Nothing less than radical whole-system change is required to fix the NHS's maternity services | Juli

Women | The Guardian

It’s vital that Yvette Cooper’s taskforce acts on the Amos and Ockenden reports – and puts the needs of women and families at the heart of maternity services

It is hard to find the words to describe the agony for those who have experienced preventable baby loss, injury or maternal death. Understandably, families who have been through this have campaigned relentlessly for local and national investigations. Every family deserves to know what caused their loss or trauma, but current and past reviews have failed to deliver on resolution and accountability.

The vital debate about how to ensure safe maternity care has intensified since the publication of two reports, led by Valerie Amos and Donna Ockenden, and the appointment of Yvette Cooper as secretary of state for health and social care, offering a golden opportunity for system-wide change. “I want to make it a personal crusade to put the cradle back at the heart of the NHS,” Cooper told the Guardian last week, adding that she was committed to introducing a new national maternity commissioner.

Julia Sanders is professor of clinical midwifery at Cardiff University and was an expert adviser to the national maternity and neonatal investigation led by Valerie Amos

August 20th 2026, 7:27 pm

‘We are impatient’: meet the women protesting for change in India

Women | The Guardian

From student organisers to a model-turned-activist, these women are risking their reputations – and sometimes their lives – to fight against injustice. Plus, actor Imran Khan recommends a classic film

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There is much to be said for the extraordinary women living ordinary lives, who nonetheless shaped India. Women have changed public life in the country far more than their presence in formal politics would suggest.

And so, as India marked its 79th birthday over the weekend, I found myself reflecting on the multitude of people’s movements, big and small – as well as the women who helped shape them. During India’s struggle for freedom from British rule, women organised boycotts of British goods, made contraband salt and marched to confront the police, taking on roles usually dominated by men. In the 1970s Chipko movement, protesting deforestation, women put their bodies on the line, wrapping them around trees to stop them being felled, turning a local struggle into a national reckoning over environment and development. More recently, grandmothers in Shaheen Bagh sat to protest the citizenship law, which critics have denounced as discriminatory, creating space for dissent when many thought none existed.

August 20th 2026, 7:27 pm

Let’s all get on board with travel etiquette | Letters

Women | The Guardian

Readers add to a guide for handling tricky situations on public transport

Re your article on travel etiquette (The ultimate guide to travel etiquette: how to handle 36 tricky situations, from manspreaders to smelly armpits, 4 August), it’s totally wrong to advise people not to give up seats for a woman any more. Women could be menstruating, in the first trimester of pregnancy (the most exhausting time, and not one you advertise with badges saying “Baby on board”), perimenopausal, menopausal or have endometriosis (excruciating pain). Women live with a level of pain and discomfort as routine, for much of their lives. Yes, of course men can be suffering with specific ailments at specific times, but it is not part and parcel of being a man. Gentlemen, please just do it.
Helen Walker
London

• To your list of dubious travel behaviours, I’d like to add constant sniffing and its more guttural and nauseating relation, snorting. It seems that handkerchiefs, tissues and even the concept of blowing your nose have gone out of fashion. I am frequently nauseated by this on planes and trains, and if I don’t have headphones with me I have to resort to blocking my ears. I have not yet had the courage to speak to a culprit (although I have often been tempted to pass them a tissue).
Judith Milburn
Hartlepool, County Durham

August 20th 2026, 7:27 pm

Sali Hughes on beauty: a shortcut to glass skin? Try these one-step moisturisers

Women | The Guardian

Three new products – and one old favourite – achieve a glazed sheen in one easy application

As you will no doubt have noticed, “glass” skin – that is, a complexion with a smooth, glazed sort of sheen – has been fashionable for ages. Until now, however, it has only come as the result of a meticulous, umpteen-step Korean skincare routine. But the new glass skin moisturisers attempt to mimic the look in one simple application.

Erborian’s Glow Moisturiser (from £9, all skin types) is a Goldilocks’s porridge sort of face cream. Not too heavy, not too light, just dewy enough without looking oily, and with lasting hydration that never becomes wet. I must advise the glimmer-avoidant that it does have a smidge of pearlescence, but I find that flattering.

August 20th 2026, 7:27 pm

‘Feminists need to push back’: how did the women’s movement become so divided – and how can it reuni

Women | The Guardian

Just a few years ago, women would fight for other women whatever their background or politics. Today, many loudly dismiss the struggles of those who are not like them. But the solidarity is still there, if you look hard enough

One June day in 2015, I stood outside Yarl’s Wood immigration removal centre near Bedford and heard the women inside singing. “Set her free,” said the graffiti on the walls. “Shut it down.” I had often visited the centre and heard the desperate stories of women who were held inside it. But that day felt hopeful rather than despairing, as hundreds of women – refugees, campaigners, lawyers, members of parliament, actors, writers – gathered around the centre to demand freedom for the women locked up.

When I set up the organisation Women for Refugee Women, I was driven by my faith in solidarity among women. The organisation works with women seeking asylum in Britain to tell their stories and campaign for justice and safety. For years I felt that faith being proved in practice. Women turned up for other women at events and demonstrations; they were volunteering and campaigning, marching and supporting.

August 20th 2026, 7:27 pm

Over/Under review – beautiful coming of age story of female best friends set across five summers

Women | The Guardian

There’s an astonishing naturalism about the two leads, navigating the ups and downs of adolescence, bodily changes and learning to use tampons

Practically any woman who had a best female friend in early adolescence will be able to relate to this fragile, thoughtful drama about two American children, Violet (Emajean Bullock) and Stella (Anastasia Veronica Lee), living through the ages of nine to 13, a time as packed with incident as it is simultaneously uneventful and reassuringly dull. Unlike Richard Linklater’s justly acclaimed Boyhood, which had the resources to film for over a decade and thus observe its central character grow up, this was clearly made over a more compact schedule. Violet and Stella age much more subtly here, gradually growing breasts and getting a little bit taller, but those tiny incremental changes mean so much to them. Just as in real life with girls this age, a little bit of makeup, different clothes and some flat-ironing on the hair can alter a kid’s whole presentation.

