‘Father’s Day, to me, is a lot like being single on Valentine’s Day’
‘Father’s Day, to me, is a lot like being single on Valentine’s Day’

Sarah Gill

Page Turners: ‘Thirst Trap’ author Gráinne O’Hare
Page Turners: ‘Thirst Trap’ author Gráinne O’Hare

Sarah Gill

Social photos from our Beyond the Awards: Stories of Success and Impact event
Social photos from our Beyond the Awards: Stories of Success and Impact event

Sarah Gill

Here are the interiors trends we’ll all be searching this summer (and how to shop them)
Here are the interiors trends we’ll all be searching this summer (and how to shop...

Megan Burns

‘Virtually everyone experiences imposter syndrome, from interns to C-suite executives’
‘Virtually everyone experiences imposter syndrome, from interns to C-suite executives’

Megan Burns

The best events happening around Ireland this weekend
The best events happening around Ireland this weekend

Sarah Gill

In Her Shoes: Silvana Landa McAdam of LANDA
In Her Shoes: Silvana Landa McAdam of LANDA

IMAGE

Conductor Orla Flanagan: ‘This concert explores human existence in different spheres’
Conductor Orla Flanagan: ‘This concert explores human existence in different spheres’

Sarah Gill

This 1970s Galway semi-d has been refreshed and revived
This 1970s Galway semi-d has been refreshed and revived

Nathalie Marquez Courtney

Material Intelligence: Meet the emerging designers from Ireland’s leading fashion colleges
Material Intelligence: Meet the emerging designers from Ireland’s leading fashion colleges

Ruth O'Connor

Image / Editorial

Watch Jen Gunter’s incredible TED Talk which asks why we can’t talk about periods


By Edaein OConnell
23rd Jan 2020
Watch Jen Gunter’s incredible TED Talk which asks why we can’t talk about periods

Gynaecologist Jen Gunter blew the audience away with her TED Talk which asked why we can’t talk about periods. Watch the full video below 


“It shouldn’t be an act of feminism to know how your body works.”

This line was spoken by Jen Gunter – a gynaecologist who specialises in pain medicine – in her December 2019 Ted Talk which focused on why we can’t talk about our periods.

She explains how menstrual shame silences and represses, thus leading to misinformation surrounding periods and the mismanagement of pain.

Her speech begins by looking at the history of women and menstruation and how during the 1920s and 1930s, many thought women could wilt flowers by walking past them while they were menstruating.

Taboos

She speaks of common taboos surrounding periods such as period diarrhoea, which affects many women but is something rarely discussed.

Throughout the speech, she drops enlightening information to describe the severity of the pain women experience each month, saying that the pressure which is released in the uterus is the same “amount of pressure that’s generated during the second stage of labour when you are pushing”.

She delves into the world of pain management and other issues such as endometriosis but her closing lines are what will stick in the mind.

“The era of menstrual taboos is over. The only curse here is the ability to convince half the population that the very biological machinery that perpetuates the species, that gives everything that we have, is somehow dirty or toxic. And I’m not going to stand for it.”

This is most definitely a must-watch.


Read more: Watch: When Prince Charles met with Greta Thunberg in Davos

Read more: Free dose of MMR vaccine offered to 11 to 30 year olds due to ‘significant’ rise in the mumps

Read more: HPV and the HPV vaccine: the facts (and myths) you need to know