Empowering Our Girls: Being Part of the #MeToo Solution

Recently, a memory of an experience I had made me think about how we can empower our girls and young women in a culture that is wrought with many obstacles to do so. A number of years ago I saw a new male doctor for some medical issues I was experiencing. He was warm and friendly, but instead of putting me at ease, something didn’t feel right. In his brief exam (with my clothes on) he lingered in a way that gave me an uncomfortable gut feeling. He asked me questions about my sex life that seemed irrelevant to my issues. He sat unusually close to me and gave me a hug when I left, which no other doctor had ever done. I began to question my own experience. Am I giving off some signals to bring this on? Maybe I’m crazy — this is all in my head, I’m just imagining this. He is just being friendly and concerned. He is a reputable doctor, so it must be me. Despite my better judgment I continued to see him on several more occasions, and on each time I felt a similar gut feeling of something not being quite right. It was not until years later, when I found out that he had lost his medical license (for undisclosed reasons) that I felt some validity for my own gut feeling of something not being right after all. This situation was a relatively minor one in comparison to some of the far more severe issues that girls and women face on a daily basis in a culture that has historically disempowered women. But as the memory of it surfaced recently, I began thinking a lot about my t...
Source: World of Psychology - Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Tags: Men's Issues Mindfulness Minding the Media Peer Support Personal Policy and Advocacy Sexuality Trauma Violence and Aggression Women's Issues #MeToo abuse of power Body Image Empowerment Rape Respect Sexual Abuse Sexual As Source Type: blogs