As the film starts, the two are nine-year-old besties, spending their summers together in New England where they go to camp, frolic in the surf (the title refers to a game they play with waves) and try to sleep over at each other’s houses. Unfortunately, Stella can’t yet cope with sleeping through the night at someone else’s place, and every time they try she must be collected by her parents after waking up frightened in the night. But it’s still something the girls yearn for. They even wish for it when they trap morning moths in jars, hoping fairies will grant them their hearts’ desires.

August 20th 2026, 7:27 pm

Waves Turn review – the exhausting, joyful, boring, wondrous realities of new motherhood

Women | The Guardian

Josephine Ahnelt’s gentle but truthful documentary has home-movie intimacy and some incredibly touching moments

As a piece of art depicting motherhood, Judith Rohrmoser’s self-portrait of breastfeeding sticks two fingers up at the tradition of the Madonna with child. In her painting, Rohrmoser’s baby feeds contentedly, chubby cheeked and sleepy under damp lashes. The artist is less serene, looking directly at us, headphones clamped over her ears, eyes filled with what might be a roar of grief, or possibly an overwhelming sense that everything has changed.

Rohrmoser is one of five women who agreed to be filmed at their most vulnerable in the first year of motherhood for this Austrian documentary. It’s a gentle but truthful look at new motherhood, making the point that – ignore the Renaissance artists – having a tiny baby does not put you in perpetual state of bliss. The reality is exhaustion, joy, boredom, wonder and a rush of other feelings. Director Josephine Ahnelt shoots in 16mm, her camera up close, filming with the intimacy of a home video, cutting off heads to at one point zero in on what interests her: a mother snipping her baby’s tiny fingernails.

August 20th 2026, 7:27 pm

Can antihistamines really help with PMDD and menopausal symptoms?

Women | The Guardian

Debilitating symptoms lead some to try over-the-counter medications Allegra and Pepcid due to a social media trend

Premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) and menopause can come with debilitating symptoms, like intense emotional changes and exhaustion.

All over social media, women are claiming that a simple hack has helped enormously: a combination of two over-the-counter medications, both antihistamines – typically, the name brands Pepcid AC and Allegra.

August 20th 2026, 7:27 pm

Jess Cartner-Morley on fashion: the secret to summer layering? Sheer bravery

Women | The Guardian

Adding layers doesn’t have to leave you a hot mess – think sheer scarves and crochet with flashes of colour to elevate your look

Perhaps I shouldn’t admit this, but I’m in two minds about summer dressing. Part of me believes summer is about joy, sunshine and good times, and clothes should embrace all of that. This woman loves Pucci and owns not one but two silver kaftans. The other part of me believes summer should be uncomplicated, laid-back and earthy. This woman never checks in luggage and has worn the same black beach cover-up for so many years it’s too threadbare to cover anything much.

The thing is, either approach looks absurd if taken to extremes. Candy swirls, cherry prints and strawberry bag charms are delightful, but pile them too high and you look like a walking knickerbocker glory. And while white linen shirts and simple black sandals are chic, you risk looking a bit like you’re on a meditation retreat where the dress code is “wealthy disciple”. Know what I mean?

August 20th 2026, 7:27 pm

‘So destructive’: women are paying for face scans that tell them what cosmetic procedures to get

Women | The Guardian

‘Looksmaxxing’ culture has led to the rise of facial analysis services – but experts warn they aren’t backed by science and can be harmful to users

Danielle, 37, didn’t always have issues with body image: she used to be a model and recalls receiving positive attention from men. However, when two years of unemployment plunged her into a period of financial insecurity, her confidence faded. “It was easy to wonder, if I was prettier, if some of my features were different, would that help?” she said.

So, when Danielle saw videos on TikTok about a “facial analysis” service that claimed it could provide her with “science-backed” glow-up advice, she bought it without hesitation. Three-hundred and thirty dollars later, after sending in selfies to be analyzed, Danielle received her personalized 30-page report from the company Qoves.

August 20th 2026, 7:27 pm

Disappointment over Liz Truss decision not to appoint minister for women

Women | The Guardian

Nadhim Zahawi’s new role as minister for equalities ‘covers women’, says PM’s spokesperson

Women have reacted with dismay at Liz Truss’s decision not to appoint a minister for women to her cabinet team, instead naming Cabinet Office minister Nadhim Zahawi as minister for equalities.

A spokesperson for the new prime minister – who held the title minister for women and equalities – confirmed that Zahawi’s role “covers women”.

September 7th 2022, 1:55 pm

Anger as Lisa LaFlamme dropped as Canada TV anchor after going grey

Women | The Guardian

Award-winning host of CTV National News ‘shocked and saddened’ as company denies accusations of sexism and ageism

Allegations that a popular television news anchor in Canada lost her job after “going grey” have prompted anger and disbelief, casting one of the country’s largest media organisations into turmoil and highlighting the rigid expectations facing women in the workforce.

In a two-minute video posted on Twitter on Monday, Lisa LaFlamme announced she had been ousted as anchor of CTV National News, one of the country’s most-watched evening shows.

September 4th 2022, 7:40 pm

‘I could not get out of Britain fast enough’: Amanda de Cadenet on tabloid bullies, teenage fame and

Women | The Guardian

She was dubbed ‘the wild child’ in the UK when she presented The Word in the early 90s – and left scarred by the experience. After fleeing across the Atlantic, she reinvented herself, as a feminist activist, photographer, talkshow host and now a podcaster

Amanda de Cadenet. If you are of a certain vintage, that name will probably bring back a Proustian rush of sensory memories: Impulse Vanilla Kisses body spray, the feel of a Primal Scream Screamadelica cassette in your hands, the taste of Hooch on your tongue – all the greatest hits of 1990s Britain. At only 18, De Cadenet was one of the hosts on the cult Channel 4 late-night show The Word, and images of her in all her messy teenage glory, with chunky blond hair falling around her shoulders and tights always ripped, were everywhere. The tabloids gleefully tutted at the careening nightlife antics of the “wild child”, as they invariably called her.

When she was 20, she ran off to the US with John Taylor of Duran Duran soon after she had their daughter, Atlanta. Despite the doomsayers’ predictions, she did not become another show-business casualty: she and Taylor broke up but remain friends, and she later married Nick Valensi from the Strokes and had twins. Her professional career was even more surprising as she became a portrait photographer for glossy magazines – and a good one.

September 4th 2022, 7:40 pm

My partner doesn’t masturbate – and gets frustrated when we don’t have sex

Women | The Guardian

Parenting and housework take up so much of my time. Must I be responsible for his sexual satisfaction as well?

