Speaker 1: Hey there, folks, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ.
Speaker 1: Robes sitting next to me here, and we're gonna start
Speaker 1: with this. I got a bone to pick with you.
Speaker 2: Great.
Speaker 1: You do this all the time when we start. We
Speaker 1: used to do this when we were hosting the show
Speaker 1: on television together. TEJ, you start right, I give you
Speaker 1: the opportunity. Hey, you can start. I let you do
Speaker 1: it if you wanted to, and you said no, So
Speaker 1: I'll take it.
Speaker 3: I said, I know what I'm good at, and I
Speaker 3: know what you're good at, and you were significantly better
Speaker 3: than me at starting.
Speaker 2: You know how to just.
Speaker 1: Rev it up, all right, So I'm reving it up
Speaker 1: by taking I have a beef to pick with you, okay.
Speaker 2: I have a.
Speaker 1: Really big problem with how sometimes you talk about your health, okay.
Speaker 1: And what I say to that is, as we sit here,
Speaker 1: you are, how far as a breast cancer survivor past
Speaker 1: the date of when you were recommended by your doctor
Speaker 1: to have blood work done? You came in hot, you said,
Speaker 1: I'm better at starting. How's that starting?
Speaker 2: Well?
Speaker 3: I also said, you know how to rev it up
Speaker 3: or stir it up, and you certainly are doing that.
Speaker 3: So the last time I had blood work done was
Speaker 3: August of twenty twenty two, and it's been weighing on
Speaker 3: me because I know, up until that point I was
Speaker 3: getting blood work every six months, as was recommended by
Speaker 3: my oncologist. I got off to moxifen then after eight years,
Speaker 3: and so that's the drug where I do have to
Speaker 3: be monitored very carefully and closely. And so then I
Speaker 3: just kind of took it upon myself to extend how
Speaker 3: long I was going to go back for the next
Speaker 3: blood work, and then all hell broke down.
Speaker 1: You shaid, so good upon yourself. I have that right.
Speaker 2: I made that choice. I made a choice.
Speaker 1: Okay, So August twenty twenty two. The next one you
Speaker 1: should have had would.
Speaker 3: Have been when February twenty twenty two.
Speaker 1: And you didn't have it. I was twenty three, right.
Speaker 3: Sorry, sorry, Yes, February twenty twenty three. We were going
Speaker 3: through our hell, and yes, it was the last thing
Speaker 3: on my mind.
Speaker 1: So your doctor, upon hearing that you have gone a
Speaker 1: year and a half past getting blood work done as
Speaker 1: a breast cancer survivor of ten years now, which is
Speaker 1: I know what, you get a little farther past the date,
Speaker 1: and I think they say it's not as often that
Speaker 1: they are.
Speaker 3: Statistically speaking, it's less likely to come back metastatic.
Speaker 1: Yes, okay, what would your doctor say too.
Speaker 3: That she would tell me to make an appointment for
Speaker 3: my blood work?
Speaker 1: How soon?
Speaker 2: Probably should call when I'm done with this podcast?
Speaker 1: Okay? So why is it as we sit here still
Speaker 1: you have a grin on your face And that's okay.
Speaker 1: I'm not saying you're taking this lightly, but I'm saying,
Speaker 1: why still won't you or haven't you done it? And
Speaker 1: you say you'll do it right after the podcast, I'm
Speaker 1: guessing you won't. But tell me why you're putting it.
Speaker 3: Off, because I think anyone who has survived this knows
Speaker 3: that when you go in for the blood work, it's
Speaker 3: very emotional because you're literally getting they're looking for tumor markers,
Speaker 3: is what they're looking for. So if the cancer were
Speaker 3: to come back in the places you don't want it to,
Speaker 3: with breast cancer, bones, liver, lung's brain, you would think
Speaker 3: that you'd get a blood test that would show a
Speaker 3: tumor marker, which means that you would be facing then
Speaker 3: a terminal yet treatable, but ultimately a terminal cancer. And
Speaker 3: so I think the fear of that you get into
Speaker 3: this mindset I don't want to know. I'd rather not know.
Speaker 3: It's not going to make a difference anyway. You start
Speaker 3: to get in that headspace and maybe it's an excuse
Speaker 3: just not to have to go to the doctor again,
Speaker 3: or go back to the NYU Cancer Center again, or
Speaker 3: just to avoid something that's uncomfortable and scary.
Speaker 1: You're saying, you're saying you as a general thing, like
Speaker 1: the general population. I'm saying you are you telling me
Speaker 1: because I'm telling it from me. Okay, we were talking
Speaker 1: about this early and I was surprised to hear this.
Speaker 1: If you go back in that the blood work you
Speaker 1: get and if you get a bad result, then that
Speaker 1: is essentially you being told this is a terminal now
Speaker 1: illness you're dealing with. Is that correct?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 3: I mean if I had tumor markers that showed that
Speaker 3: it had spread, yes, that my cancer had become what
Speaker 3: we call metastatic stage four. Yes, But I do know
Speaker 3: that there are amazing treatments out there now. They can
Speaker 3: extend your life, they can make your life, you know,
Speaker 3: a lot better than they could have even five years
Speaker 3: ago or ten years ago.
Speaker 2: So there's a lot of.
Speaker 3: Promise, but yes, it would ultimately be right now, it
Speaker 3: would be considered terminal.
Speaker 1: See, I don't know how to get my I've covered
Speaker 1: obviously covered breast cancer. I've known people with breast cancer.
Speaker 1: I'm now in love with somebody who has as a
Speaker 1: breast cancer survivor. But it always bothered me and it
Speaker 1: scares me. Right, And you and I have talked about this,
Speaker 1: and that we have gone through a past almost a
Speaker 1: decade together in a lot of ways, and been through
Speaker 1: a lot as friends. You've seen a lot of hell
Speaker 1: and help save my life in a lot of ways,
Speaker 1: I would argue, and all we went through together to
Speaker 1: this point. And I have to pause sometimes and catch
Speaker 1: myself when we're having the conversation because you do talk
Speaker 1: about it in the way you talk about it, and
Speaker 1: all I'm hearing is that this woman I've gone through
Speaker 1: all this with isn't doing all she can to make
Speaker 1: sure we have as much time together as we can.
Speaker 1: Does that make sense?
Speaker 4: Yes?
Speaker 1: Okay? And that this is your body, this is your struggle,
Speaker 1: this is your what you went through. But for some
Speaker 1: reason I feel bad, or I feel selfish, or I
Speaker 1: feel wrong for having that thought about our relationship.
Speaker 3: Well, I think it's very sweet, and I'm sorry to
Speaker 3: because it is true. I think my mom would feel
Speaker 3: the same way, my dad would feel the same way
Speaker 3: everything you're saying. And so I know, I know they do. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: and I know, and I appreciate that. I know that
Speaker 3: means that you truly love and care for me, and
Speaker 3: I understand where that's coming from. And so yes, it's
Speaker 3: actually I think selfish of me to not go get
Speaker 3: the test, but it just I don't know.
Speaker 1: That's what I was getting at. There, all are produces
Speaker 1: are in here. They were all in it right, tears
Speaker 1: in their eyes, and now they're like, come on.
