Latest / The Voice: Breaking, Believing, Becoming / So This Is Being A Woman? : A Conversation About Everything Nobody Warned Us About

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So This Is Being A Woman? : A Conversation About Everything Nobody Warned Us About · The Voice: Breaking, Believing, Becoming

0:11
Welcome to The Voice, where Breaking, Believing, and Becoming finally have somewhere to be heard.
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I'm Kim Munoz, and I'm so happy you're here.
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Today, ladies, this one's for us. Gentlemen, welcome.
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You're about to hear things you probably never thought about,
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and by the end of this episode, I hope you'll have a whole new appreciation
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for the women in your life.
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Because I don't want to hear another man complain about having the man flu until
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we discuss literally everything women have to deal with.
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We menstruate, we ovulate, we get cramps, we grow humans, we push them out,
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we have major abdominal surgery to get them out, we breastfeed,
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we leak, we sweat, we have hot flashes.
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Our hormones throw surprise parties every month.
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And somewhere in between, our body wakes up one morning and says,
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you know what today needs?
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Yeast infection or, equally awful, a bladder infection.
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Ma'am, we were already busy. There's a quote that's floated around the internet
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for years, usually credited to Betty White, although nobody really knows if
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she actually said it. It goes something like this.
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People say, grow some balls. Balls are weak and sensitive. If you really want
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to be tough, grow a vagina.
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Those things can take a pound and.
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Whether Betty White said it or not, whoever did clearly understood the assignment.
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Because I would just like to know whose idea was it to put the amusement park,
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the construction zone, the chemical factory, the crime scene,
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and the miracle of life all in the exact same neighborhood?
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It seems like poor planning to me.
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Women deserve some sort of Lifetime Achievement Award just for making it through puberty.
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Because from the moment we're about 12 years old, our bodies basically become a full-time job.
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Nobody prepares you. One day you're riding your bike, playing outside,
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living your best little kid life.
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The next day someone hands you a box of pads and says, congratulations,
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congratulations for what?
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Nobody explained this. They just expected us to walk back into math class like nothing had happened.
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Looking back now, it's funny. At the time, I was convinced I was dying.
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Then you realize this isn't a one-time thing. No, it's a subscription,
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a monthly subscription that lasts for about 40 years without ever asking if you'd like to enroll.
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Every month, our uterus apparently redecorates.
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And if no baby's moving in, it tears everything down and starts over every single month.
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Who designed this? And can we please discuss the timing?
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Vacation, period. Beach day, period. Wedding, period.
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White pants, absolutely. It's almost like your uterus checks your calendar and
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says, oh, this looks important. Let's make it memorable.
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Then there are the hormones. Women's hormones don't believe in consistency.
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They believe in plot twists. One minute you're crying because a golden retriever wagged his tail.
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Five minutes later, you're irrationally angry because someone loaded the dishwasher wrong.
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And somehow, both emotions feel completely justified.
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Men say, I just don't understand women. Gentlemen, neither do we.
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We're leaning in and learning in real time.
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Every morning, we wake up wondering, who's driving today? Estrogen?
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Regesterone? Ovulation? Or complete chaos?
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Our bodies don't send calendar invites. They don't even send warning texts.
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They just wake up and announce, today's the day.
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The day to cry over a dog food commercial. The day every bra you own suddenly becomes offensive.
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Nobody knows, not even us.
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I think there should be a support group called Things Men Have Never Had to
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Google, like, can period cramps actually kill you?
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Can hormones make me hate everyone for 48 hours? Is this perimenopause,
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or have I simply lost my mind?
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And my personal favorite, why
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do I suddenly have one chin hair with the confidence of a redwood tree?
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Seriously, that thing wasn't there this morning Now it's long enough to braid
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And we've only made it through hormones We haven't even talked about yeast infections,
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bladder infections, pregnancy, childbirth, or menopause,
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Ladies, how are we doing?
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Gentlemen, are you still with me? Good, because we're just getting started.
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Let's talk about yeast infections Because somehow we're expected to casually
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carry on with life life, while feeling like our own body completely betrayed
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us, every woman has had that moment where she thinks, seriously?
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Now? This is what we're doing today?
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And the craziest part, you still got to work. Run errands, pick up the kids,
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smile at people, pretend everything is perfectly normal.
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Women deserve Academy Awards because we'll be standing in the line at Target,
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smiling politely while internally thinking, I'm pretty sure there's an entire
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loaf of sourdough bread rising between my legs.