My partner doesn’t masturbate and he gets very frustrated and difficult to live with when we don’t have sex. I feel it’s unfair for all the responsibility to fall on me to relieve him of his sexual tension. It just ends up becoming a chore I have to do on top of the parenting, housework, etc. I want to get another opinion on whether this is fair, plus advice on how to manage a man’s expectations about how much sex couples with kids have in long-term relationships.

I suspect this is not really about masturbation, or even sex. There is underlying resentment between you, and it needs to be addressed before everything becomes worse. You believe there is an unfair arrangement – and this can only be resolved by you asking him for more help. Be specific, and approach him calmly – expressing your feelings without starting a fight. You deserve to be less stressed.

September 4th 2022, 7:38 pm

Hair syrup: is it just old-fashioned hair oil by a sweeter name?

Women | The Guardian

This ‘new’ treatment may have gone viral, but hair oil has been part of Indian beauty routines for centuries

The hack
Hair syrup is the latest must-have viral product, and promises the softest strands of your life. But is it truly buzz-worthy – or just another marketing gimmick?

The test
Meet Hair Syrup, a hair oil that’s going viral on TikTok, formulated as a pre-wash treatment. I know what you’re thinking: that sounds familiar. That’s because it is: VO5’s hot-oil treatments in the 1980s had a similar approach.

September 4th 2022, 7:38 pm

‘Night after night I get harassed’: comedians call for safer working conditions

Women | The Guardian

With research showing sexual harassment is a routine occurrence, there is growing demand for arts venues to commit to protecting entertainers

Posey Mehta, like many performers at the Edinburgh fringe, has been flyering for her own show. It’s called I Am Not a Gorilla so she took to the streets in a gorilla costume. She did not expect to encounter daily sexual harassment.

Mehta has experienced “persistent verbal and physical harassment” such as “non-consensual touching, including men coming up behind me and grabbing my bum”. She continues: “I’ve experienced men and women hugging me, and tweaking, touching or rubbing the nipples of my gorilla costume, which are obviously directly on top of my actual breasts. These interactions have made me feel so unsafe that I now wear a bra over my costume.”

September 4th 2022, 7:38 pm

Vegetarian women more likely to fracture hips in later life, study shows

Women | The Guardian

Research suggests some vegetarians may not get sufficient nutrients for good bone and muscle health

Women who are vegetarian are more likely to experience hip fractures in later life than those who frequently eat meat, a UK study has found.

Researchers analysed health and diet records from more than 26,000 women and found that over a roughly 22-year period, vegetarians were a third more likely to break a hip than those who regularly ate meat.

September 4th 2022, 7:38 pm

‘Why did this young man have such a hold on me?’ How dating someone half my age rebooted my sex life

Women | The Guardian

After splitting from my husband and four years of celibacy, getting out there was daunting. Was I ready to be the ‘older woman’?

In the decade I lived in California, before I moved back to Britain in 2018, men would sometimes approach me in cafes or the gym, once at the Norton Simon museum, where Eve Babitz had played nude chess with Marcel Duchamp. On the 12-hour flight home from LAX to Heathrow, I lost all appeal. No man ever talked to me again, starting with the customs agent who turned his head as I walked through with the last of my legal weed. When I flew later that year, to take my kid to her dad who was working in Atlanta: lots of attention! When I landed back in England … silence. After a year of this, I caved in to my friends’ demands to join a dating app.

I put up the most me photograph that exists: writing, in a city with a view, wearing a pretty dress that made me feel powerfully “Rita Moreno”. It was literally Rita Moreno’s dress, which I’d bought at a consignment store in Venice Beach. There’s a cat leaning into me and next to my computer you can see Richard Avedon’s photo of Truman Capote, the Julian Opie painting of Blur that hangs in the National Portrait Gallery and, at the front, a snapshot of my mother as a college student.

September 4th 2022, 7:38 pm

What can a woman do with a canoe – and a small chip on her shoulder?

Women | The Guardian

Megan Mayhew-Bergman tackles a historic canoe route - five years after a condescending conversation with a male adventurer. Instead of revenge, she found a touch of transcendence

Five years ago, while on assignment in the Adirondacks – a New York state park with 2m acres of protected land – an over-confident outdoorsman attempted to dazzle me with his recent adventures. He mentioned that he’d just finished the Seven Carries, a historic canoe route through the Saint Regis Canoe Area.

I was annoyed by the conversation – the notes of toxic masculinity, the sense that he was waiting for me to fawn – but intrigued by the route, and decided I would one day complete the Seven Carries myself.

September 4th 2022, 7:38 pm

A shopping guide to the best … summer tote bags

Women | The Guardian

Carry yourself through to the end of the season with these stylish, striking and practical additions to any outfit

Rainbow stripe, £75, stories.com

September 4th 2022, 7:38 pm

Hospitalised Torres Strait victims denied domestic violence protection, police report finds

Women | The Guardian

The internal Queensland police intelligence report found officer responses had heightened the risk of fatal consequences

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Police officers in the Torres Strait Islands have avoided applying for domestic violence protection orders even after observing victims’ “swollen faces”, “black eyes” and need for hospitalisation, according to an internal intelligence report that found deaths were “likely”.

Victims who sustained injuries after having cars driven into them, or had received threats of violence, were referred to domestic violence services with no further action taken, “heightening the risk of … fatal consequences,” the report said.

August 6th 2022, 3:30 pm

Female in Focus photography awards 2022 – in pictures

Women | The Guardian

The Female in Focus international awards from the British Journal of Photography and its publisher 1854 Media, were established to champion the work of exceptional female photographers and combat gender inequality in the industry

August 3rd 2022, 3:29 am

Spain ‘beach bodies’ ad edited out my prosthetic leg, says British model

Women | The Guardian

Sian Green-Lord says adding a limb in promotional poster for body-positive campaign is ‘beyond wrong’

Spain’s summer campaign encouraging women of all shapes and sizes to hit the beach has backfired for a second time, after one of the models featured said her prosthetic leg had been edited out.

The likeness of Briton Sian Green-Lord features on the far left of the promotional poster, in a white swimsuit with floral patterns. Compared with an image on her Instagram account, the colour of her swimsuit has been changed, and a left leg added where her prosthetic limb should be.

