All in Her Head: The Truth and Lies Early Medicine Taught Us About Women’s Bodies and Why It Matters Today

In the spirit of Sid Mukherjee’s Emperor of All Maladies, a groundbreaking medical history that is both a collective narrative of women’s bodies and a call to action for a new conversation around personal health, self-improvement, and the future of healthcare for everyone. Much of what we know about women’s bodies and health has come from men. Their points of view have helped shaped the way we feel about our bodies–and the kind of medical attention we receive. Women’s bodies have never been considered as powerful, capable, or of equal worth as men’s. Our “normal” bodily functions–as well as our pain, pleasure, strength, and intellectual capacity–have been based on an overwhelmingly male narrative uninformed by women’s own voices, and often used to shame and subjugate us. The result is a cultural and societal legacy that continues to shape our health, despite recent advances that challenge it. Memorial Sloan Kettering oncologist and medical historian Dr. Elizabeth Comen peels back the curtain on the collective medical history of women to (re)introduce us to our whole bodies–how they work, the actual doctors and patients whose perspectives and experiences laid the foundation for today’s medical thought, and the many oversights which still remain unaddressed. With a physician’s knowledge and empathy, Dr. Comen uses the eleven systems of a woman’s body as a way to tell these unique and untold stories, drawing upon medical texts and journals, as well as her own extensive experience treating thousands of women. Empowering women to advocate for better care that prioritizes healthy and joyful lives–both for ourselves and generations to come–All In Her Head is written with humor, wisdom, and deep scientific and cultural insight. Eye-opening, sometimes enraging, yet always captivating, this shared memoir of women’s medical history is an essential contribution to women’s understanding of ourselves and a much-needed reclaiming of history.