Speaker 3: Do you know what's interesting is I preach this or
Speaker 3: I have preached this to so many women who this
Speaker 3: is what I'm saying right now is the same mentality
Speaker 3: a lot of women have about not getting mammograms because
Speaker 3: they don't want to know. They don't want to find
Speaker 3: the mask. They don't want to know if they have
Speaker 3: cancer because that's scary and that means it's going to be.
Speaker 2: Difficult.
Speaker 3: And so that you know, ignorance is bliss mentality, as
Speaker 3: stupid as that is and as illogical as that is
Speaker 3: somehow becomes this human trait that I'm now experiencing because
Speaker 3: I've put it off. I've and once you keep putting
Speaker 3: it off, you're like, Oh, this feels so good to
Speaker 3: not have to make a phone call. This feels so
Speaker 3: good to not have to do good a blood test.
Speaker 3: I feel normal. I feel like I never had cancer.
Speaker 3: And that's what I want to feel. And so then
Speaker 3: somehow I want to wish it into existence. But it's
Speaker 3: illogical and dumb.
Speaker 1: Okay, doctor Coleman, I just want you to react to
Speaker 1: what you just heard the back and forth. We're going
Speaker 1: to officially do the right introduction to doctor Elizabeth Cohen
Speaker 1: and on cologist who's in the room with us here now,
Speaker 1: But give us what do you think about that dynamic
Speaker 1: and that back and forth and what the concern for
Speaker 1: a loved one me sitting in this seat with the
Speaker 1: loved one who has gone through what she's gone through.
Speaker 1: Just I would like to hear what you think of
Speaker 1: what you just heard of us from us.
Speaker 5: Well, I have an emotional response, and then I also
Speaker 5: have an academic doctory response. Emotionally, I just want to
Speaker 5: give you both a big hug. There is so much
Speaker 5: love there. There's so much connection, and there's just so
Speaker 5: much deep passion for each other that you both feel.
Speaker 5: And this is just incredibly, incredibly hard stuff. So I
Speaker 5: would first just want to give you both a hug
Speaker 5: and a ton of grace, because clearly you'll nowavigate it
Speaker 5: with a lot of love and a lot of grace.
Speaker 5: From an academic, purely intellectual doctor voice standpoint, tumor markers
Speaker 5: are complicated, and you may be getting them for a
Speaker 5: very specific reason for yourself. It's not historically something that
Speaker 5: we do for all women who are survivors of breast cancer.
Speaker 5: They can sometimes be misleading, They can cause a lot
Speaker 5: of anxiety. It doesn't always mean if you have elevated
Speaker 5: tumor markers that it's necessarily cancer. Lots of things, other
Speaker 5: things can elevate them. So they are very wrought with
Speaker 5: a lot of anxiety when women go, depending on the
Speaker 5: context for those tests. But I also think it's really
Speaker 5: understandable people have a lot of trauma from our healthcare system.
Speaker 5: Women in particular. The idea of going even having to
Speaker 5: show up at a place where you were treated for cancer,
Speaker 5: even if it is for some form of monitoring, can
Speaker 5: be really terrifying. And sometimes you know, if this is
Speaker 5: something that your doctorate suggest did, maybe you make a
Speaker 5: pack to go together.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's funny just you even saying about going back
Speaker 3: into the place where you were diagnosed. It's crazy the
Speaker 3: PTSD you have from walking and thinking you were perfectly
Speaker 3: healthy to realizing that you actually weren't, to think I
Speaker 3: could go in again and this could happen again, and
Speaker 3: it prevents you from doing things maybe that you should
Speaker 3: because you're so traumatized by that moment when it happened,
Speaker 3: when you thought it was impossible. What do you say
Speaker 3: to doctor Elizabeth Coleman, by.
Speaker 4: The way, maybe we should introduce her.
Speaker 3: I mean, she is one of the leading breast oncologists
Speaker 3: here with memorial Sloan Kettering MSK like the gold standard
Speaker 3: of treating people who are battling breast cancer and just
Speaker 3: has been an unbelievable voice and an advocate for breast
Speaker 3: cancer patients. And I love your your advocacy for breast
Speaker 3: cancer research. I know that your passion is my passion,
Speaker 3: and we met. I believe it'd BCRF Breast Cancer Research Foundation,
Speaker 3: but also have ties to five hundred and forty as well.
Speaker 3: Where these are organizations that one of them is to
Speaker 3: helping women get through tough times emotionally and physically, but
Speaker 3: the other is to prevent or to stop this from
Speaker 3: killing women. So I know you've done so much work
Speaker 3: looking for that blood test that actually would let a
Speaker 3: woman know at an early stage that she had breast
Speaker 3: cancer instead of a mammogram. So you are an amazing
Speaker 3: physician that you've saved countless lives. But now you've written
Speaker 3: a book which goes beyond breast cancer, goes beyond cancer,
Speaker 3: and it talks about women's health altogether, and it's all
Speaker 3: in her head. We've all heard that, right, And this
Speaker 3: is something to me that spoke to I think any
Speaker 3: woman who's ever gone into a doctor's office or had
Speaker 3: an issue and second guest herself. There's a reason why
Speaker 3: we doubt our bodies, in doubt what we're feeling and
Speaker 3: think maybe it's nothing, or maybe it's just anxiety, or
Speaker 3: maybe I am emotion and that's what it is.
Speaker 2: Hysterical.
Speaker 3: Right. That's so tell me about why you're a woman,
Speaker 3: you're a physician, Why would you write a book like this?
Speaker 5: Well, a lot of it came from, as you said,
Speaker 5: I've spent my whole career taking care of women, countless women,
Speaker 5: thousands of women, And the book is not about cancer,
Speaker 5: but really what it is like to be a woman
Speaker 5: seeking medical care throughout history. The book is broken down
Speaker 5: by organ system the same way that specialties and are
Speaker 5: created today cardiology, gastroentrology, neurology, and mirrors the fragmentation of
Speaker 5: the body as we learn about it in medical school,
Speaker 5: and walks through history with each of those organ systems.
Speaker 5: But I wrote the book really having been inspired and
Speaker 5: at times heartbroken and other times enraged and horrified by
Speaker 5: the stories that patients were telling me when I met them,
Speaker 5: not about their cancers per se, in some instances dismissed
Speaker 5: for having alan been being told or you're too young
Speaker 5: to have cancer, but in all other aspects of their
Speaker 5: medical care, feeling invalidated or shamed or apologizing for their
Speaker 5: normal bodily functions. And as I became a mother myself
Speaker 5: and a daughter and caring for women in my family,
Speaker 5: I just felt this overwhelming need to work to try
Speaker 5: to change that narrative and be part of a mission
Speaker 5: to improve the health care for women which goes far
Speaker 5: beyond cancer, but in every aspect of our bodies.
Speaker 1: You said, change narrative. It seems on a wider scale,
Speaker 1: when we talk about women's health, it's uh, breast cancer
Speaker 1: and abortion rights, right, and that's the end of the
Speaker 1: On a larger scale, we know there's more, but why
Speaker 1: are we not talking about more when it comes to
Speaker 1: when's he.
Speaker 5: It's a great question because I think that's exactly part
Speaker 5: of the problem. When I was in medical school, I thought,
Speaker 5: you know, women's health was gynecology. And as I've had
Speaker 5: this much longer career taking care of women, the reality
Speaker 5: is we are not small men from head to toe.
