Sara Szal MD<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n I was in my 50s, sitting across from a divorce attorney, when I finally saw it. <\/p>\n It wasn\u2019t the bargain that I was ending in my marriage. I saw the bargain I made 30 years earlier and never stopped making in my life since age 27, and probably before.<\/p>\n I was 27 when I made it, though at the time, I didn\u2019t know recognize it as a bargain (and what I\u2019d have to pay for it later). <\/p>\n I had just graduated from Harvard Medical School and moved to San Francisco to begin my internship in obstetrics and gynecology. I could deliver babies at midnight, manage a hemorrhage before sunrise, take out an ovary at 9 a.m., and keep going for 36 hours without sleep.<\/p>\n I called this competence. I now recognize it as my first bargain: if I could do everything myself, I wouldn\u2019t need anyone.<\/p>\n I was learning how to care for women. I knew almost nothing about caring for myself.<\/p>\n Then I met a man. He was brilliant, emotionally unavailable, and clear from the beginning about what he wanted. No exclusivity. We\u2019d see each other when it worked for him. The relationship would fit around his life.<\/p>\n I\u2019d never been in an arrangement like that before. I said yes. It wasn\u2019t because it was what I wanted, but because somewhere inside me, I believed demanding more might cost me the relationship, so I settled for the breadcrumbs.<\/p>\n That was my second bargain. It would not be the last. <\/p>\n For 30 years, I told myself the heartbreak came when he eventually left. It took another 25 years and another ending, sitting in that attorney\u2019s office, to show me otherwise.<\/p>\n What I was taught:<\/strong><\/em> be easy and fun, don\u2019t ask for too much, and it will all work out.<\/span><\/p>\n What I now understand: <\/strong><\/em>it works out for whoever was on the other side of the bargain. I disappeared a little more each time to make sure of it.<\/span><\/p>\n I realize this is one of the oldest female stories there is, and it is rarely only about romance.<\/p>\n Women make bargains with their bodies, careers, time, and worth, long before we are old enough to recognize the lesson being given.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n I\u2019ve been sitting with these bargains for months, not trying to resolve them but trying to understand them. As a physician, I know how tempting it is to look for a diagnosis or to run labs for them. While I suspect these bargains show up eventually in inflammation in the body, autoimmune disease, hormonal imbalances, cardiometabolic disease, and low heart rate variability, it\u2019s also true that some truths ask to be witnessed before they are explained.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve been sitting with these bargains for months, not trying to solve them, but trying to understand them. As a physician, I know how tempting it is to look for a diagnosis. Some truths ask to be witnessed before they\u2019re explained.<\/span><\/p>\n Here are some of the bargains I keep seeing, in my own life, in my patients, and in the culture that shaped us.<\/span><\/p>\n Share<\/span><\/p>\n The bargain of productivity. <\/strong>I can rest after I\u2019ve earned it.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n The bargain of beauty.<\/strong> If I look young enough, thin enough, pretty enough, I\u2019ll be safe.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n The bargain of the good girl.<\/strong> Harmony matters more than honesty.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n The bargain of self-abandonment.<\/strong> If I betray myself first, no one else can reject me.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n The bargain of silence.<\/strong> If I don\u2019t ask for too much, I won\u2019t lose the connection.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n The bargain of competence.<\/strong> If I can do everything, I won\u2019t need anyone.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n The bargain of accommodation.<\/strong> If I make myself easier to love, love will stay.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n The bargain of being chosen.<\/strong> If someone chooses me, I\u2019ll finally feel worthy.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n The bargain of emotional labor.<\/strong> It\u2019s my job to anticipate everyone\u2019s needs before my own.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n The bargain of certainty. <\/strong>If I can just find the perfect protocol, I\u2019ll finally feel at home in my body.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n Thanks for reading The Female Edge! This post is public so feel free to share it.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Share<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n I\u2019m no longer convinced that women\u2019s greatest challenge is low estrogen, faltering mitochondria, or low testosterone. Those matter, and I\u2019ve devoted my career to understanding them. <\/p>\n But I\u2019m becoming more curious about something medicine rarely measures\u2026<\/p>\n How often does a woman override herself in a single day?<\/em><\/p>\n How many times does she swallow a no?<\/em><\/p>\n How much pleasure leaks away, not because her body has failed her, but because she\u2019s been taught that belonging requires self-diminishment?<\/em><\/p>\n I don\u2019t have answers yet, only a growing suspicion that pleasure begins much earlier than the bedroom.<\/p>\n I believe it begins the moment a woman stops making bargains with herself, and starts to understand that sovereignty isn\u2019t the opposite of love, it\u2019s what makes love possible. <\/p>\n This is the invisible agreement millions of women inherit, one no one writes down or teaches it, yet somehow we learn it: trade small pieces of yourself for approval, harmony, love, and belonging. We don\u2019t notice the cost because we pay it gradually, until one day we realize we\u2019ve become experts at caring for everyone else except the woman living inside our own body.<\/p>\n I\u2019m curious\u2026 <\/strong>What agreement are you ready to break?<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n xo, Dr. Sara<\/p>\n\n
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