It's Always More Complicated

I may just possibly have fulminated heretofore about the assumption that a woman over 35 is But A Barren Stock and her fertility has fallen off a cliff and She Should Have Frozen Her Eggs while there was still time -

- and this may be a factor of age and reading certain novels at an impressionable age not to mention being a historian with interest in that area -

- but honestly, is the existence of The Menopausal Baby - You're Not Having The Change, Duckie, You're Preggers! - unknown to the present generation?

I will state, for information, that my sources in organisations such as BPAS indicate that a significant % of their custom comes from women who believed that their ovaries had shrivelled up and they no longer needed to employ contraception, and WHOOPS.

Misinformation about perimenopause on social media ‘putting women at risk’: Dangers include unintended pregnancies, taking unnecessary medication and missed diagnoses, say experts

(Okay, maybe there's some kind of pendulum thing going on here, from No-One is Talking About The Menopause to Everything is Attributed to the Peri/Menopause once a woman is over a certain age?)

Briggs said misinformation around perimenopause is concerning.
“I look at things like Instagram to see what they are exposed to and I am horrified,” she said, citing examples of women in their 30s being told to demand HRT if they are unable to sleep or are struggling with migraines – and to switch GPs if denied. Or women being told they should seek testosterone treatment.
“I’m not anti any of these things in the right person, but females produce their own testosterone lifelong, even women without ovaries, so the idea that everybody has to demand testosterone is bonkers,” Briggs said.
Dr Channa Jayasena, an expert in reproductive endocrinology at Imperial College London, also raised concerns.
“It’s great that there’s better [public] awareness [about perimenopause]. And I think many doctors are completely unaware about how debilitating the symptoms of perimenopause can be,” he said. “But the flipside of that, I think there’s a risk that some women are being mislabelled as having perimenopause when they have other things that are wrong.”

I am very much inclined to think that the President of the British Menopause Society knows whereof she peaks:

[T]here is a perception that any symptom affecting women between the ages of 40 and 60 is due to perimenopause or menopause and that HRT is required.
“I think HRT is completely wonderful,” Rymer said. But, she added, “it’s not for women who don’t need it,” noting that in such situations it can cause heavy bleeding.

Well, I suppose getting a text from the GPs apropos slots opening up for Covid booster was not entirely unanticipated - I was looking the other day to see whether these were on the horizon - so anyway, my dearios, I am scheduled for mine in just over a fortnight.

But the other thing was getting an email from radio people as to whether I could talk to them about History of Criminalisation/Decriminalisation of Abortion THIS VERY AFTERNOON -

- which it so happened I could, and these days, it is not just talking to them, it is being on Zoom as well with instructions re camera -

So I am always up for saying that the way the police have been carrying on of very recent years, and the health professionals who have been grassing women up to them, is worse than the Victorians as historians have pretty much failed to find anything much in the way of prosecutions of women rather than abortionists -

- possibly because in most cases that even came to light it was because the woman had died, though there are a few cited In The Literature where she lived and testified in the court case, and presumably was granted immunity.

I suppose it is not totally improbable that a very detailed search of the British Newspaper Archives using the various likely search terms under which one would anyway search for cases of abortion (not the word mostly used) would turn up a case or two of women prosecuted for procuring their own, but I really think it's more likely to turn up a lot of fascinating detail about who was doing illicit abortions, and whether local juries thought they were performing a public service and had just had bad luck in this one case (came across at least one in a fairly random swoop myself).

Unfortunately time constraints and what they actually wanted me to talk about (like why the 1861 Act still pertains, cue me ranting about having to defend the 1967 Act, which just introduced Exceptions to the existing Act, for decades because of the RtL mobs rather than press forward with further reform) prevented me from doing the full oursin Boring For Europe on the subject.

Mr 'warm leads for archivists' is still badgering me.

Margaret Atwood seems to be claiming some kind of unusual prescience for herself when writing The Handmaid's Tale:

Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs, Atwood said she believed the plot was “bonkers” when she first developed the concept for the novel because the US was the “democratic ideal” at the time.

I think the idea of a fundamentalist, patriarchal, misogynist backlash was pretty much in people's minds?

I've just checked a few dates.

At least one of the potential futures in Marge Piercy's Woman on the Edge of Time (1976).

Margaret O'Donnell's The Beehive (1980) .

Suzette Haden Elgin's Native Tongue (1984) and sequels.

Various short stories.

Various works by Sheri Tepper.

I'm probably missing a lot.

And assorted works in which there was an enclave or resistance cell of women embedded in a masculinist society.

I honestly don't think a nightmare which was swirling around at the time is something that can be claimed as woah, weird, how did I ever come up with that?