July 31st 2022, 3:07 am

Spanish artist sorry for using models’ likeness without permission

Women | The Guardian

Image of UK model Nyome Nicholas-Williams among those used in government poster celebrating diversity of women’s bodies

The artist behind a Spanish government poster encouraging women of all shapes and sizes to be proud of their bodies has apologised for failing to seek the permission of the models who inspired the work.

On Wednesday, the Women’s Institute – part of Spain’s equality ministry – launched a campaign called “Summer is ours too”. The accompanying poster, designed by the artist Arte Mapache, shows five women of different body types, ages and ethnicities. It also shows a topless woman who has had a mastectomy.

July 29th 2022, 11:08 am

Why women and weights are a healthy fit | Letter

Women | The Guardian

I am sick to death of hearing women should focus on cardio exercise and leave strength training to men, says Bernadine Jones

Rose George writes about women’s exercise plummeting (Pandemic knocked you off your stride? An active woman’s tips for getting fit again, 26 July). The NHS wants us to vigorously run and moderately mow the lawn,, and then also strength train twice a week. Those of us who do all the housework and all the career-aspiring thinking work and then all the childcare would like to know where this time could be retrieved from? Often, we are pointed to spin classes and 2kg dumbbells and told “you can fit in a run in the morning”.

Here’s another solution: three times a week, after you deal with the kids and before work, lift a barbell loaded with two 25kg plates (or whatever you can manage) for 30-45 minutes, and then down a protein shake. Do the same thing every week, just a wee bit heavier. Ignore the “fitfluencers” doing donkey kicks while jumping with 50kg dumbbells. It doesn’t need to be fancy. You don’t need to be bathed in sweat. You don’t need to spend an hour hating yourself on a treadmill. You don’t even need to get that tired.

July 27th 2022, 4:52 pm

The cult of confidence: could positive thinking be making us feel less secure?

Women | The Guardian

The past decade has seen a boom in ‘confidence culture’. But behind all the positive thinking, are more cynical forces at work?

Believe in yourself. Be empowered. Show up. Love your body. Stand tall. How many times have you seen statements like these on social media? Or used to advertise products? All point towards confidence: a particular c-word that the modern woman cannot get away from.

Being self-confident is the command of our time. At some point in the past decade, women’s media seemed to shift from celebrity mockery and dieting advice to talking about “empowerment”. Parenting books told mums it was OK to be imperfect, wobbly and have stretch marks, as long as they were bringing up self-assured children. Beauty companies and fashion brands started telling us to love our bodies just the way they are. Along with the ascent of social media came a tide of feminism that prioritised self-care and welcomed imperfection. On the surface, we are living in a golden age of female confidence. But how much are we really feeling it?

July 25th 2022, 11:52 am

Male ‘biological clock’ can affect chances of birth more than was thought, study finds

Women | The Guardian

The research could help shape fertility education and messaging for couples trying to conceive through IVF

The first thing a woman seeking to conceive via fertility treatment will undoubtedly be told is the impact her age will have on her chances of a successful pregnancy.

But now a study of nearly 19,000 IVF cycles has shown how the influence of the paternal age on live birth rates could play a more vital role than previously thought.

July 23rd 2022, 6:20 pm

The women who wish they weren’t mothers: ‘An unwanted pregnancy lasts a lifetime’

Women | The Guardian

As Roe v Wade is overturned and abortion bans are reinstated in the US, women from across the world who felt pressured to have children tell their stories

I became pregnant two years after getting married and it was the worst thing that could possibly have happened to me because I was in the middle of separating from my husband. He had tried to hit me and I didn’t want to stick around to see if he would do it again.

July 22nd 2022, 7:03 pm

A shopping guide to … gold hoop earrings

Women | The Guardian

Available in myriad shapes and sizes, these are a simple way to add polish to any outfit

Gold hoops are earrings for those who don’t usually do jewellery. Partly because there’s something for everyone – tiny ones for newbies, and hoops the size of saucers for the truly daring. And partly because they are trend-adjacent, gold hoops are never in fashion and never really out, yet worn by everyone from Diana Vreeland to Blue Velvet’s Dorothy Vallens. They’re a simple way to add polish regardless of the season. There’s a huge array of shapes to rent or thrift, though hoops with embellishments – lapis lazuli or crystal beads – add a summer flourish. If you’re worried about weight, try clip-ons (they don’t drag the lobe), and if you’re worried about cost, try renting – it’s what celebrities do on red carpet duty.
Lauren Cochrane

July 22nd 2022, 7:03 pm

Florence Pugh hits back at ‘vulgar’ criticism of her body on social media

Women | The Guardian

Black Widow actor rails at ‘how easy it is for men to totally destroy a woman’s body, publicly, proudly, for everyone to see’

Florence Pugh has hit back at “vulgar” social media users who criticised her body, after she posted photographs of herself wearing a sheer dress at a fashion show.

“What happened to you to be so content on being so loudly upset by the size of my boobs and body?” said Pugh in an Instagram post on Sunday to her 7.4 million followers.

July 22nd 2022, 7:03 pm

Sierra Leone backs bill to legalise abortion and end colonial-era law

Women | The Guardian

Country hails ‘monumental step’ towards expanding reproductive rights at a time when the US has overturned them

Ministers in Sierra Leone have taken a major step towards decriminalising abortion and overturning the country’s colonial-era law, in a move hailed by campaigners and women’s rights activists.

President Julius Maada Bio said his cabinet had unanimously backed a bill on risk-free motherhood, which would expand access to abortion in a country where terminations are only permitted when a mother’s life is at risk.

July 22nd 2022, 7:03 pm

You be the judge: should my fellow bridesmaid dial down the hen-do plans?

Women | The Guardian

One bridesmaid is stressed and can’t afford the hen do, the other wants to go even bigger. Who’s in the right? You decide

Our friend wants a tropical hen do, but Katie seems to have no regard for how expensive it all is

July 22nd 2022, 7:03 pm

A shopping guide to the best … summer shorts

Women | The Guardian

Shorts season is upon us. Whether you prefer long and structured linen or short and sporty for the beach, here are the best to buy rent or thrift

Striped seersucker, £55, everlane.com

July 22nd 2022, 7:03 pm

Sexual Healing: My wife and I haven’t had sex for years. How can I boost my libido?

