Submitted by:  Emily Frost-Leaird

I use OBOS in my community college women’s health class and I continue to be amazed by how inspiring and meaningful the text is to the students. Thank you for 40 years of making a difference in womens’ lives!

Do you remember when you first read “Our Bodies, Ourselves”? Take part in OBOS’s 40th anniversary by sharing how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” made a difference in your life. View more stories and submit your own.

Submitted by: Heather Reiners

“Our Bodies, Ourselves” means empowerment, learning honestly about my body and knowledge to make decisions that are meaningful to me. As a women’s studies major just graduating this May OBOS has supporting my life’s mission in bringing education to girls and women on not only their bodies, but their ’body, mind, and soul’!

Do you remember when you first read “Our Bodies, Ourselves”? Take part in OBOS’s 40th anniversary by sharing how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” made a difference in your life. View more stories and submit your own.

Calling all out and proud African American lesbians! Due to a last-minute replacement, we need a photo, specifically of one or more couples, for the new edition of “Our Bodies, Ourselves,” scheduled for publication in October.

If you think you have a great shot, and know you can gather permissions by 5 P.M. TUESDAY, JUNE 14, please email the photo to obos07@gmail.com.

Everyone in the photo needs to be willing to sign a release giving permission for it to appear in the Sexual Orientation chapter. We’ll also need a signed release from the photographer, who will receive photo credit. These are all standard one-page forms required for publication. Names of people in the photo will not be published unless requested.

This ninth edition of “Our Bodies, Ourselves” focuses on reproductive health and sexuality. It has been under development for more than a year and includes dozens of personal stories and essential, up-to-date information about gender identity, sexual orientation, birth control, abortion, pregnancy and birth, perimenopause, menopause, health issues such as breast and ovarian cancers, and sexuality and sexual health as we age.

Thanks for reading, and feel free to share this message!

Submitted by: Molly

When I think of OBOS, I think, Empowerment! OBOS means knowing your body, your personal power, and taking control of your health care and your reproductive rights. OBOS is an essential voice for women.

Do you remember when you first read “Our Bodies, Ourselves”? Take part in OBOS’s 40th anniversary by sharing how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” made a difference in your life. View more stories and submit your own.

By Inna Hudaya

Quinn fuller, my beloved American friend, is the first who introduce me to OBOS. She and I started a weekly workshop and self-help group in Yogyakarta in 2009.

My work focuses around abortion issues in Indonesia, and as a counsellor I found that less education and information on sexuality and reproductive health leads to unwanted pregnancies that end in abortion. Unsafe abortion is the common option for women in Indonesia, especially for unmarried women, women in rural areas and poor women.

Based on these facts, the Sexuality and Reproductive Health workshop and self-help group is our first step to provide information and education to these women. We use OBOS as the source for the workshop. I never enjoyed reading a book like OBOS. I love the language because it makes me feel like I’m reading a magazine—so fun !

A change starts from an itch to act. Start with workshop in 2009, and a year later, I and two American girls, Quinn Fuller and Jeannie Mc’Intosh were designing curriculum for our first Sexuality and Reproductive Health School in Yogyakarta. This is a 16 day/48 session school for 15 scholars in Yogyakarta. This year, we will invite scholars not only from Yogyakarta but all over Indonesia. Yet again, OBOS has really been helpful and has become my favourite source.

What I like most bout OBOS is it gives women many options, yet lets women decide what is best for them. Not only does it give information, OBOS helps women find wisdom to know what they need.

Before Quinn left Indonesia, she gave me her copy of OBOS. To me it’s more than a gift, it’s a treasure and a blessing. It’s not just a gift for me, this is a gift for every women I work with, for every student of the school. We have only one copy of OBOS, but many students borrow it so they can share it with their communities.

I’m now working as facilitator for SRH, and OBOS is always there on my table whenever I need it.

Thank you OBOS!!

Do you remember when you first read “Our Bodies, Ourselves”? Take part in OBOS’s 40th anniversary by sharing how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” made a difference in your life. View more stories and submit your own.

Submitted by: Sarah Whedon

I really want to have a great story to tell about how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” provided personal health information at a moment when I desperately needed it. But it wasn’t really like that for me. The book was more like a steady companion in my adolescence. I kept it handy as a personal reference work and even lugged it off to college with me. I benefitted from it having been first published before I was even born.

When I think about “Our Bodies, Ourselves” what comes to mind most quickly and forcefully is the brief time I spent volunteering in the office. I took an introductory women’s studies course in college which involved a service learning component and I chose Our Bodies Ourselves to work with.

When you volunteer anywhere for a brief time, you rarely get to do anything glamorous, and my experience was no different. I stuffed envelopes. I think one time Judy Norsigian gave me an article to bring home so I could tell her what I thought of it. I don’t even remember the topic.

But the experience of volunteering made a big impression on me anyway. I think that’s because being in that office showed me in material form that it was entirely possible to care about women’s health and then start doing something about it and so create something that really mattered.

Volunteering at the Boston Women’s Health Book Collective was the first real action I took on behalf of women’s health. Now I have training as a birth doula, a graduate education in Women’s Studies, and a blog called Reproductive Rites.

Who knows what the future holds? Thank you, Our Bodies Ourselves.

Do you remember when you first read “Our Bodies, Ourselves”? Take part in OBOS’s 40th anniversary by sharing how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” made a difference in your life. View more stories and submit your own.