Speaker 5: The way we present with diseases is entire It can
Speaker 5: be entirely different. There are female specific and female predominant diseases,
Speaker 5: but yet our healthcare system and the public we've largely
Speaker 5: been reduced to, as you said, our breast and our
Speaker 5: reproductive function. And that's a real problem. I mean, we
Speaker 5: don't recognize as a whole as a society that, for example,
Speaker 5: eighty percent of autoimmune diseases are in women. Much of
Speaker 5: those we don't even have the right names for. We
Speaker 5: don't even know how to have the right blood tests,
Speaker 5: or that Alzheimer's disease is two times more likely in
Speaker 5: women than men, and women are often the ones who
Speaker 5: are the caregivers of our society, So who's caring for
Speaker 5: those women? Or that heart disease is the number one
Speaker 5: killer of women, And yet we are often taught that
Speaker 5: the way women present with symptoms is atypical as compared
Speaker 5: to a man, that we're greater than fifty percent of
Speaker 5: the population, We're not atypical. So all these ways that
Speaker 5: we have myself included thought that women's house with this
Speaker 5: was this very reductionist view of what our bodies are,
Speaker 5: and I want that to change. It has to change.
Speaker 3: Oh, I mean, I think this is so relatable to
Speaker 3: any woman who's gone in with with some issue and
Speaker 3: are so afraid they're not going to be believed even.
Speaker 2: To start off with.
Speaker 3: Have you ever experienced that bias you as a woman,
Speaker 3: you as a patient. Have you ever felt like you
Speaker 3: weren't believed or you were dismissed.
Speaker 5: Absolutely, it's almost embarrassing to say, and I didn't want
Speaker 5: to include it in the book, But when I told
Speaker 5: my editor what had happened to me at the end
Speaker 5: of writing the book, right before I wrote the conclusion,
Speaker 5: she was like, well, how can you not share this?
Speaker 5: And I said, well, here, I am advocating for women's health.
Speaker 5: I have all these resources in the world, and look
Speaker 5: what happened to me. If I couldn't do it. How
Speaker 5: can the average woman do it? Or how can the
Speaker 5: woman with no resources do it? I had had at
Speaker 5: the conclusion of writing this book, I had a very
Speaker 5: small back surgery, and about six weeks later, I developed
Speaker 5: a horrible headache that was worse when I was sitting
Speaker 5: up but somewhat relieved when I was lying down, but
Speaker 5: literally I could not raise my head a millimeter. And
Speaker 5: I had said to a friend, I think that I'm
Speaker 5: leaking spinal fluid from where I had my other surgery,
Speaker 5: and that can happen beca because your spinal fluid is
Speaker 5: encased in almost like a cellophane membrane, and that connects
Speaker 5: to the fluid that's in your brain as well. So
Speaker 5: if that leaks from the back of your spine, you
Speaker 5: have less fluid around your brain, and it can feel
Speaker 5: like your brain's being sucked down your spinal cord, literally
Speaker 5: in a vacuum. It's something that women who have had
Speaker 5: an epidural might experience after childbirth. It's called the spinal headache,
Speaker 5: and so immediately I thought I knew what I had,
Speaker 5: but very long story short, I had several other people
Speaker 5: tell me that it was not that, and instead of
Speaker 5: advocating for myself and believing, well, I know what's wrong
Speaker 5: with me, I spent days and days and days not
Speaker 5: getting the care that I need, not being heard, and
Speaker 5: ultimately being admitted to the hospital with swelling around my brain.
Speaker 1: What I mean, did they do any testing or you
Speaker 1: just said it and they said, now I don't need
Speaker 1: to check for that or what.
Speaker 2: Well.
Speaker 5: I was so embarrassed that my idea seemed so crazy,
Speaker 5: which is what I was initially told. There's no way
Speaker 5: that could happen. You're crazy. It's just like a compressor
Speaker 5: nerve or you just have a head. So in that
Speaker 5: process I didn't even express a part to my friend
Speaker 5: what I thought was going on. So the last time
Speaker 5: the diagnosis was uttered was when I said to my friend,
Speaker 5: who's not a doctor, who's like, I don't know who
Speaker 5: do you?
Speaker 3: You were asking someone who isn't a doctor, and you're
Speaker 3: a doctor. That's so fascinating, Yeah, yes, yes, and so
Speaker 3: relatable by the way, so relatable, and then I had
Speaker 3: several doctors also tell me that I was crazy and
Speaker 3: that's no way it could be that, but it was,
Speaker 3: but it was.
Speaker 1: Are women doctors more prone to listen to women or no?
Speaker 5: So when you look at the data per se, women
Speaker 5: in general listen longer to patients. Women who are operated
Speaker 5: on by women do better. Overall, if a man is
Speaker 5: operated by a woman or by a man, their outcomes
Speaker 5: are the same. Now wow yeah, oh wow, So that's
Speaker 5: the data. That's not to say uniform. That's the case.
Speaker 5: There are amazing male physicians to do a beautiful job
Speaker 5: of listening and are empathic, and then there are female
Speaker 5: physicians that are not. Right. We can't just split this
Speaker 5: along gendered in sex.
Speaker 1: Lineskay, But generally if you're a woman, you're in better
Speaker 1: hands with a woman doctor if.
Speaker 5: You will agitated. But I would like to say is
Speaker 5: that that doesn't have to be that way. We can
Speaker 5: value nurturing, we can value listening, we can value empathy
Speaker 5: from any doctor that shows up. And I think we
Speaker 5: have to bake that back into our system. That's kind
Speaker 5: of sidelined some of those qualities that are really essential
Speaker 5: to being a good doctor and have pressured our system.
Speaker 3: Dramatically, doctor Clem, and I asked, if you had ever
Speaker 3: not been believed, have you ever dismissed a female patient,
Speaker 3: And come to realize, oh wow, she was actually saying
Speaker 3: something that I didn't hear.
Speaker 5: You know, one of the stories in the book, if
Speaker 5: I can be somewhat provocative.
Speaker 2: Was you can go as a safe space.
Speaker 5: Okay, so we're just going to go there. You can
Speaker 5: start giving me hand signals if if it's a bit much.
Speaker 2: Nothings as off limits, okay.
Speaker 5: So I had a woman who isn't She must have
Speaker 5: been in her late seventies, and this amazing photographer and
Speaker 5: artist and just sort of fabulous with big glasses, and
Speaker 5: I love taking care of her. And she had been
Speaker 5: put on in aromatase inhibitor, which, as you know, depletes
Speaker 5: the amount of estrogen. Can cause joint aches, it can
Speaker 5: cause decrease libido, it can cause vaginal dryness, it can
Speaker 5: cause decreased bone density. It can have a lot of
Speaker 5: different side effects. And when I spoke with her, I
Speaker 5: neglected to talk about her sexual health. And one day
Speaker 5: she came in and she said, you know, I'm really
Speaker 5: having some problems with my special friend, and I thought, well,
Speaker 5: this lady lives alone. What is she talking about? And
Speaker 5: I got all excited that I that there was some
Speaker 5: new person, her new special friend. And I said, well,
Speaker 5: you know who's your special friend? And she said, it's
Speaker 5: my vibrator. And you you never talk to me about
Speaker 5: what the hell would happen to me on this aromatase inhibitor.
Speaker 5: And I'm miserable. And so I had dismissed that an
Speaker 5: older woman would want to be sexually vibrant and thriving.