I'm a bit beswozzled by the idea that in the early-mid 80s the USA was a shining city on a hill, because I remember reviewing a couple of books on abortion in US post-Roe, and it was a grim story of the erosion of reproductive rights and defensive rearguard actions to protect a legal right which could mean very little in practice once the 1977 Hyde Amendment removed federal funding, and an increasingly aggressive anti-choice movement.

Not sure these links are particularly appropriate, but maybe so.

Well, I do remember her saying she scarcely noticed The Change, though she did nuance that statement by adding that she had so much else going on at the time (eldercare and other stuff) she didn't have time to notice:

Yet more on monetising the menopause: Menopause getting you down? Don’t worry, the wellness industry has a very pricey solution for you.

I am probably being horribly cynical, but when somebody goes for a home birth after a first high risk experience of parturition, one does wonder if some kind of wellness woowoo was in the mix (“She had read or heard somewhere that there was less chance of bleeding at home and that is why she wanted a home birth.”)? but this is a dreadful story: 'Gross failure’ led to deaths of mother and baby in Prestwich home birth.

This is also a really grim story about reproductive politics in Brazil: Two More Weeks: The Brutality Behind Brazil’s Reproductive Politics:

In complicated childbirth scenarios, when the life of the pregnant person and the fetus are in conflict, therapeutic abortion has historically been considered the last resort. But in Brazil, since the nineteenth century, this solution has been replaced by the cesarean operation. This was not based on medical reasons. Cesarean sections, up until the early twentieth century, were rudimentary procedures, almost always fatal to the birthing person. What motivated its adoption in Brazil was based on different logics: religious, legal, and moral. The cesarean became an acceptable alternative to abortion because it allowed the fetus to be born, even if the birthing parent died. The nineteenth-century theological and medical debates that gave rise to this sacrificial logic still shape birth in Brazil.

And I wonder whether small or even large earthquakes have been noticed in the vicinity of Fishkill.

‘Who Am I Without Birth Control?’:

Ms. Hamrick, who was 26 at the time, felt normal. No unusual weight gain, no mood swings. But a couple of questions had wormed their way into her mind and lodged themselves there: Who am I without birth control? Will I feel some sort of difference coming off it? Ms. Hamrick had started taking birth control pills a decade earlier, when she was 15. Now, as she browsed her social media feeds, she kept stumbling on videos of women saying how much better they felt when they stopped taking the pills, content she wasn’t seeking out. The posts typically went like this: a glowing blonde in a workout top — the picture of health! — saying that she had stopped taking birth control pills and immediately felt more clarity of mind. Like an emotional fog had lifted, like she was a brand-new, much happier person. Ms. Hamrick’s doctor was clear with her. If she wasn’t experiencing any side effects, there was no reason to stop taking birth control. Ms. Hamrick wasn’t so sure. The more videos about the pill she watched, the more skeptical she became, and the more she felt drawn toward experimenting. She was, after all, in a moment of change. She had moved, on a whim, from Indiana to Texas. Soon after settling near Houston she met a guy and they started dating, then looking at engagement rings.
Just over a year since Ms. Hamrick decided to stop taking the pills, she has figured out who she is without birth control: She is a mother. Her baby is four months old.

Okay, my own history with the Pill was not wonderful, but I do wonder if the doc I saw at the Migraine Clinic was just a bit too invested in biochemical explanations (in particular, I discovered later that she got very into The Awful Effects of the Pill over a range of factors) rather than, um, things going on more generally in my life. Because going off the Pill may have brought about some temporary alleviation (don't honestly remember) but not much, really.

Anyway, it is probably a bit of an exaggeration to say, this is like going off the TB drugs to experience the full Consumptive Experience (and I have no doubt that there are people around in thrall to the Myth, and it is a myth, of Syphilitic Geeenyus: Sid is falling about larfing liek drayne). But honestly. 'Pure' 'Natural' I spit on that.

On 'pure', I like this on the 'pure bloodlines' mythos Alot: Claims of pure bloodlines? Ancestral homelands? DNA science says no.

And on The Miracles of Modern Science: Huntington’s disease treated successfully for first time in UK gene therapy trial:

The disease, caused by a single gene defect, steadily kills brain cells leading to dementia, paralysis and ultimately death. Those who have a parent with Huntington’s have a 50% chance of developing the disease, which until now has been incurable.
The gene therapy slowed the progress of the disease by 75% in patients after three years.

[H]omegrown remedies from locally gathered plants – defined here as ‘local herbalism’ – were still being used to address both simple and complex healthcare needs.