Women | The Guardian

Doctors tell me I’m hormonal or menopausal. Should I be looking elsewhere for help?

I am a 57-year-old lesbian and I have no sex drive. These are hard words to write, but my wife and I have not been intimate in years. She loves me and I do love her, but I suspect that over the years she got tired of initiating, and me either acquiescing out of obligation or turning her down. I want to be normal but don’t feel as if I am. Doctors dismiss me as either hormonal or menopausal. What should I do? What type of specialist can help me?

People living with such sadness and quiet desperation about their sexual functioning or lack of it should never be dismissed. Unfortunately, I often hear that they are. You deserve to be helped, so seek a well-qualified, knowledgable sex therapist or practitioner of psychosexual medicine.

Pamela Stephenson Connolly is a US-based psychotherapist who specialises in treating sexual disorders.

If you would like advice from Pamela on sexual matters, send us a brief description of your concerns to private.lives@theguardian.com (please don’t send attachments). Each week, Pamela chooses one problem to answer, which will be published online. She regrets that she cannot enter into personal correspondence. Submissions are subject to our terms and conditions.

Comments on this piece are premoderated to ensure discussion remains on topics raised by the writer. Please be aware there may be a short delay in comments appearing on the site.

July 22nd 2022, 7:03 pm

Breastfeeding improves cognitive ability for children of poorer mothers – study

Women | The Guardian

Analysis of data on almost 6,000 children found breastfeeding boosted brain development in disadvantaged mothers’ babies

Children of poorer mothers who breastfeed are much better at tasks involving speaking, drawing and comprehension as a direct result, a British study has found.

They do 8% better in tests of their cognitive ability up to the age of seven – if they were breastfed for at least three months – than those who were bottle-fed, according to the research.

June 30th 2022, 7:19 pm

She’s a single mother who works shifts at Whole Foods – and just climbed Everest for the 10th time

Women | The Guardian

Lhakpa Sherpa, who recently climbed the Nepal side of Everest, negotiates her adventures with remarkably limited resources

Lhakpa Sherpa – the female world record-holder for Everest summits – uses a 50-year-old oxygen mask. She has no regular sponsors, no trainers or dietitians.

She works an hourly job at Whole Foods in Connecticut, and raised three children nearly on her own while navigating poverty and domestic abuse.

June 28th 2022, 9:03 am

Julie Bindel to sue Nottingham council after talk cancelled

Women | The Guardian

Council says it called off Bindel’s talk at library because of her views on transgender rights

Julie Bindel, the veteran feminist and lesbian activist, has said she intends to take legal action after a council cancelled a talk she was due to give.

Bindel was scheduled to speak at Aspley library in Nottingham on Saturday but the 90-minute event was cancelled the day before. She says she found out when she was already on the train and ended up speaking in the library car park.

June 27th 2022, 5:18 pm

US woman left traumatised after Malta hospital refuses life-saving abortion

Women | The Guardian

‘Desperate’ tourist who fell foul of country’s total ban fears for her life if complications set in while she waits for transfer to UK

Doctors have denied an American woman on holiday in Malta a potentially life-saving abortion, despite saying her baby had a “zero chance” of survival after she was admitted to hospital with severe bleeding in her 16th week of pregnancy.

Despite an “extreme risk” of haemorrhage and infection, doctors at the Mater Dei hospital in Msida told Andrea Prudente that they would not perform a termination because of the country’s total ban on abortion.

June 22nd 2022, 10:46 am

The female orgasm: lots of throbbing and quivering – but no moaning

Women | The Guardian

A woman enjoying a noisy end to sex is a cliche of TV and film. But is there any truth to it?

Name: The female orgasm.

Age: As old as humans.

June 22nd 2022, 10:46 am

Life inside the wild London club where lesbians were free to be themselves

Women | The Guardian

A new documentary takes viewers back down the rickety stairs to the trailblazing Gateways in Chelsea

The Gateways is back. The longest-running lesbian club of all-time – the one whose actual clientele appeared in the 1968 film The Killing of Sister George; the one where Mick Jagger tried to talk the owner into letting him crash in a frock; the one that was a sanctuary to every class and sort of woman, from well-known figures such as the writer Patricia Highsmith and the artist Maggi Hambling (then an art student) to swimming-pool attendants at the Tooting Bec lido – has been given a new lease of life in the first full-length documentary film to celebrate its history, and ensure that it is not erased.

Behind a dull green door on the corner of King’s Road and Bramerton Street in Chelsea, down some rickety steps to the basement lay the dive, a former strip club. The lease had been won in a bet at a televised boxing event at the Dorchester hotel by course bookie Ted Ware in 1943, and initially he offered it as a hang-out to a group of his lesbian pals who had been kicked out of their old Soho haunt the Bag O’ Nails pub after new owners took over and banned them.

June 18th 2022, 10:31 am

‘Fun and the beautiful game’: rise of women’s recreational football

Women | The Guardian

More women in England are making up for the decades when they felt shut out of the game

It’s Saturday-morning 11-a-side at a football pitch squeezed between a scrubby path running along the River Lee Navigation and a technology campus in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, Hackney. A dark-haired woman in red defies a gaggle of defenders with a skilled pass to the front. “Yes! Beginner’s debut, right there,” yells coach Julie Leaff at the top of her Mancunian lungs. The player breaks into a grin.

The camaraderie and joy on the pitch, where women are playing football, some for the first time, is noisy and infectious. This is Clapton Community Football Club’s open access training, one of thousands of grassroots sessions in England that have sprung up as women’s football has advanced. Unlike many targeted at encouraging young women and girls to take up the sport, however, it is for all ages.

June 17th 2022, 7:59 am

Revlon files for bankruptcy in US after supply chain trouble and surging costs

Women | The Guardian

Cosmetics company hopes to refinance and keep trading, saying demand for products remains strong

Revlon, the 90-year-old multinational beauty company, has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the US, weighed down by debt load, disruptions to its supply chain network and surging costs.

The New York-based company said that on court approval, it expects to receive $575m (£469m) in financing from its existing lenders, which will allow it to keep its day-to-day operations running.