Speaker 5: And she said, that's a real problem. You got to
Speaker 5: think about why you didn't talk to me about that.
Speaker 5: You talked to you about about other women. Why did
Speaker 5: you neglect to think about that with me? My special
Speaker 5: friend is very important to me. And so there have
Speaker 5: been many patients along the way. I am human and
Speaker 5: I have drank the kool aid as well about a
Speaker 5: lot of the legacy that we inherit when we show
Speaker 5: up at the doctor's office, a lot of the bias
Speaker 5: whether we're doctor or as patient. So as much of
Speaker 5: writing this book was not only to help patients, but
Speaker 5: it's the kind of book I wish I had read
Speaker 5: in medical school. And I perfectly not perfectly, but I
Speaker 5: have to humbly own what has happened to me along
Speaker 5: the way and what I have learned.
Speaker 1: I've never heard I heard it put that way to
Speaker 1: where it snaps, and I get it in a better
Speaker 1: way in that you're talking about a woman and yeah,
Speaker 1: a vibrator, right, But you had a bias against this
Speaker 1: woman based on her age. There are so many other
Speaker 1: women that walk in bias based on their education level
Speaker 1: that a doctor we're looking at, Ah, you're not a
Speaker 1: colle educator, so I don't have Or this is because
Speaker 1: of race. Is that what we're talking about, the same thing,
Speaker 1: that example, But that is the way that someone could
Speaker 1: get less healthcare or not get the type of quality
Speaker 1: care they deserve because a doctor like you. And I'm
Speaker 1: not getting onto you, but to that point, just makes
Speaker 1: a simple conclusion based on age, race, or whatever it
Speaker 1: may be.
Speaker 5: And I think it's not always intentional. I show up
Speaker 5: with the good intentions, but part of writing this book
Speaker 5: was to unpack again this legacy that we may not
Speaker 5: even be aware of that we inherited. The book walks
Speaker 5: through history and there are extraordinary examples, going back to
Speaker 5: the Greeks to the Middle ages to the nineteenth century
Speaker 5: that will blow your mind. I guarantee you that medical
Speaker 5: history can be fascinating and engrossing, and those examples are
Speaker 5: obvious where it's like, oh my god, I can't believe
Speaker 5: they did that. What I think becomes more insidious and subtle,
Speaker 5: and even worse is to recognize the ways that we
Speaker 5: don't even realize that we are showing up that way.
Speaker 5: And if we look at our medical system when we
Speaker 5: think about the aging woman, what we learn about so
Speaker 5: much in medical school is women at the age of puberty,
Speaker 5: women and their reproductive function and their reproductive fitness. But
Speaker 5: that woman who goes through menopause is less tended to
Speaker 5: in our medical system. That aging woman who may have
Speaker 5: cognitive decline is less tended to in our medical system.
Speaker 5: And much like medicine doesn't exist in a vacuum, but
Speaker 5: is so inextricably linked to society, we neglect the aging
Speaker 5: woman as a society. So that trickles through into how
Speaker 5: we study women as the age, how we care for
Speaker 5: women as the age, and how we tend to their
Speaker 5: medical problems as the age. And that was very much
Speaker 5: something that clearly I was doing in my practice and
Speaker 5: didn't realize.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 3: I mean, you're a daughter, you have your own daughter,
Speaker 3: you're a woman, you're a self, and yet you know
Speaker 3: we're continuing to perpetuate this. I mean, it actually makes
Speaker 3: me sad. I remember I have a very good friend.
Speaker 3: She was in her sixties and she said to me,
Speaker 3: there's nothing as invisible in this world as a woman
Speaker 3: past menopause, Like people don't even see you. Your value
Speaker 3: goes down significantly. So then what is your advice to
Speaker 3: women of any age to make sure that you're owning
Speaker 3: your own health care and that you're asking the right questions.
Speaker 3: And let me ask you this, as a doctor, is
Speaker 3: the onus on the patient, on the woman?
Speaker 5: I think the onus is really on that doctor patient
Speaker 5: relationship and our society at large, our medical system at large.
Speaker 5: And then, you know, Amy, you talk so much about
Speaker 5: what it means to not just survive, but to thrive,
Speaker 5: And much of writing this book is the idea that
Speaker 5: everybody that we're in has a history, a history we've
Speaker 5: been told by our family, by society, by the healthcare system.
Speaker 5: And my hope is, after reading all of these stories,
Speaker 5: can women tell a different story about themselves? And in
Speaker 5: that can we ask better questions about what it means
Speaker 5: to really have a good day, what it means to
Speaker 5: really find joy, what it really means to thrive. And
Speaker 5: so my hope is that patients will come back to
Speaker 5: the healthcare system, come back to their doctor and say,
Speaker 5: as that woman getting older, you know what I miss
Speaker 5: this or this is what I really value in feeling good.
Speaker 5: It's not just about making sure you get your paps,
Speaker 5: mirror and your colonoscopy. But you know, I really enjoy
Speaker 5: playing piano. But my hands are bothering me. I have
Speaker 5: these joint aches and I don't know what that's about.
Speaker 5: I would like to access that again. Can you help me?
Speaker 5: So I think there's really this two way dynamic that
Speaker 5: we have to create space for. And that's what I'm
Speaker 5: really talking about changing this narrative about women's health moving forward.
Speaker 1: Why is this so hard to cure cancer?
Speaker 5: Oh? Wow, you're really going for it.
Speaker 2: Well I have's let's do it.
Speaker 1: I seem all I feel almost silly asking the questions,
Speaker 1: right because we talk so much about it. It seems
Speaker 1: to be so much money. She always was the thing.
Speaker 2: You say, there's a cure for cancer, it's called cash. Yeah, yes,
Speaker 2: it's a question.
Speaker 5: So I think part of it is the history of
Speaker 5: what we've called cancer. So you know, a leukemia, where
Speaker 5: you have a replication of a blood cell many times over,
Speaker 5: is extremely different from a solid tumor cancer, like where
Speaker 5: you have one cell that multiplies awry in the colon
Speaker 5: or the breast. So again, cancer is just one cell
Speaker 5: in your body, starting in one tissue that starts to
Speaker 5: multiply too much and then develops the ability to invade
Speaker 5: and travel. So that is the basic definition. But when
Speaker 5: we talk about curing cancer, a blood cancer is so
Speaker 5: wildly different than a breast cancer, so wildly different than
Speaker 5: a lung cancer. But yet we've created this like how
Speaker 5: we're going to cure all of cancer. And I think
Speaker 5: it's the reason why it's so complicated is because we've
Speaker 5: used this one name for a very very It's like saying,
Speaker 5: how we're going to cure an infection, right, but a
Speaker 5: skin infection is totally different from a pneumonia. And so
Speaker 5: we have these very, very complicated diseases that are not
Speaker 5: only very unique biologically just in a petri dish, But
Speaker 5: then again we have to think about the hosts that
Speaker 5: they live in. You can have the same biological cancer,
Speaker 5: the same diagnosis in two different women, but how they
Speaker 5: do and how that interacts with their whole body and
Speaker 5: how they experience illness is entirely different. So it's a
Speaker 5: very very very complicated web that you know, you have
Speaker 5: so many people dedicated to working on.
Speaker 3: Do you think that there will be a cure to
Speaker 3: metastatic cancer in your lifetime?