Most women want children – but half are unsure if they will. For some, they won’t be bothered if they remain childless:

The researchers used data from the National Survey of Family Growth, a federally funded survey conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics, from 2002 to 2019. This included surveys of a nationally representative group of 41,492 women aged 15 to 44 about a broad range of fertility-related indicators.
Findings showed that there was little change during that time in the proportion of women who said they intended to have children. On average, 62% of women said they intended to have a child and 35% did not intend to, with only a small percentage saying they didn’t know.
But up to 50% of the women who intended to have children said they were only “somewhat sure” or “not at all sure” that they would actually realize their intention to have a child.
....
And it is not just the certainty that may be affecting the fertility rate. The intensity of the desire mattered, too.
The study found that up to 25% of childless women who intended to have children also said they would not be bothered if they ended up not having a child.
“This not being bothered was especially high among younger women, and it increased over time among those who were younger,” Hayford said.
“They are open to different pathways and different kinds of lives. If they don’t become parents for whatever reason, it doesn’t seem that upsetting to many of them.”
One possibility often discussed for the declining birth rate is that young people today are unsure about the future of the country and the world, and that is keeping them from having children.

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Interesting nuanced article: “It Makes It More Real to You”: Abortion Attitudes Following Experience and Contact With Abortion (research done in UK).

(Okay, stating here that yay for the decriminalisation of women taking abortion pills this week but I have been saying for years - in fact I think the reformers were saying this in 67 but it was a trade-off to get medics on side - the 2 doctors provision in the current legislation is a fossil relic from the period when doctors reckoned that 'unlawful' in the relevant clause of the 1861 Offences Against the Person Act predicated 'lawful' and that meant docs with sound clinical reasons, but even so they made very very sure to get a second opinion. And this hardened into the situation after the Bourne judgement of 1938 where the doc who would operate would refer to a psychiatrist to get the 'threat to mental health' box ticked.)

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Yes, I think this is creepy, though I also think there are other (more reliable than cycle-tracking) methods of contraception besides the Pill: TikTok is obsessed with the hormone-free birth control debate: why is everyone telling you to stop the pill?

While on the one hand yes, contraception should be part of general routine healthcare and the sort of thing that GPs provide. But on the other, back in the day, specialist clinics were prepared to work with women to discover what was best for them, and I'm not sure GPs have either the time or the training to do this. At a panel I was on some years ago people were claiming that there was one Pill formulation that was the go-to and it so did not suit every woman.

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This is more in the realm of general demographic information, and I am sure my dearios are already aware of this: There Were Still Old People When Life Expectancy Was 35. (And the menopause is not some new-fangled unnatural thing, siiiiigh.)

No, really what're the odds?

In 3 different fora over the past couple of days, I have been strutting Mi Xpertise on:

Cartoons relating to birth control, abortion, etc. (I do know of a few, including a very early one featuring Bertrand Russell's father.)

Victorian courtesans (English/French differences, definitions, etc).

In connection with which, this video of Hardy's 'Ruined Maid' poem:

Condoms as STI prevention in UK, was this illegal (no, but advertising was a murky area, is my take on this, and the law was rather vaguely written but actually meant to be about spurious cures).

(Does that there Dr oursin ever shut up???)

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Entirely unrelated, but what a concept: Back from the dead: the ‘zombie’ ponds repumping nature into Essex farmland:

Ponds that were dried up, shaded over or dominated by brambles have been opened up to sunlight and dug out, and are now burgeoning with rare aquatic plants, dragonflies and great-crested newts – also providing food and water for birds and bats. “It’s ideal for farmers,” says Emma Gray. “You get a lot of biodiversity bang for your buck in a marginal area for farming – you’re not taking productive land out but quickly you build up a network for species to hop across a landscape. It’s a no-brainer.”

Revisiting the question of people actually moving around in The Past: this seems to be mostly about those who had the time and the money to voluntarily travel rather than for occupational reasons, but still, of interest: Should I Stay or Should I go?: Encouraging travel in the early modern period.

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This is interesting: Invisible Ink: Unearthing the Work of Female Screenwriters but I found it a bit frustrating because it's not entirely clear whether the scripts eventually got produced - clearly some of them did (I've seen Pink String and Sealing Wax) but I'm not at all sure, at the period in question, that a movie about a doctor's ethical dilemmas over abortion would have got past the British Board of Film Censors. I need to dig deeper into this....

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A couple of things relevant to Pride Month:

What ‘Operation Tiger’ can tell us about LGBTQ+ publishing in the 1970s and 1980s:

Most of the works seized were published post-Stonewall and captured in print an emerging and increasingly confident and distinct LGBTQ+ voice. Forty years later, the seized books provide us with an unexpected layer of social history, by presenting us with a microcosm of LGBTQ+ publishing in the USA during the 1970s and early 1980s.

Arden Eversmeyer, a retired Houston schoolteacher who devoted her retired years to campaigning for visibility for older lesbians, who she felt were missing from the cultural discussion, began interviewing women in 1998.