Submitted by: Meg Sawicki

The first time I saw “Our Bodies, Ourselves” was in 1977 and I was a freshman in college. Some women I knew had the book and I remember thinking how fantastic it was that a group of women had written a collection of stories that shared their own wisdom about health and life and being a woman. For the first time I was affirmed that different was okay, and I was hooked.

To this day the book remains one of my favorite gifts to give young women who I love and care about, including my own daughters. I have only love and admiration for those first brave women of the Boston Women’s Health Collective who gave us real and important information about our health and happiness, and who set the bar for other women’s self discovery books as the first of it’s kind. Cheers and all good things to my sisters of the Collective to continue to light the way.

Do you remember when you first read “Our Bodies, Ourselves”? Take part in OBOS’s 40th anniversary by sharing how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” made a difference in your life. View more stories and submit your own.

Submitted by: Debbie Ali

I read and re-read the first copy on recycled newsprint in 1970; loved it when it came out bigger with more info. It was the guide to my learning about my body, and I have proudly shared it with many young women I have known over the years. I look forward to sharing it with my grand daughters and great nieces!

Do you remember when you first read “Our Bodies, Ourselves”? Take part in OBOS’s 40th anniversary by sharing how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” made a difference in your life. View more stories and submit your own.

Submitted by: Michele Hamilton

I remember reading OBOS in 1980. My friends and I held a meeting and took turns examining our own vaginas. I remember thinking how pink it looked!

Do you remember when you first read “Our Bodies, Ourselves”? Take part in OBOS’s 40th anniversary by sharing how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” made a difference in your life. View more stories and submit your own.

Submitted by: Joanne Accardi-Goldberger

When I was a college girl in the early 70’s, I didn’t know much about my body. Then came OBOS… it empowered me… my friends… my entire generation! Thoughts, questions we had been taught to suppress could now be discussed openly. Thank you OBOS for helping me get in touch not only with myself, but for becoming a life-time proponent for women’s health concerns. BTW: When my daughter turned 13, I gave her first copy of OBOS… may the tradition continue! Happy 40th Birthday!

Do you remember when you first read “Our Bodies, Ourselves”? Take part in OBOS’s 40th anniversary by sharing how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” made a difference in your life. View more stories and submit your own.

Submitted by: Cat Grant

I found this book when I was about 20. It politicized me about my body and other women’s bodies — in reading it I realized that our bodies weren’t “private.” I found it just as I was changing my position on women’s right to choose – moving away from a pro-life position to a position where women had the right to control their bodies.  I bought one in a second hand shop and passed it on to a younger woman and hopefully she passed it on too. A new edition is well needed for a new generation for girls and women.  All mothers, aunties, grandmothers should give this to their daughters, granddaughters and nieces.  All women around the world should have this book — and it wouldn’t hurt the men to read it either!

Do you remember when you first read “Our Bodies, Ourselves”? Take part in OBOS’s 40th anniversary by sharing how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” made a difference in your life. View more stories and submit your own.

Submitted by: Cheryl de Jong-Lambert

The thought of OBOS immediately brings to mind so many excellent conversations with girlfriends the world over. Today, the ”Pregnancy and Birth” volume in particular means having a son named after my husband’s maternal family, and a daughter named after my grandmother.

Do you remember when you first read “Our Bodies, Ourselves”? Take part in OBOS’s 40th anniversary by sharing how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” made a difference in your life. View more stories and submit your own.

Submitted by: Nancy Goldstein

I’ve had OBOS on my shelves since 1972 (I was 11) and even before, I’m pretty sure. It was the first place I could look up all sorts of things I couldn’t say aloud, or wanted to find out about privately (lesbians! labias! yeast infections!), and one of first places where I could hear other women’s voices talking about all of this verboten stuff. Nearly 30 years later it remains a vital, vibrant ”discussion” and source of information. All my love on its 40th birthday.

Do you remember when you first read “Our Bodies, Ourselves”? Take part in OBOS’s 40th anniversary by sharing how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” made a difference in your life. View more stories and submit your own.

Submitted by: Harvey Kliman

I first read OBOS in 1971, my senior year of High School. Being the oldest of four boys I was always intrigued with the mystery of girls, especially the menstrual cycle, which may explain why I became an Ob/Gyn and now do research on the endometrium at Yale.

The creative link for our work on orgasm, menstruation and endometriosis came directly from a single sentence in the original OBOS which recommended masturbating to ease the pain of menstrual cramps. It turns out that orgasm helps to expel menstrual debris out the cervix and vagina, decreasing the risk of retrograde menstruation and the endometriosis that follows.

Do you remember when you first read “Our Bodies, Ourselves”? Take part in OBOS’s 40th anniversary by sharing how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” made a difference in your life. View more stories and submit your own.

Submitted by: Margaret Park Bridges

OBOS was born in 1971, just as I entered womanhood and turned 14. It became my go-to resource for any questions I couldn’t ask out loud. I had no idea it was as revolutionary a book as it was at the time. I’m not sure where I would have turned to get the straight talk and detailed answers it provided!

Do you remember when you first read “Our Bodies, Ourselves”? Take part in OBOS’s 40th anniversary by sharing how “Our Bodies, Ourselves” made a difference in your life. View more stories and submit your own.