There are pieces of hope, but visiting families in their homes and seeing the squalor and lack was awful.

I’m not a development officer or a hardened photo journalist. I’ve not been doing this for years. I’ve never been anywhere like this before regardless of the fact there aren’t many places like this. I’m a woman who picked up a camera a few years ago, likes to mess around on the internet, likes to play with words and talk with people…and yet here I am. I’m deeply grateful for the opportunity I’ve been given to be here but I can’t shake that feeling someone is having me on.

But here I am. Today we visited Al Ahli hospital, run by Christians to serve all people, to see the Medical Mission project. The purpose of the project is to provide transport to bring people in from the refugee camps and other areas that were obliterated by the wars, especially the 2014 event and t give them a wide range of treatment and education. I haven’t been to their homes and won’t get to visit on this trip but I’ve seen pictures and spoken to people who live in what amount to shipping containers. They have no healthcare options at all in the area they live.

Again, I can’t really give away the stories of the people I met, but I am really, really proud of the difference Embrace supporters are making to these most vulnerable people.

Young teenage boy who came in to Al Ahli on the Medical Mission bus

I watched as a little boy had his burns bandages changed. I listened to a grandmother emotionally describe how her grandson really needs help because he isn’t growing; all they have to eat and drink is flatbread and tea. I listened to a mother being given advice as to how to feed one of her triplets whose health is waning. I talked to the head of the hospital about the hope they have to increase an oncology department bringing much needed education, diagnosis and treatment options to a population where breast cancer is still almost always a death sentence.

While I’m on the subject, my Embrace colleague and friend Su is running the Palestine half marathon in April to raise funds for Al Ahli. She has had treatment for breast cancer this past 12 months and is inspirational in her dedication to help others less fortunate when it comes to treatment options. Her Justgiving page is here.

After a few much needed hours of downtime, we visited Fr Mario at the Latin patriachate. Fr Mario is a Catholic priest in Gaza. We spoke at length about the Christian population in Gaza, what it is like to be a Christian here, what his job entails and much more. I will tell his story at length another time but I had to hold back tears repeatedly as he described the very real dangers he faces, the isolation he feels and the desperate situation the Christians he serves are in.

Father Mario da Silva

Embrace’s mission is to support Christians in the Middle East who are serving people here who are marginalised and vulnerable. Fr Mario provides a place and a ministry for those Christians to find support and solace with their brothers and sisters in Christ. With less than 1200 Christian in Gaza, which has a population of 1.8million (probably more), feeling part of the church, locally or more is almost impossible. I feel isolation tangibly as Fr Mario talks.

Fr Mario is originally from Brazil and has been via Rome (where he worked in the parish containing Mafiosa) and is in his 3^rd year in Gaza. He talked of imprisonment, arson, having drugs planted in his car and what it was like to be heading back in to Gaza in 2014 as the war started while many others fled. I was floored by his humility and selflessness as he talks about himself and the people he serves. I was struggling to comprehend how he was still standing at all, when he described how he has asked to be transferred to Aleppo but didn’t expect to be allowed to go. He shrugged and said, “we must go to the places no one else wants to go.”

A lot of people didn’t want me to go to Gaza, they were understandably concerned. But I am very glad I came and I wish I could stay longer to see more, meet more people and talk with them. I haven’t felt unsafe, I haven’t felt threatened. Everyone looks at us because it’s relatively unusual to see a couple of pasty Brits walking around with notebook and cameras not blending in in the slightest, but they all say ‘hello, welcome, why are you here?’ When we explain we’re hoping to help people in the UK and beyond hear the stories of people in Gaza and the Middle East they start to talk and don’t stop.

Tomorrow we head back to Jerusalem for a few days to meet more partners. I’m excited about that too but I really do wish we could stay here a little more.