June 16th 2022, 1:14 pm

Why can’t women in the UK afford to buy their own houses? We ask an expert

Women | The Guardian

Sara Reis, of the nonprofit Women’s Budget Group, says there is nowhere in the UK where an average-earning female can afford her own place

It is well known that the UK’s astronomic property prices have locked many people out of home ownership – especially if you’re single. Indeed, there is no region in the UK where a man or woman on median earnings could buy on their own. But a damning report has revealed there is no region where a median-earning woman can even rent alone. I asked the report’s author, Sara Reis, why.

The title of A Home of Her Own borrows from Virginia Woolf’s 1929 essay where she writes that a woman “must have money and a room of her own”. Woolf is talking about writing conditions, but I wonder if women have ever had the space they need.
I don’t think this situation is necessarily new. But we know that, say, 30 years ago, wages and house prices were much closer than they are now. So housing affordability has decreased for everyone, but women still earn less. And if you have a gender pay gap, you will have a gender housing affordability gap.

June 14th 2022, 5:44 pm

The people making a difference: she was devastated by vaginal-mesh surgery. Now she helps others rec

Women | The Guardian

Kath Sansom’s surgery changed her life forever – and motived her to lobby for its halt

In 2015, Kath Sansom was the “ridiculously superfit mother of two adult daughters”. She did high-board diving, mountain biking, swimming and boxing. She had started to have a few “embarrassing leaks” while exercising, so Sansom did what many women do in her situation: she went to her GP, who referred her for transvaginal tape surgery, in which a small piece of mesh is fitted around the urethra to prevent incontinence.

“I assumed it was a bit like a coil,” says Sansom, 54, a PR manager from Cambridgeshire, “and if I didn’t get on with it, I could have it taken out. I had no idea it was permanent.”

June 14th 2022, 5:44 pm

We need stories from older mothers – and from women who don’t want children too | Letters

Women | The Guardian

Monica Cardenas advocates a move away from a culture that tends to see all women of child-bearing age as potential parents, and Claire Flood-Page and another reader write about the experiences of those who have been mothers for longer

Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett’s column on the importance of telling stories of motherhood focused on Rachel Cusk’s A Life’s Work, which Cosslett notes was criticised on publication, mainly by mothers (Writing honestly about motherhood still provokes anger, but we must tell our stories, 6 June). Cusk noted in 2008 that many of her critics exhibited a “hunger to express themselves not as women, not as commentators or intellectuals, but as mothers”.

Honest stories of motherhood are essential, but so too are identities beyond the maternal, for both mothers and non-mothers. We must come to know women as more than nurturing caregivers. Although truthful stories of motherhood are gaining traction, our culture tends to see all women of child-bearing age as potential mothers. Any thirtysomething can tell you about a time they were asked when they would have children, told they’d make a wonderful mother, or condescendingly advised that they would change their mind about not having children.

June 14th 2022, 5:44 pm

Surrey golf club welcomes Muslim women as taster tour begins

Women | The Guardian

Walton Heath golf club hosts one of series of sessions in England and Scotland for Muslim women

Last weekend, something unusual happened at Walton Heath golf club, one of the world’s top courses whose first captain was King Edward VIII and which has counted four prime ministers, including Winston Churchill, among its members.

The prestigious club, set amid Surrey heathland, first hosted the English Ladies’ Championship in 1914. A century later, it launched a ladies’ academy to encourage more women to take up the sport.

June 14th 2022, 5:44 pm

Depp-Heard trial verdict decried as ‘symptom of a culture that oppresses women’

Women | The Guardian

Heard’s lawyer says verdict sends ‘a horrible message’ while sexual violence experts say it reveals a system that doesn’t guarantee equal protection

A day after Johnny Depp largely won his defamation lawsuit against Amber Heard, Heard’s lead attorney said “lopsided” social media posts about the trial turned the courtroom into a “zoo” and influenced the jury’s verdict.

Speaking to NBC, Elaine Bredehoft said the verdict sent “a horrible message”, adding that she believed the seven-member jury was not able to escape the social media frenzy that enveloped the six-week trial.

June 14th 2022, 5:44 pm

How women saw the world in 1968

Women | The Guardian

Actors, bus conductors and accountants offered the female perspective on work, parenting and pervasive attitudes

The Observer Magazine of 28 January 1968 featured women talking about ‘families, life, husbands, sex, love, careers, money, children’. And gnomes.

Pamela, a clippie on the buses, may have objectified the passengers when she said, ‘You don’t have a lot of time to talk to the fares,’ but probably hinted at being objectified herself when she revealed: ‘Quite a few flirtations do go on.’

June 14th 2022, 5:44 pm

Eat plants, try pilates and stay positive: how to keep your body younger than your years

Women | The Guardian

Do blueberries make you live longer? Is pilates proper exercise? How do you avoid loneliness? Botox, yes or no? Here’s how to age better

Who doesn’t want a long and healthy life? Ageing may be non negotiable but how you do it affords some wiggle room. There is, however, no time to lose. Ideally you’d have been getting your health in order before middle age. But it’s never too late to start. Each of us has a chronological age that’s measured in birthday candles. Since every person ages differently we also have a biological age that reflects how old our body really is. This age depends on the relationship between our genes, lifestyle and living conditions. It’s this biological age you can change by doing what I’m about to tell you.

May 28th 2022, 2:43 am

Tell us: what is your experience of women’s healthcare in England?

Women | The Guardian

We would like to hear about your treatment for conditions like endometriosis, fibroids or UTIs

We would like to find out more about women’s health provision in England.

If you have recently been accessing care – for conditions such as endometriosis, fibroids or UTI’S, or for menopause (including HRT), devices (eg. vaginal mesh implants) or maternity services, we would like to hear from you.

May 26th 2022, 10:56 am

Can you give yourself a temporary facelift with tape and elastic?

Women | The Guardian

Some vloggers are tightening their skin with ‘beauty’ tape, but should we have anything to do with this perpetuation of unrealistic ideals?

The hack
Beauty enthusiasts – and supermodel Bella Hadid – are reportedly using face tape and elastic to temporarily tighten their skin.

The promise
This old Hollywood hack has made a comeback, and several companies now sell ready-made tape-and-elastic kits. But is it a toxic TikTok trend too far?

May 20th 2022, 7:03 am

I’m tired of accepting most of the domestic load. How do I tell my husband? | Leading questions

Women | The Guardian

How to approach this will depend on your husband, writes advice columnist Eleanor Gordon-Smith. Is this an issue of ignorance or motivation?

