THE OTHER HALF, Part 1: Hysteria and the Socially Constructed Woman

Is Western medicine designed for women?In Part 1 of The Other Half of Healthcare, we’re starting at the beginning—or at least, thousands of years ago—with hysteria.For centuries, women’s bodies, symptoms, emotions, sexuality, and behavior were interpreted through ideas about what a woman was and what she was supposed to be. From the wandering womb to witchcraft, lobotomies, and Valium, the diagnosis of hysteria changed over time—but the assumptions surrounding women are worth examining.How did those ideas shape women’s healthcare? What happens when the people being treated don’t have a seat at the table where medical knowledge is being created? And when an explicit belief disappears, can pieces of it survive through social norms, medical assumptions, or implicit bias?This episode explores the history of hysteria and the socially constructed woman—not to tell you what to think, but to ask how we got here and whether any of that history still matters today.This is only the beginning of a much bigger conversation about women and Western medicine.So, let’s talk about it.