Speaker 5: I hope so, I hope so. I mean, I say
Speaker 5: you believe that, I believe it. I mean I am
Speaker 5: desperate to be out of a job in that way.
Speaker 5: I think we both know the trauma that that really
Speaker 5: far too many women suffer from and have endured, and
Speaker 5: it's it is unacceptable. I think, much like people can
Speaker 5: live with a chronic disease like diabetes or heart disease.
Speaker 5: I think that is a very reasonable that we're already
Speaker 5: doing that. Can we make it all go away? I
Speaker 5: certainly hope so, But I'm not I'm not sure.
Speaker 3: Do you know what you said, I'd be happy to
Speaker 3: be out of a job, you know. And this floored
Speaker 3: me when I started going through this. How many people
Speaker 3: out there do believe that there is a conspiracy within
Speaker 3: the healthcare community to make sure that cancer isn't cured
Speaker 3: because a lot of people, doctors, pharmaceutical companies would be
Speaker 3: put out of business.
Speaker 2: What do you say to that, because I know you've
Speaker 2: heard that before too.
Speaker 5: I have heard that before, and I have a hard
Speaker 5: time not crying when I when I answer that question.
Speaker 5: And I will try to answer it as logically as possible,
Speaker 5: because people may say, well, you're just too low on
Speaker 5: the total pole. You don't know what really goes on
Speaker 5: behind the scenes. But having cared for royalty, having cared
Speaker 5: for people who have seemingly more money than God, who
Speaker 5: could buy out any pharmaceutical company, and you know, hire
Speaker 5: any CIA agent to I, I don't know, uncover some
Speaker 5: secret cure in a corner. It doesn't it doesn't fit right.
Speaker 5: People with all the power in the world world have
Speaker 5: died from cancer. People with all the love and power
Speaker 5: and money who would do anything possible and could have
Speaker 5: still lost love once to cancer. People at pharmaceutical companies
Speaker 5: have died of cancer with all of their power and
Speaker 5: insight into how everything works. It's understandable because it's a horrible,
Speaker 5: horrible disease. And also there's a lot of mistrust, understandably
Speaker 5: in our healthcare system. How could this possibly be? How
Speaker 5: have you not figured it out yet? But yet there
Speaker 5: have been incredible advances from academics, from pharmaceutical companies, from
Speaker 5: government institutions that have really allowed cancer to look incredibly
Speaker 5: different than what it used to when I first started out,
Speaker 5: whether it's immunotherapy, whether it's women living for years and
Speaker 5: years and years with metastatic disease, whether it's some women
Speaker 5: who are getting treatment from metastatic disease and I can't
Speaker 5: see their cancer on their pet skin anymore. We have
Speaker 5: made tremendous advances and I hope will continue to do so.
Speaker 5: And I am sympathetic to this conspiracy theory because it
Speaker 5: is scary and how could this possibly be so hard?
Speaker 5: But it is?
Speaker 1: Was it a king, a queen, the prince, you said,
Speaker 1: royalty that nobody else skipped over? That it's just going
Speaker 1: to slide.
Speaker 5: I think any doctor that brags about who they care
Speaker 5: for is a problem. Right, We don't need to hitch
Speaker 5: our start to anybody.
Speaker 6: They hit me with that, But but I think that
Speaker 6: I say it to say that, you know, whether it's
Speaker 6: high ranking political leaders, royalty, people with billions of dollars,
Speaker 6: I don't even know how much.
Speaker 5: Cancer effects is an equal common denominator to suffering.
Speaker 1: Dude, are we throwing everything at it? Even if right,
Speaker 1: even though it's not a conspiracy? Are we still doing
Speaker 1: all that can be done? Of course, more money is
Speaker 1: always a good thing. But is there a collective enough
Speaker 1: of a of an effort going on out there? Are
Speaker 1: we doing enough to try to cure cancers?
Speaker 5: I think there's never There's never enough because we have
Speaker 5: such a huge problem. I wish that we could inspire
Speaker 5: younger generations to go into cancer, to go into oncology,
Speaker 5: to go into research. There are so many incredible minds
Speaker 5: out there that I sometimes wonder if you weren't developing
Speaker 5: a video game, could you come on board and help
Speaker 5: us out right? Could you think outside the box? What
Speaker 5: are we missing? I'm humble, right, and I think it
Speaker 5: has to start with new and fresh ideas and humble
Speaker 5: ability to really pull together people from various different walks
Speaker 5: of life and different backgrounds. Because one of the problems
Speaker 5: with medical science is you never want to get too comfortable,
Speaker 5: and you never want to be too siloed in your ideas,
Speaker 5: and that means really bringing in people of different interests
Speaker 5: and capacities. So for anybody with kids who are thinking about,
Speaker 5: you know, developing another toy, maybe there's something else we
Speaker 5: could do with that bright.
Speaker 4: Minds, right, I love that, doctor Colemann.
Speaker 3: How many women do you think, I mean, this is
Speaker 3: just give me an idea perspective, have lost their lives
Speaker 3: because they weren't believed.
Speaker 5: I don't obviously, I don't have numbers on that. I
Speaker 5: think there's two different ways that I think about that.
Speaker 5: There's losing their life meaning being alive, but being miserable,
Speaker 5: and I think that is countless. I think countless of
Speaker 5: women have asked questions far too late in life about
Speaker 5: what they really want, how they really want to feel,
Speaker 5: how they can feel better in their bodies, So that
Speaker 5: number is countless. In terms of medical error and people
Speaker 5: feeling invalidated, that's complicated, but I think that also happens
Speaker 5: far too commonly. But the bigger problem of women not
Speaker 5: feeling like they have the runway to access the medical
Speaker 5: that they really want is countless. It's unfortunate that every
Speaker 5: woman says to me, I love your title. I have
Speaker 5: a story for you. Everywhere I go, I have a
Speaker 5: story for you. Let me tell you what happened to me.
Speaker 5: Let me tell you what happened to my mom. Let
Speaker 5: me tell you what happened to my daughter. I don't
Speaker 5: want this title to resonate so much, but yet it
Speaker 5: strikes a chord with every woman I talk.
Speaker 3: To, and it's this whole notion of hysteria. Yeah, talk
Speaker 3: a little bit about if you're a woman and you're
Speaker 3: saying and you're in pain, and maybe there isn't a
Speaker 3: test to say, ah, this auto immune disease, that's what
Speaker 3: you're suffering from it. I know people and so many
Speaker 3: women talk about chronic fatigue, chronic pain, kind of not
Speaker 3: even being able to describe it, coming and going, and
Speaker 3: being too embarrassed to have someone look at you skeptically
Speaker 3: or tell you it's all on your head. They just
Speaker 3: live with it, this whole notion that we're just hysterical
Speaker 3: or we don't have a high pain tolerance. How do
Speaker 3: you combat that?
Speaker 5: It's interesting I just gave a talk to a group
Speaker 5: of young women, probably in their mid to late twenties,
Speaker 5: and I said, I wasn't sure what the answer was
Speaker 5: going to be. How many of you have ever been
Speaker 5: told that you were hysterical? Every single one of them
Speaker 5: raise their hand. If you go back in history, the
Speaker 5: word hysteria derives from the Greek word for womb and Hippocrates,
Speaker 5: and you know where we say the Hippocratic oath had
Speaker 5: all these treaties and there were other doctors that aligned
Speaker 5: with him that basically said, the wandering womb is the
Speaker 5: source of all women's ills. And over course of time,
Speaker 5: obviously we learned that actually it's tethered in place. It's
Speaker 5: not that we have to put certain smells next to
Speaker 5: our nose and other smells next to our vagina to
Speaker 5: reposition the uterus, but that was what they thought we
Speaker 5: should do.
