Compromising to have a body that works – lecturer publishes her account of lung clots

A lecturer from the University of Northampton has opened up about developing a potentially fatal condition after she was prescribed the contraceptive pill.

Dr Rachel Moss, who lectures in History, has contributed to So Hormonal, a collection of 30 essays on the role hormones play in our daily lives.

In 2017, she was diagnosed with a pulmonary embolism – three clots inside her lung. The likely cause of those clots? The contraceptive pill she had been prescribed to manage debilitating, painful periods. In her essay, Clot, she discusses the many ways those of us who have a uterus have to repeatedly compromise to have a body that more-or-less works: that we are meant to accept side effects of the pill as normal, that we are socialised to downplay menstrual pain, that we are discouraged in so many ways from seeking the best possible outcomes for our reproductive bodies, rather than just settling for bearable.

So Hormonal is on sale now.