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And bladder infections, those don't just make you uncomfortable.
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They make you feel like you're standing on death's door.
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Suddenly, you're a medical researcher. You're drinking cranberry juice like it's a prescription.
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You're Googling symptoms every 30 minutes. You're bargaining with Jesus.
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Lord, if you just get me through this, I'll drink more water, I promise.
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Every trip to the bathroom becomes an emotional event. Meanwhile,
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you're still answering emails, acting like everything's perfectly fine,
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while wondering if this is how the story ends.
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Then somewhere along the way, people start asking, so, when are you going to have a baby?
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Like it's the most casual question in the world.
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Sure, let's grow another human inside our body for nine months.
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Then when they're fully cooked, we'll either push them out or have major abdominal
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surgery to get them out. No big deal.
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When you really stop and think about it, we're growing eyeballs,
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tiny fingers, a heartbeat inside our bodies.
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If that's not a miracle, I don't know what is.
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I remember being pregnant with my first son, and then later with my twins.
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With every pregnancy, I was sick as a dog. Meanwhile, I'd meet these women who
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absolutely loved being pregnant.
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I just loved being pregnant, and I'd have to remind myself, assault is illegal.
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Because I didn't share that experience, there was no magical pregnancy glow.
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I looked more like I was fighting for my life.
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Then I found out I was having twins, and people would say, oh,
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twins, how exciting. I always wanted twins.
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And they were right. It was exciting.
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I felt incredibly blessed. It was also one of the scariest, most uncomfortable,
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body-changing, and most isolating seasons of my life.
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And I think motherhood teaches you very quickly that two things can be true at once.
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You can feel incredibly blessed and incredibly overwhelmed. You can be filled
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with love and completely exhausted.
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Joy and struggle can occupy the very same season.
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And let's just be honest, if men had to have babies, they'd call in sick the
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moment they got that first Braxton Hicks contraction.
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Forget nine months. By month three, there'd be a national emergency,
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congressional hearings, support groups, a federal holiday, a Netflix documentary.
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The nightly news would have a countdown clock. Day 147, he's still pregnant.
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Can you imagine labor? Men don't get a little stomach bug.
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They get the man flu, a slight fever, a little congestion, and suddenly it's
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like, tell my family I love them.
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If childbirth had been left to men, I think the human race would have ended after Adam.
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There would have been one kid, and Adam would have looked at Eve and said,
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Yep, we're not doing that again.
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I'm also convinced God designed women with a selected memory,
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because somewhere between childbirth and that baby's first birthday,
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your brain starts whispering, You could do this again.
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Excuse me, did we forget what just happened?
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And then the baby comes. Everyone comes to see the baby, which they should. Babies are adorable.
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But meanwhile, mom's sitting there thinking, can someone check on me for a second?
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Nobody really prepares you for postpartum. Your hormones are everywhere. You're exhausted.
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Your body's healing. You're learning how to breastfeed. You're wondering if
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you'll ever sleep again.
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And as if that wasn't enough, you've got these new little house guests called
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hemorrhoids that absolutely should not have been invited, yet somehow they've moved in.
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At this point, you're thinking, can my body please stop adding new characters to the story?
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Then someone looks at you and asks, so when are you going to have another one? Excuse me?
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I'm still trying to recover from this one, and at that point,
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you're so sleep-deprived and delirious, you don't even know they're asking about
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another baby or another hemorrhoid.
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Either way, the answer is no.
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And if you think all of that sounds exhausting, just wait, because eventually,
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your body looks at everything you've finally figured out, smiles, and says, that's cute.
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Now let's change all of it.
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Ladies, let's talk about menopause, because nobody, absolutely nobody,
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warned us about this part.
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It's like your hormones quietly pack up in the middle of the night and leave
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without saying goodbye.
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The nerve. And somehow, they take your memory with them.
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One day, you're sleeping through the night. The next, you're awake at 3.17 in
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the morning for absolutely no
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reason, wondering, have I always had that mole? Did I answer that email?
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Why don't I walk into the kitchen?
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Then there are the hot flashes. One minute, you're freezing 30 seconds later.
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You're literally combusting. You're standing in the freezer aisle at Costco
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thinking, I live here now.
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And the brain fog, you walk into a room with complete confidence,
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only to realize you have absolutely no idea why you're there.
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So you walk back into the room you just left, hoping your memory followed you. Usually, it doesn't.
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Now, I will say, bioidentical hormone replacement has been a real gift for me.