Speaker 2: Throughout history.
Speaker 5: This specter of the ghost of the hysterical woman lingers
Speaker 5: on till today. Whether it was also our ovaries that
Speaker 5: made us crazy or even worse, your bathes and estrogen
Speaker 5: and that's just every cell of your body is completely
Speaker 5: screwed because we're so hormonal. This has infiltrated every aspect
Speaker 5: of our medical care and what we study and what
Speaker 5: we understand. It wasn't until the nineteen eighties that it
Speaker 5: was even removed as medical diagnosis.
Speaker 2: Hysteria, Yeah, was a medical diagnosis.
Speaker 5: Absolutely hysterical. Yeah, nineteen eighties, Well I just got chills?
Speaker 2: What yeah?
Speaker 4: What?
Speaker 5: Yeah? That was an actual diagnosis that you could be
Speaker 5: diagnosed with, But yet it gets translated in different ways.
Speaker 5: And there's also the other component of that women somehow
Speaker 5: endure suffering and that we are meant to endure And
Speaker 5: perhaps that even goes back to original Sin and Adam
Speaker 5: and Eve. We can dissect that. But whether it's women
Speaker 5: in pain or women from fatigue or any sort of ailment,
Speaker 5: there is throughout history this thread of we are just
Speaker 5: suffering too much. And in part it's because in recent years,
Speaker 5: in the last one hundred and fifty years, our medical
Speaker 5: system was created. And I'm not bashing men, but it
Speaker 5: was created not by women and not by listening to women.
Speaker 5: And so if you have female predominant diseases, how were
Speaker 5: those men supposed to understand them unless they really took
Speaker 5: the time to listen to women. And a lot of
Speaker 5: what I'm trying to change now is we have to
Speaker 5: reconfigure this narrative of how we listen to women to
Speaker 5: better understand their symptoms, to not just say, oh, you're
Speaker 5: tired because you know you're a new mom, you're joint
Speaker 5: aches because you didn't sleep well, have a glass of
Speaker 5: wine and relax. It's just you know, or maybe it's
Speaker 5: that time of the month.
Speaker 1: Well, but what do you do with that, because sometimes
Speaker 1: it's a badge of honor for women will say all
Speaker 1: the time, but what they can take, what they can
Speaker 1: endure and have their pain tolerance even higher. You've been
Speaker 1: very arrogant about that at times, with me having the
Speaker 1: same illness or.
Speaker 2: Whatever we call it man flu right, Yes, I think.
Speaker 1: But really that is that that is very pervasive in
Speaker 1: our society that sometimes even women take that as a
Speaker 1: badge of honor, and you're saying you should not.
Speaker 5: No, I think that women also apologize. They apologize for
Speaker 5: their pain, They apologize for needing to take care of themselves.
Speaker 5: They apologize for having to call out sick when they're
Speaker 5: you know, got a fear or one hundred and four.
Speaker 5: I think we need to have pacts with each other
Speaker 5: to stop apologizing, to say you don't need to be
Speaker 5: in this much pain, let me help you. And that
Speaker 5: takes that takes village because sometimes it's hard for women
Speaker 5: to do that by themselves.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you write about and this one really struck me
Speaker 3: about some of the patients who've apologized to you, and
Speaker 3: why they were apologizing to you.
Speaker 5: Yeah, so the opening of the book is a woman
Speaker 5: who apologizes to me on her deathbed for sweating. Not
Speaker 5: the first nor the last woman to apologize. Every day
Speaker 5: in my clinic, women apologize to me for basic functions,
Speaker 5: whether it's I forgot to shave the hair under my
Speaker 5: armpit or I'm having a hot flash. I'm so sorry,
Speaker 5: you just gave me really scary news about my pet scan.
Speaker 5: I'm sorry now that you're examining me that I'm sweating.
Speaker 5: Why is that? It's unacceptable and it really holds women
Speaker 5: back from actually having the space and the comfort to
Speaker 5: access what's really scaring them, as opposed to apologizing to
Speaker 5: the authority in front of them.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm reacting to that because of you, Rotes
Speaker 1: that this wasn't on goodness. So many times if I
Speaker 1: end up at NYU with you over the past year
Speaker 1: and a half or a couple of times, the reason
Speaker 1: of the other but one of them was doctor Coleman
Speaker 1: was your case. He was your on collegist telling you
Speaker 1: to get in that saw something she didn't like on
Speaker 1: you know what I'm talking about.
Speaker 3: Here right, Well, it was it was my obgyn because
Speaker 3: my tamoksovin uterus and she saw I did not take
Speaker 3: care of what was happening with my uterus, and I
Speaker 3: let it go a year and things had grown, and
Speaker 3: there was concern that now there could be potentially uterine
Speaker 3: ca cancer or some polyps that were developing that weren't healthier. Good.
Speaker 1: Well, this was full doctor comba. This was full freak
Speaker 1: out mode, right. And again we hadn't gone in yet,
Speaker 1: but this was it had gone a week or two
Speaker 1: weeks and the doctor was onner about going in and
Speaker 1: another situation to where she just didn't want to know, right,
Speaker 1: didn't want to know. But we go to this appointment
Speaker 1: and you made me think of it. In the story
Speaker 1: you were just telling. Is that we're sitting I'm sitting
Speaker 1: there with her. She's got the gown on. The woman
Speaker 1: is doing the ultrasound right right right. She was looking
Speaker 1: for the ores right right, all right, and she couldn't
Speaker 1: find the second right, she couldn't find one. Am I
Speaker 1: over it? This was the thing she during this exam.
Speaker 1: I'm watching her. She's not asking questions, She's not wondering
Speaker 1: or what's going on? Or is there an issue or
Speaker 1: where is it or what can I do?
Speaker 2: Nothing?
Speaker 1: To the point I felt like like this isn't my party,
Speaker 1: but hey, I got a question. To the point, I
Speaker 1: did more talking in her exam than she did. It's
Speaker 1: called fear, and that was bizarre. But to your point,
Speaker 1: there even looking and we walked out of there not
Speaker 1: having a resolution or feeling better because she couldn't find
Speaker 1: something on the scan right, And so you making the
Speaker 1: example of telling the point about being believed or speaking
Speaker 1: up or apologizing almost for the tech not being able
Speaker 1: to find her over like, I'm sorry, am I Over
Speaker 1: is tucked in there. I don't know where it is.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure where it is.
Speaker 1: That was bizarre to me, but that sounds like it's
Speaker 1: normal to you. That's a normal thing.
Speaker 5: Well, I also think when you're so anxious and you
Speaker 5: said fear, when you're so fearful, you're in fight or
Speaker 5: flight in mode and you just want to exist in
Speaker 5: that moment any way you possibly can. But how lucky
Speaker 5: she was to have you there, because we all need
Speaker 5: an ally, we all need no matter I don't care
Speaker 5: how smart you are, how empowered you are, what an
Speaker 5: advocate you are, everybody needs someone with them when they're terrified,
Speaker 5: to help ask those questions, to help for reassurance, to
Speaker 5: make sure you have another set of eyes and ears
Speaker 5: with questions and answers, to say, you know what that
Speaker 5: wasn't answered, Can we try that again?