I’m tired of accepting the majority of the domestic load just because I’m technically better at it. My husband is a wonderful human, a great father and a generous and loving partner. But ever since I’ve known him, he has been almost inept at anything domestic in nature, be it chores around the home or managing life in a partnership with a family of his own. It all falls on me, and I’m tired not only from the physical load, but the mental load too. It’s this part that people talk less of – holding the knowledge and remembering, planning, executing all the things that are needed to run a household successfully.

I feel like the reason I, like many women I’m sure, carry this load is because we’ve let our men get away with the perception that “we know how” to do it better and therefore it’s easier that we take on the responsibility. My husband will only do things like chores or organising of household needs when prompted and guided.

May 19th 2022, 7:03 pm

US supreme court abortion reversal would be global ‘catastrophe’ for women

Women | The Guardian

If Roe v Wade is overturned, it will encourage anti-choice groups – particularly in the developing world, activists warn

The probable demise of abortion as a federal right in the US will be a “catastrophe” for women in low and middle-income countries, with an emboldened anti-choice movement likely to raise renewed pressure on hard-won gains, doctors and activists have warned.

The leak this month of the US supreme court’s draft majority opinion, which argued that the 1973 ruling effectively legalising abortion had been “egregiously wrong from the start”, stunned and enraged many in America.

May 18th 2022, 4:01 am

Prejudices that led to witch-hunts still affect women today, says historian

Women | The Guardian

Lucy Worsley, whose BBC TV series focuses on powerless people, says women continue to bear brunt of men’s rage

Prejudices that led to witch-hunts hundreds of years ago have not disappeared and women are still on the receiving end of men’s anger, a leading historian has said.

Writing in the Radio Times, Lucy Worsley, a historian and author, said: “[Although] we like to think we’re better than the people who hunted witches, witch-hunting still happens in some parts of the world today.”

May 17th 2022, 1:29 am

From the toxic culture that gave us mansplaining and manterrupting, here comes … hepeating

Women | The Guardian

Ever noticed how some men make a habit of repeating what women say – and then get all the credit? There’s a word for that

Name: Hepeating.

Age: Getting on for five years old.

May 16th 2022, 6:11 pm

HRT products could be sent to UK from mainland Europe next week

Women | The Guardian

Regulator expected to consent to import of hormone replacement pills and patches from France

Extra supplies of hormone replacement therapy products could be shipped to the UK from France and Poland as soon as next week, a major manufacturer has said after crisis meetings were held to address the nationwide shortage.

Tina Backhouse, the general UK manager at Theramex, which makes about a dozen HRT drugs, including Bijuva pills and Femseven patches, said the company needed special permission to bring in products from France that were not licensed in the UK. Theramex’s products are mainly made in Germany, and some are only licensed in other European countries.

May 13th 2022, 6:40 am

Spain to ease abortion limits for over-16s and allow menstrual leave

Women | The Guardian

Parental permission to end for terminations and up to five days’ leave a month for painful periods

Spain’s Socialist-led coalition government is preparing a law that would allow women over the age of 16 to have abortions without permission from their parents or guardians, and introduce up to five days of menstrual leave a month.

The draft legislation, which is due to be approved by the cabinet next week, is intended to ensure that abortion is available to all those using the public health system, and that menstruation is treated as a proper health issue.

May 12th 2022, 5:56 pm

‘A sea of men’: Andie MacDowell recalls having panic attack on all-male film set

Women | The Guardian

Realisation she was only woman in the room on 2016 film led Four Weddings and a Funeral star to fall to her knees

Andie MacDowell has said she had a panic attack prompted by the realisation she was the only woman on the set of a film she made in 2016.

Speaking to Marie Claire, MacDowell said she “dropped to [her] knees” after the incident, which came in the aftermath of the election of Donald Trump to the US presidency.

May 12th 2022, 7:40 am

Contentious Croatian abortion goes ahead after medical officials step in

Women | The Guardian

Woman had been denied termination in strongly Catholic nation despite damaged foetus

A Croatian woman who was denied an abortion although her foetus had serious health issues has undergone the procedure, it was revealed on Wednesday.

The case sparked nationwide outrage in the EU country where Catholic church-backed conservative groups aspire to curb the right to abortion, which is legal until the 10th week of pregnancy.

May 11th 2022, 8:40 pm

Women who fought for US abortion rights in the 70s call for mass global protests

Women | The Guardian

Veteran activists say the overthrow of Roe v Wade would equate to murder, and should send warning signals around the world

It was over the Thanksgiving holiday, catching up with old high school friends, that Frances Beal heard that Cordelia had died. Like the now 82-year-old Black feminist and activist, her friend had left home to go to college, but she didn’t make it through her first year because, like anybody who wanted to terminate a pregnancy in America in 1958, she had been forced to undergo a backstreet abortion.

“She was dead because she’d had an illegal abortion. And it had gone bad. And if you take a look at the statistics, the number of woman that died from illegal abortions was tremendous,” Beal, who later joined the movement to legalise abortion, told the Observer.

May 8th 2022, 4:07 am

‘Inclusive’ language on maternity care risks excluding many women | Letter

Women | The Guardian

When discussing inherently sexed processes such as pregnancy, birth and breastfeeding, there are risks to desexing language, writes Prof Jenny Gamble

Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett’s article emphasised the importance of respectful, individualised maternity care, including in the language used to address transgender people (The language of maternity is alive and well – so why not expand it to include trans parents, 5 May). This idea is entirely uncontroversial. What has become contentious, however, is whether terms like “women” and “mothers” should be used in a broader sense, including in health communication and policy or replaced with other words that do not reference the female sex.

It is a well-established principle of communication that the sex of individuals should be made visible when relevant and should not be made visible when not. This ensures that sex-related needs and issues are not overlooked and sex stereotyping is avoided. As I and others outline in a recent paper in Frontiers in Global Women’s Health, when discussing inherently sexed processes like pregnancy, birth and breastfeeding, there are risks to desexing language.