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It helped ease me into this season much more gently, and I'm incredibly grateful for that.
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But apparently, there's some fine print, because nobody tells you your body
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starts relocating hair.
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The hair on top of your head, it starts getting thinner, like angel hair pasta thin.
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Meanwhile, your chin says, don't worry, I got this.
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How is that a fair trade? Hair leaves one place I actually want it and relocates to my face.
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And there's always that one chin hair. You check the mirror in the morning, nothing.
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Then you get in the car. The sunlight hits it just right, and suddenly, there it is.
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As long as that thing is there, I'm wondering, how long has it been there?
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Was it waving at people? Did it vote?
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And while we're talking about things nobody warned us about,
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can we discuss mammograms?
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I mean, whose idea was it to take one of God's most delicate creations,
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Put it between two freezing cold plates and call that preventative care.
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The technician always says, just relax. Relax?
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I physically cannot.
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And remember when I said postpartum? Kept introducing new characters.
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Well, menopause apparently invited the entire cast.
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Hot flashes, brain fog, hair thinning, random chin hairs, sleep that disappears without notice.
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At this point my body feels less like a body and more like it's updating software
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without asking my permission.
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And meanwhile, men wake up basically the same person they were yesterday.
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Then one of them looks at us and says, I just don't understand women.
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Gentlemen, neither do we. We're figuring it out one hot flash at a time.
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But the more I worked on this episode, the more I realized something.
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This isn't really about periods or yeast infections or pregnancy or menopause.
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Those are just the stories. What this episode is really about is what women learn to carry.
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Our bodies change over and over and over again.
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Puberty, periods, pregnancy for some, postpartum, perimenopause, menopause.
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And with every new season, we adapt.
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Sometimes gracefully, sometimes crying, sometimes laughing, and sometimes eating
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an entire sleep of Oreos and calling it self-care.
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But we adapt. And maybe that's the story we don't tell enough.
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Not everything women endure, but how often we keep showing up while we're enduring it.
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For our families, friends, our work, the people we love.
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Sometimes, even when we barely recognize ourselves.
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Writing this episode made me look at my own body a little differently,
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because I've spent plenty of time noticing everything it doesn't do like it used to.
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The wrinkles, the gray hair, the metabolism that quietly packed its bags and
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moved away, the thinning hair on my head, and the chin hair that apparently
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thinks it's been promoted.
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But what if, instead of only noticing what's changing, I thanked my body for
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everything it's carried me through?
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This body carried three beautiful children. It carried me through heartbreak,
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healing, stress, joy, seasons I wasn't sure I'd make it through.
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It has healed with me, adapted with me, and somehow it's still here.
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Maybe our bodies aren't the enemy. Maybe they're the evidence,
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evidence of a life that's been lived, of prayers that have been answered,
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of battles we've survived, of the fact that we're still here.
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I believe God knew exactly what He was doing when He created women,
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not because our lives would be easier, but because He created us with an incredible
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capacity to adapt, to nurture, to persevere, to begin again.
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Every season asks something different of us.
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Puberty asks us to grow Motherhood, for those who experience it,
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asks us to give Menopause asks us to let go And every season invites us to become someone new,
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Maybe becoming isn't just something that happens to our hearts Maybe it happens in our bodies too.
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Before we go, I want to say something to every woman listening.
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The next time you find yourself frustrated with your body, pause before you
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criticize it and thank it.
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Thank it for every mile it's carried you, every scar, every stretch mark,
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every gray hair, every wrinkle, every season.
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Because maybe those things aren't evidence that your body has failed you.
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Maybe there are evidence that it has faithfully stayed with you through every
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chapter of your life, and that's something worth celebrating.
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And gentlemen, if you've listened this far, thank you. You must be one of the
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good ones, and you know where to find me.
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You now know more about the female body than you probably planned to today.
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So the next time the woman in your life says, I don't feel good today,
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do not ask, is it your hormones?
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Do not ask, is it that time of the month?
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Just bring the chocolate, offer a hug, do the dishes, and if she says,
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I'm fine, I want you to proceed carefully, very, very carefully.
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Thank you for spending this time with me today. I hope we laugh together.
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I hope every man listening leaves with a little more appreciation for the woman in his life.
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And I hope every woman listening leaves with a little more appreciation for
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the body that's carried her this far.
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Because it may not always cooperate, but look at everything it's carried you through so far.
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Until next time, keep listening to that still small voice, the one that's sometimes breaking,
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always believing, and reminding you that even through every changing season, you're still becoming.