Speaker 1: You know, when she puts it that way, I felt rude.
Speaker 1: I didn't want to speak up. But when you say
Speaker 1: it that way, you need to be there to support
Speaker 1: somebody who is who has fear, who is feeling fear.
Speaker 1: That's a good way to put it.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And especially sometimes when someone's this strong woman who
Speaker 5: can articulate and is really powerful and informed, that doesn't
Speaker 5: mean that you don't need somebody there with you and
Speaker 5: your side. And I tell patients all the time, you know,
Speaker 5: our healthcare system is hard to add, it's hard to navigate,
Speaker 5: it's hard to advocate for yourself sometimes, so having somebody
Speaker 5: there with you who can bring a set of questions
Speaker 5: is really important. It's also essential to know how you're
Speaker 5: going to get information right because we have my chart
Speaker 5: right now speaking of fear, where a lot of patients
Speaker 5: can get information before your doctors.
Speaker 3: I can read labs and think I don't want this information.
Speaker 3: I don't know what to do with it, and it
Speaker 3: looks scary, and I don't like my brother. I'm lucky
Speaker 3: as a physician, and early on when I was getting
Speaker 3: some of this stuff, I would just send it to
Speaker 3: him and say, please tell me what this means. I
Speaker 3: don't know what any of this means. So there is
Speaker 3: this information without any explanation, and I certainly don't have
Speaker 3: an MD. So yeah, you can go into a tailspin.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's really important to speak to your care team
Speaker 5: about how you want to get information, because that type
Speaker 5: of information without context is not compassionate or thoughtful care.
Speaker 5: It's just terrifying rabbit hole Google like nightmare, right, And
Speaker 5: we wouldn't google how to fly a plane and then
Speaker 5: try to do it, but yet it's like we're given
Speaker 5: some instructional manual and then it's terrifying. But that's the
Speaker 5: nature of much of our healthcare system right now, and
Speaker 5: you have to be careful about how you want that
Speaker 5: information and who's going to communicate with you.
Speaker 1: To be clear, you would recommend people do not start
Speaker 1: googling if you have a medical issue.
Speaker 5: No, but we all do. I do the same thing
Speaker 5: to you, right, so I think.
Speaker 2: How you do it too? Of course I love that, okay, but.
Speaker 5: We all need it.
Speaker 2: We all need it.
Speaker 5: I have like three in the morning, it's the worst time. Right,
Speaker 5: we're a I don't know everything everything. It's I'm just
Speaker 5: I'm human, I'm mayor myself right, But I think knowing
Speaker 5: how who should you call in your your doctor may
Speaker 5: not be available. Is there a nurse, Is there a
Speaker 5: nurse practitioner? Is there someone that can schedule an appointment
Speaker 5: with you? Really knowing how your doctor's office works, so
Speaker 5: that you can kind of have these landmarks when things
Speaker 5: start to spiral.
Speaker 3: I also love something that you wrote about in this
Speaker 3: book because my brother gave me permission to do this.
Speaker 3: And I say permission because it is one of those
Speaker 3: weird things. It doesn't matter what you do in your life,
Speaker 3: who you are as a woman, maybe how outspoken you'd
Speaker 3: be when you're talking about someone else, but somehow, some way,
Speaker 3: when it's you and it's your health care or it's
Speaker 3: your concern, I know that I tend to feel like
Speaker 3: I just have to look up to the doctor as
Speaker 3: God and I don't know anything and they know everything.
Speaker 3: And my brother was always so quick to say amy
Speaker 3: second opinions, third opinions, and if you don't like how
Speaker 3: someone's talking to you or treating you, by all means,
Speaker 3: get another doctor. And you said the same thing, and
Speaker 3: that was like I needed him to be able to
Speaker 3: say that to me for me to feel like I
Speaker 3: could because when you don't know, and you know you
Speaker 3: don't know, you think, well, that other person's got to
Speaker 3: be telling me the truth.
Speaker 5: And you want to see a doctor who's comfortable with
Speaker 5: you get a second opinion too, Right, I'm thrilled if
Speaker 5: patients are worried and want another set of eyes, go
Speaker 5: for it, you said earlier in the conversation. You know
Speaker 5: what you know, right, I know what I know and
Speaker 5: i know what I don't know, and I'm humble enough
Speaker 5: in that. And if someone feels that they need to
Speaker 5: speak with somebody else or want me to partner with
Speaker 5: somebody else, I'm delighted to do that.
Speaker 1: Okay, that's probably be a warning sign if your doctor
Speaker 1: doesn't want you to get a second opinion or gets
Speaker 1: an attitude about you getting a second opinion.
Speaker 5: But that happens all the time. Wow, Yeah, what was.
Speaker 1: The doctor you were just saying? They they found they almost.
Speaker 2: Got on to you, like what you didn't feel that,
Speaker 2: so I had the This was tough.
Speaker 3: The day I was diagnosed with breast cancer, the radiologist
Speaker 3: who was reading my sonogram in that moment obviously saw
Speaker 3: one of the masses and she took my hand and
Speaker 3: took my two fingers and put it up on the
Speaker 3: side of my breast, right underneath my armpit where the
Speaker 3: mass was, and she said.
Speaker 2: You didn't feel that. Let me just tell you.
Speaker 3: If there was a way for me to feel worse
Speaker 3: in that moment, she found it. And I remember feeling shame.
Speaker 3: Here I am being diagnosed with cancer, and now I'm
Speaker 3: ashamed that I didn't do brest self examinations. And so
Speaker 3: that was one of those moments where it's just I'm
Speaker 3: sure there wasn't an intention to be mean, but it
Speaker 3: was like, to feel shameful about your cancer was a
Speaker 3: whole new level for me in that moment.
Speaker 5: It's horrible. I'm so sorry that happened to you. And also,
Speaker 5: I think women feel shame about their bodies even for
Speaker 5: their normal bodily functions, let alone when they have a
Speaker 5: cancer diagnosis, and that pervasive shame absolutely gets in the
Speaker 5: way of every aspect of women's healthcare.
Speaker 3: I'm sorry, well, thank you for that, And it was
Speaker 3: a lesson. It was just an experience to learn from
Speaker 3: and grow from you. In that same vein, I was
Speaker 3: saying this to TJ when we were looking at your book.
Speaker 3: The Latin name for or female genitalia is.
Speaker 5: What opeduendum that area to be ashamed.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it literally means that. Can you explain, because I
Speaker 3: was my jaw drop when I read this.
Speaker 5: Well, there's all sorts of language, and language is become
Speaker 5: so important with respect to the subtle cues that we
Speaker 5: give women, and they're not so subtle cues, but in
Speaker 5: multiple different ways, we are taught to shame or ignore
Speaker 5: parts of our bodies. If you look at the clitterists
Speaker 5: throughout anatomical history, it is lost and found and men
Speaker 5: who claim to find it as if women didn't know
Speaker 5: where it was. How is that possible? In the Renaissance,
Speaker 5: the debate between these anatomus was just simply mind boggling, like, honey,
Speaker 5: I don't think you found.