May 6th 2022, 6:25 pm

I’ve got a seven-month-old baby. How do I make sure she doesn’t feel the same body shame I did? | Le

Women | The Guardian

Bracing a child for a bad outcome can teach them to expect it, writes advice columnist Eleanor Gordon-Smith. Fortunately time is on your side

Read more advice from Eleanor Gordon-Smith

I’ve never been happy with my looks and was often overlooked as a child and high school for the prettier girls which was very hurtful. I’ve got a seven-month-old baby (brown hair and brown eyes), quite chubby compared to other babies her age, and when I see pictures of her with my friends with babies a similar age I feel worried that she will always be seen as the “less than” one in the group due to her looks.

The other babies in my friendship group have bigger eyes, blond hair and blue eyes and my friends and extended family have made comments about her “not taking after this side of the family” (ie by being blond and skinny) or “oh no, she is going to have brown eyes!”

May 5th 2022, 2:35 pm

Calls for buffer zones around abortion clinics in Scotland after protests

Women | The Guardian

SNP urged to act by Scottish Labour and campaigners as fears grow threat to Roe v Wade in US could embolden anti-choice movement

The Scottish government is facing growing calls to impose buffer zones around abortion clinics amid fears that potential changes to abortion rights in the US are emboldening anti-choice protesters.

A leaked US draft supreme court ruling overturning Roe v Wade has sharpened anxieties over delays in implementing the SNP’s 2021 manifesto pledge to support local authorities to establish protest-free zones around clinics.

May 4th 2022, 2:37 pm

Abortion services in Northern Ireland almost nonexistent despite legalisation

Women | The Guardian

Stormont has failed to fully put into effect 2019 law passed by Westminster leaving women with ‘deplorable options’

While the battle over abortion rights rages in the US the problem of access to abortion services is yet to be fully resolved in part of the UK.

Two years after abortion was legalised in Northern Ireland girls and women in the region struggle to access services that are patchy to nonexistent. Despite progressive legislation, in practice they still face having to continue a pregnancy against their wishes or travelling to England for abortions or taking unregulated abortion pills, Alyson Kilpatrick, chief commissioner of Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, said on Wednesday. “In Northern Ireland women and girls are still faced with deplorable options,” she said.

May 4th 2022, 2:37 pm

‘We can’t trust Scotus’: California pledges to protect abortion rights

Women | The Guardian

Governor Gavin Newsom said an amendment is being proposed that would ‘enshrine the right to choose’ in the state’s constitution

With reproductive rights in peril across the US and a draft supreme court ruling that would overturn Roe v Wade, California is working to further enshrine abortion rights and expand access in anticipation of a surge of people seeking care from out of state.

California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, has long pledged that the state would become a “sanctuary” for people seeking reproductive care if the supreme court were to overturn the 1973 case that guaranteed the right to abortion. After a draft ruling leaked showing the court may have decided to do just that, Newsom said he and state leaders were proposing an amendment that would “enshrine the right to choose” in California’s constitution. State lawmakers are currently considering recommendations from a council tasked to finding solutions in case Roe is overturned.

May 4th 2022, 2:20 am

Erosion of abortion rights gathers pace around the world as US signals new era

Women | The Guardian

A leaked supreme court draft ruling shows the US is set to end 50 years of a woman’s right to choose. Elsewhere, the battle still rages

In 2022, abortion remains one of the most controversial and bitterly contested ethical and political battlegrounds. It is illegal for women to terminate their pregnancies in any circumstance in 24 countries, with a further 37 restricting access in any case except when the mother’s life is in danger.

As a leaked document signals that the US supreme court is poised to strike down the landmark 1973 ruling in Roe v Wade, millions of American women face losing their access to legal abortions, joining millions more living in those countries rejecting a woman’s right to choose.

May 3rd 2022, 2:20 pm

Supreme court voted to overturn Roe v Wade, leaked draft opinion reportedly shows

Women | The Guardian

In an unprecedented revelation, a document written by Justice Samuel Alito says ‘Roe was egregiously wrong from the start’

The US supreme court has provisionally voted to overturn Roe v Wade, the landmark ruling that legalised abortion nationwide in America, according to a draft opinion reported on by Politico.

In what appeared to be a stunning and unprecedented leak, Politico said on Monday evening it had obtained an initial majority opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito and circulated in the court on 10 February.

May 3rd 2022, 12:04 am

How will we count the cost of having a baby during a pandemic? | Eva Wiseman

Women | The Guardian

For everyone who went through a birth in the early days of lockdown, the longer-term effects and anxieties will take years to process

Two years ago today a good witch came very close and looked into the blacks of my eyes and said: “Look around, this is not your first birth. Everything’s different, it’s going to be OK,” then a few minutes later slid a new baby on to my chest and this was how our pandemic began.

Everything was different. Lockdown had started the week I went on maternity leave, and I gave birth in a time of PPE shortages and hands cracked from soap, and the prime minister leading the government from his hospital bed. There were no lateral flow tests then. The nurses who so elegantly looked after me were figuring things out as they went along – grappling with latex gloves, their plastic gowns man-sized, too long and too large. Soldiers had converted an exhibition centre in east London into one of the world’s largest hospitals; in Liverpool council bosses were discussing how to “grease the mortality highway” to prevent backlogs in mortuaries. Refrigerated shipping containers were accommodating extra bodies. Outside the hospital, I eyed a blacked-out coach with a livid kind of dread.

May 1st 2022, 5:04 am

A new start after 60: ‘I won MasterChef – and finally learned to believe in myself’

Women | The Guardian

Life as a retired banker bored Irini Tzortzoglou, so she decided to enter the cooking competition. She trained hard to win and now works as a chef, writer and public speaker

When she worked in banking, Irini Tzortzoglou’s idea of cooking was to pick up a ready meal from Marks & Spencer at Waterloo station on her way home, and put it in the oven. But now, since winning the BBC cooking competition MasterChef in 2019 at the age of 60, with menus inspired by her Greek heritage, food has become her life and new career.

She had not been overly interested in cooking, she says with a laugh, though as a child, food was an important part of her life. Tzortzoglou, 64, was born in Crete, where her grandparents’ house was always open – her grandfather was a priest – and her grandmother would often be cooking for dozens of people. Tzortzoglou would help out: “I loved the smells, I loved the processes.” After her parents moved the family to Athens when she was about eight, she didn’t really cook again, until she got married and moved to London. “I thought: ‘I better be a good housewife and feed my husband.’ I bought recipe books, and started cooking three-course meals every day because I was bored.”