Jennifer Gunter

The cover of the book states: “Buy this book if you have a vagina or if you spend any time at all in reasonably close proximity to one.” As someone who does not have a vagina, and spent a lot of time with my wife of nearly 50 years, this book is not very applicable to me.

There is a lot of health maintenance information.

There is a lot of corrections for common misinformation, and clarification that there is a lot we don’t know about the effectiveness (or harm) from various products. Dr. Jen Gunter comes across as very knowledgeable in this area.

Much of it is also more applicable to younger people than us.

I largely skipped over the chapters on STD. After that there are some chapters on common problems such as yeast infections, pain, and other topics relevant to many women.

… the burden of “well, it can’t hurt.” But they truly are a burden. Every time we make a woman jump through a useless hoop to get better, we add a burden, be it financial, or emotional, or the exasperation of doing so many things and yet realizing that you are running very hard but not getting anywhere. (Page 316 of 407)

The last chapters of the book contain some really good general information.

“Sorting the good from the bad online can be hard even for a doctor with access to the medical literature as well as trusted colleagues who are experts in other fields. Just fact-checking a Goop post that is squarely in my field of expertise, like a post on tampons, can take several hours.”
She then recommends:
“Before you research one more thing online, go to the National Library of Medicine and do the tutorial “Evaluating Internet Health Information.””
https://ods.od.nih.gov/HealthInformation/How_To_Evaluate_Health_Information_on_t...
https://medlineplus.gov/evaluatinghealthinformation.html… (altro)

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, despite its size and sometimes dry lists of side effects. I have read a few books on women's health/medical treatment of women, and this is the first one that has been trans-inclusive. I also appreciated the frequent mentions of purity culture and the harmful myths that has pushed on a generation of women. This book is no-nonsense, and clearly goes over the pros and cons or evidence and lack of evidence for so many things related to menstruation. I think huge sections of this book would be great for high school health class, and the rest of it is excellent when the particular set of circumstances applies - choosing the right birth control, understanding PCOS or endometriosis, and other things that might not apply to everyone right now. The woo woo natural medicine and homeopathy are brought up often, mentioning what evidence there is (often none) for these treatments. Pain and the host of symptoms that often come with a period are not normal, and no one should embrace them as natural if they don't want to.… (altro)

I've really enjoyed Jen Gunter's other books, and I was excited that my local library acquired her new release as soon as it came out! Blood has a very specific focus on menstruation: what's normal, what's abnormal, what some causes of abnormalities may be, what treatments can be used for certain symptoms, etcetera. I appreciated her inclusive language--and her few pointed tirades against the patriarchy.

There is some overlap with the content of previous books, but it's been years since I read them, so I approached this one with fresh eyes. As ever, I learned a lot of incredibly useful scientific facts, things that will make me much more educated in future doctor visits. She does, at times, delve deep into medical terminology; there were a few pages where I had to skim because the content was going beyond me. There are frequent illustrations, however, to help explain concepts.… (altro)