Sff foremothers:

Ursula K. Le Guin was her own toughest (and best) critic:

To say that the Le Guin we meet in this book is argumentative, sometimes unfair, sometimes wrong and even self-contradictory is not to diminish her greatness. It is rather to rescue her from the dullness imposed on her by her canonization.
....
It’s a pity that Le Guin was one of the few writers to engage her work with such passionate intensity. Where most others were content to gesture at the existence of “The Left Hand of Darkness” as settling the question of whether science fiction could push against conventional boundaries, Le Guin was willing to ask herself if she really succeeded in doing so, and to say that the answer might be no.

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And further on foremothers: Charlotte Despard: Mother of Battersea, suffragette, and socialist rebel:

She spent a great deal of time in Ireland and in 1908 joined Hanna Sheehy Skeffington to form the Irish Women’s Franchise League. Throughout the Irish War of Independence, together with Irish republican revolutionary, suffragette and actress, Maud Gonne, Ms Despard collected first-hand evidence of army and police atrocities in Cork and Kerry. The two women also formed the Women’s Prisoners’ Defence League to support republican prisoners and in 1921, Ms Despard shared a house with Ms Gonne in Dublin.

As is oft my wont, I thought further about my post about success vs victory -

And what I thought was, thinking about the areas in which I have been interested as a historian, how very often the victories/successes after a great deal of turmoil and struggle were still only partial and still needed further fighting for - hardly the time to sit down and celebrate.

E.g. I will cite the very limited grant of female suffrage in the UK in 1918, requiring a further 10 years of campaigning to get it on equal terms in 1928 - described in demeaning language as 'the flapper vote', i.e. women aged 21-30 and those above who had not been previously eligible were being dissed as irresponsible light-minded Bright Young Things.

And even those very limited and partial gains have people wailing Deth Of Civ, as I'm sure they did when in 1923 the terms for divorce were finally equalised and women did not have to prove that their husbands were fiends in human form but only adulterous. (Unfortunately they could not divorce them if they were fiends in human form who had not, however, been unfaithful to their marriage vows.)

And as for Abortion Law Reform (I have lately written on this), scarcely was the ink dry on the 1967 Act that there were attempts to roll it back, limit it at least, hedge it about, and the next decades had activists forced to fight to keep the Act where it was, rather than being able to amend it in more liberal directions.

Progress is slow and sometimes retrograde.

Pennyroyal, Mifepristone, and the Long History of Medication Abortions. I think just possibly the following should go further up the article:

But in the current political climate, where seeking information about abortions could trigger a police investigation, I find the intense interest in abortifacient herbs to be very worrying. Many physicians have pointed to the high toxicity of these substances and the very limited data on their efficacy. Pennyroyal, for example, can cause severe liver damage and death. Mrs. L’s close call was no fluke; most people who ingest pennyroyal in a quantity sufficient to induce an abortion will end up vomiting and enduring abdominal pain, if they do not slip into a coma and die. Mrs. L was lucky to survive, and her ordeal should make clear that herbal remedies are not necessarily “gentle” or “natural.” The herbs used to induce abortion in the past were—and are—dangerous.* Too high a dose and they were toxic; too low and they were ineffective.

Not only were these women desperate, childbirth itself posed a significant risk of mortality or serious injury.

Also, there was a THRIVING industry in producing entirely useless pills which nonetheless flaunted the name of traditional abortifacient substances which was still going in the 1960s.

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We may plausibly argue that if these substances had been so well-known and so effective, the Foundling Hospital would not have been so needed an institution: online exhibition Tokens of History:

The tokens are identifying objects parents left with their children at the Foundling Hospital in the eighteenth century. They hold myriad personal stories, most of which we can only guess at. But these little objects are also passports to another time. In the hands of historians, they illuminate different facets of Georgian society – from courtship, entertainment and fashion to empire and belief. Explore these themes and more in this online exhibition, Tokens of History.

That first article mentions that there was a fine line between 'bringing on the period' and inducing a miscarriage. For many centuries it was also deemed a matter of health that women should menstruate with some regularity (balancing out those pesky humours). How did they cope with periods? Professor Helen King (who really knows her stuff), From rags and pads to the sanitary apron: a brief history of period products.

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At least this couple didn't deliberately go out into The Wild in order to have an Entirely Natural Birth Experience, but honestly, this really answers itself: Giant spiders, snakes and storms: what could go wrong with having a baby on a remote, jungle-filled island?:

Our way off the island was a rickety old ferry – black smoke sputtering out of its exhaust pipes. Even getting on it was far from straightforward. A little walk down from our house towards the rocky beach, a set of tyres had been nailed into the wall. The ferry would bump its prow into them and drive forwards, holding its position while people jumped on and off. This worked fine in perfect conditions, but in choppy weather, or if there was a typhoon on the horizon (which there often was), it made boarding the ferry dangerous and sometimes impossible.

Peace and quiet began to look like isolation. Privacy and remoteness became inconvenience and frustration. Natural beauty became potential danger.