Speaker 2: It, but that's great if you have to ask, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5: And then men claiming to have the name for it.
Speaker 5: But then in Gray's Anatomy in the nineteen forties, it
Speaker 5: wasn't even included in there. So it took till two
Speaker 5: thousand and five for a female urologist to even map
Speaker 5: the actual anatomy of the clitorists. So that's a problem
Speaker 5: Ian and five to use MRI imaging to actually map
Speaker 5: the full nerve anatomy. And we wonder why there's an
Speaker 5: orgasm gap, and it's never talked about or discussed. But
Speaker 5: here we are, yes, well, we all.
Speaker 3: Have daughters, and you know it is something that needs
Speaker 3: to be talked about. It's an important part of being
Speaker 3: a woman, and so many women miss out on it
Speaker 3: because it's shameful or not to be discussed right.
Speaker 5: Well, one of the themes throughout the book is how
Speaker 5: much woven into medical history and medical discovery and medical
Speaker 5: care for women, the fear of women's sexual desire, desire,
Speaker 5: and or the need to control it infiltrated every aspect
Speaker 5: of medicine. Whether you could ride a bike or not,
Speaker 5: whether your scoliosis was caused from somehow masturbation, whether your
Speaker 5: asthma was to blame for some sort of sexual habit.
Speaker 5: Throughout history this is pervasive. And then when we think
Speaker 5: about the legacy today, why are we two times more likely?
Speaker 5: Why did I have that bias towards my older patient.
Speaker 5: Why are we two times more likely to ask men
Speaker 5: about sexual side effects from a chemotherapy, asian or cancer
Speaker 5: targeted therapy than we are men. There are so many
Speaker 5: ways that we have lagged behind in addressing women's sexual
Speaker 5: health and medicine, and we are still playing ketchup generally.
Speaker 1: Look, you're going to continue your work no matter who's
Speaker 1: in Congress and who's in the White House, but in
Speaker 1: your community, and I'm not asking you to play politics
Speaker 1: or pick candidates or anything like that, But do you
Speaker 1: will have a concern during a political cycle that what
Speaker 1: happens in DC and what happens and who is in
Speaker 1: the White House will have an impact on women's health
Speaker 1: as a whole. Again, we only end up talking about
Speaker 1: abortion rights so often, but IVF is obviously being talked
Speaker 1: about a lot in South But do you all in
Speaker 1: your community have that concern in an election year of
Speaker 1: the future of women's health over the next couple of
Speaker 1: years or election cycle based on who's there.
Speaker 5: Politics dictate the type of care women can rest, both
Speaker 5: by legislature but also by funding right and we see
Speaker 5: how this is dramatically affected women's access to quality care
Speaker 5: in recent years. I think many of us are very,
Speaker 5: very very scared. Throughout history, so much of women's bodies
Speaker 5: have been seen as vessels and that is the priority,
Speaker 5: and I am very much politically aligned against that.
Speaker 1: Where So you said it does matter, what are your
Speaker 1: concerns going into this election cycle.
Speaker 5: Then, I'm concerned about so many different things about funding
Speaker 5: for women's health. I'm concerned about women's access to reproductive health.
Speaker 5: I'm concerned about women's ability, as we know the ruling
Speaker 5: in Alabama, their ability to have a family. So many
Speaker 5: of my patients were able to have families despite a
Speaker 5: cancer diagnosis because they had access to quality IVF, because
Speaker 5: we could move quickly in a matter of days to
Speaker 5: preserve their fertility. And to think that that would be
Speaker 5: harmed or taken away from them as the exact opposite
Speaker 5: of helping and thrive.
Speaker 1: We often have these debates about it appears to be
Speaker 1: old white women telling old white men, excuse me, and
Speaker 1: Washington telling women what they can do with their bodies.
Speaker 1: But there are a lot of women who voted for
Speaker 1: these old white men. There are a lot of women
Speaker 1: who are still engaged in this and could be impacted
Speaker 1: by the conversation we're having and about women's health. How
Speaker 1: do we are you all? I guess it's up to
Speaker 1: all of us, But how where do you see the
Speaker 1: conversation happening with women and mobilizing women more so as
Speaker 1: almost I mean, not a one issue group obviously, but
Speaker 1: to vote more for their own health.
Speaker 5: I think it's so important. I think you know, yes,
Speaker 5: I've wrote this book and I have this more public
Speaker 5: platform to speak about women's health. But where all of
Speaker 5: this started are the private stories that patients have told me.
Speaker 5: Democrat or Republican, it doesn't matter. Women have suffered from
Speaker 5: not feeling like their needs were heard, whether it's a
Speaker 5: political or religious or medical standpoint. And I think more
Speaker 5: women need to share their stories because some of these
Speaker 5: women that may have voted one way may be voting
Speaker 5: because their husbands have voted a certain way. They don't
Speaker 5: feel like they have as much agency, They feel like
Speaker 5: they have to align with people in their community. But
Speaker 5: then in very private settings say I'm terrified I voted
Speaker 5: this way, but I'm terrified. I'm terrified for myself and
Speaker 5: I'm terrified for my daughter. And the more we can have,
Speaker 5: at least alliances about what we're really feeling and what
Speaker 5: we're really afraid of. Then perhaps when we go into
Speaker 5: that private voting booth, we can have our own mindset.
Speaker 3: That was so well said, because until something happens to
Speaker 3: you or to someone you love, you can think you
Speaker 3: think one way. But then when you don't share your
Speaker 3: stories and you don't share your experiences. I'm a huge
Speaker 3: advocate in the power of one voice. I love that
Speaker 3: final bit of advice for women to share their stories,
Speaker 3: to speak up, to have an advocate, you know, even
Speaker 3: those of us who want to feel like we're strong,
Speaker 3: And I love.
Speaker 2: To having you. TJ makes fun of me. He says,
Speaker 2: I'm like Amy always.
Speaker 3: Okay, I don't want know who wants to be weak,
Speaker 3: who wants to be physically or emotionally weak in any way.
Speaker 3: But it's when we let our guards down and we
Speaker 3: actually are open and vulnerable, be willing to have someone
Speaker 3: there by your side with you to speak for you
Speaker 3: when you can't because it's gonna happen and it's okay,
Speaker 3: and just admitting all of that and having real, honest conversations.
Speaker 3: I love this book. It was long overdue, and yes,
Speaker 3: it's sad that that title resonates so much, but it
Speaker 3: does so many women have felt that way, and until
Speaker 3: we start being honest about that, that's how we start
Speaker 3: to change things. But thank you as always for everything
Speaker 3: you do, for the patients you serve, for the people
Speaker 3: you inspire, and for the work that you continue to do.
Speaker 3: And I know our paths will continue to cross as
Speaker 3: we both advocate for better research, better funding, and finally
Speaker 3: finding a way to have cancer.
Speaker 5: Thank you for sharing in the mission. I appreciate you both.
Speaker 1: And again, folks, the book is called All in Her Head,
Speaker 1: The Truth in lies early medicine taught us about women's
Speaker 1: bodies and why it matters today, by doctor Elizabeth Coleman.
Speaker 1: The book is available everywhere that books are soul. We
Speaker 1: appreciate you listening as always. You can find Rogues and
Speaker 1: I of course on individual Instagram accounts, but you can
Speaker 1: also find the show at Amy and TJ the podcast