Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom

Media:	Paperback
Author:	Christiane Northrup
Publisher:	Bantam
Release date:	25 June, 2002
List price:	~~$19.00~~
Our price:	$12.92 that is 32% off!

Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom

Average rating: Stars

Self-Help That Makes You Miserable

Christiane Northrop embraces the idea that sickness has its roots in emotional causes: cysts, tumors, cancer, PMS, etc. according to her, may be the manifestations of anger, ambivalence, lonliness, etc. The problem with this sort of ideaology, is that it negates a whole body of scientific data which would suggest otherwise, and puts the onus of illness and recovery SOLELY on the patient.
Our environment is polluted beyond anything our ancestors could have imagined. THIS is causing illness. Our modern lifestyles, sitting in traffic, taxes, etc. cause STRESS. Our hospitals are loaded with children battling cancer. Cancer rates in children are up 500-percent since the 1960's. What is her explanation for that - are these children subconsciously creating their own miseries? What an appalling thought.
Obviously, we need to eat well and exercise and have joy in our lives. But this will not prevent us from dying! We all die from something - it's the inevitable consequence of being a living creature on this planet. It might be cancer, it might be a heart attack, it might be a drunk driver, who knows?

Most annoying is her assertion that PMS is basically unfulfillment and anger that surfaces once a month. Women are supposed to root out the "real" cause of their suffering. At the same time, she acknowleges that a woman's progesterone plummets just before her period - which many doctors, including the pioneer of PMS (Dalton) have identified as the leading cause of premenstrual depression and irritability.
I could go on and on. This book made me feel very disheartened and anxious. Too much naval-gazing is a bad thing: maybe we have too much time on our hands. While millions starve to death, we're supposed to make friends with our mitochondrial DNA. It's enough to make you pass out.

Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom - Christiane Northrup

A blessing to women who wish to heal

>> In Brief <<
Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom (WBWW) is, in my experience, a truly revolutionary book for women of all ages. It's also a great read for men that have an authentic interest in the well-being of women.
I've been recommending this book to women I care about for some years now, and the feedback is always massively positive.

>> More detail <<
I first found an old copy of this book at a house I stayed at in England. I flicked through it and read a few parts in detail. My impression in that short time? "Gosh... What an amazing book... every women with a genuine interest in their well-being has to read this!
When I returned home (New Zealand) I bought WBWW and read it more thoroughly. In my experience, Dr Northrup brings forth a beautiful and deeply valuable blend of modern medical knowledge as an experienced Doctor, and very insightful knowledge of how human health is a product of our internal (mental/emotional) relationship to life. She obviously has a lot of experience in the field of health and healing from both traditional and alternative perspectives. For me, this has given the subject matter of WBWW a very grounded, pragmatic, and useful place to work from. It's not a book of theory on "new age health". Rather I can see that Northrup has distilled this knowledge through real-life experience with patients and also with her own journey into true health and healing.

>> What will it do for you? <<
For me (as a male, a healer, and a health consultant that has worked with women's health issues for many years) I can see that this book will give to those women who read it with an open-mind a very empowering perspective on their health, their body, their innate feminine wisdom, and their capacity to be beautiful, empowered, healthy women. It's the sort of book that has the potential to restore a significant perspective that our society of men and women have lost. A perspective and a quality of knowing and self-connection that is so essential to experiencing true health and happiness.

I know that those female friends of mine who have read this book have found it to be an incredibly empowering experience. I feel that regaining your power as a person (and in this case as a women) is vital to having a healthy, creative, life-giving experience of who and what you are. Dr Northrup has obviously spent many years helping women do just that.

To women I meet in person who are interested in their health, and those utilising my health programmes, I always say this book is a must read. Hence I must make the same recommendation here in this review.

>> Not for everyone <<
It's apparent from a number of the reviews here on Amazon that some women found this book quite shocking and hard to handle.
I had actually never considered that WBWW would evoke such a strong negative reaction. Yet I can certainly appreciate where they are coming from.

So I wish to add to this review that those who are currently closed to the more subtle and less "main-stream" elements of health and healing may find this book challenging and a bit much to accept. I do not recommend you buy and read this book if you are not at least open to the possibility that we each (men and women) create our health from within. You don't have to understand HOW that takes place (reading this book will help you with that), but at least being open to it is probably important if you wish to receive the many gems and insights in the pages of WBWW. If you strongly adhere to the Newtonian model of the body as a machine then this book is NOT FOR YOU.

If, on the other hand, you intuitively feel and know that there must be more to health and healing (and woman's wisdom) than what society (with it's entirely "disease management" based approach to health) has tried to feed you all your life, then please let the information in the subject matter of WBWW gently sink into your heart and mind... I know you will not regret it.

This book is NOT the be-all-and-end-of of books on health. What book would be? But in the context of what the author has set out to achieve, namely helping women with "Creating physical and emotional health and healing" WBWW is a beautiful journey to be explored in one form or another by all women seeking health.

I wish you all the best of health,

Jonathan Evatt

Christiane Northrup - Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom

ugh, I can't wait for a yard sale to give mine away

This book only feeds a new-age, mumbo jumbo societal hunger. I find the text really patronizing and frankly, dangerous. To draw a direct link between symptoms and feelings is a tenuous and even more stress inducing proposition. I have been down the road of mind/body health and I think there are better people who write on this subject with a more balanced take.

This is the first review I've ever written for Amazon. I write it because I feel so strongly that Northrup's advice causes more stress than anything else. Find yourself a great acupuncturist and a great doctor and you'll go a long way towards being healthy. This comes from a reader whose been down this path and back again for the past 15 years.

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