Posts in Herstory
SUPPRESSED SUPERPOWERS

I am an extremely annoying person with unwavering high standards. What’s even worse, is that statement makes me a fraud, as even the people who know me well would describe me as, “the sweetest, most easy-going person.”

Read More
HerstoryAbbas Qasim
EMBRACING THE DUALITY: ADVENTURES IN AGING AND LIBERATION

Entering my 50s hasn’t been fun! It’s that simple. The big five-oh didn’t meet my expectations despite my efforts to make it dreamy. For my 50th birthday, I planned a trip to Greece and my actual birthday was a brilliant sea and land adventure on a beautiful island called Naxos. Let’s not forget that it was also a culinary paradise. But as much as I tried to get myself excited for the new decade, unfortunately outside my trip to Greece, it’s been a struggle.

Read More
HerstoryAbbas Qasim
TRUST WOMEN?

When did you first learn that you shouldn’t trust women? Or a better question might be, when did you learn to trust men more than you trust women? I remember the first time someone approached me with this question.

Read More
HerstoryAbbas Qasim
UNTANGLING A MEDICAL MENOPAUSE MYSTERY

Let me introduce you to Kerri. When Kerri had her hysterectomy, she was technically already in menopause–she hadn’t had a period for more than a year. Several women in her family had had the same procedure, so she thought she had it all figured out. But, oh boy, things felt off from the get-go!

Read More
HerstoryAbbas Qasim
DIVING INTO THE "DRY" CONVERSATION

So, here's a little story about a topic that might make you uncomfortable or raise an eyebrow – yup, we're diving into the realm of the "dry" conversation. I’m not usually the shy type but even I’m feeling a little bashful right now. Deep breath and here it is - I have a dry vagina. 

Read More
HerstoryAbbas Qasim
MENOPAUSE MOMENT

On a recent Monday morning while at work, I ran into a colleague who runs our company’s facilities department. I had an idea I wanted to share with him about how we can get more people to volunteer to respond to an emergency or a fire should there ever be one. As I approached him excited to share my thoughts, I felt my brain go blank as if I accidentally pressed the delete button.

Read More
HerstoryAbbas Qasim
UNAPOLOGETIC

How and what does our posture communicate? What do people assume about us, based on how we present ourselves? How can we change those assumptions, if we don’t like them?

Read More
HerstoryAbbas Qasim
A NEW HEART

When your love is betrayed and your trust severed with the precision of a scalpel, an emergence of grace is possible. “I’m devastated,” the betrayed one wails. “Stop with the spiritual mumbo jumbo!” Hold on, before you shut me down, read one more paragraph, then decide.

Read More
HerstoryAbbas Qasim
FROM HERE, THERE AND NOWHERE

Over the years, I have experienced many shades of rejection. As a child of an immigrant family, I accepted this as an inevitable byproduct of my fate, and tried earnestly to assimilate. But after living in North America for almost 30 years, I still get asked where I am “really from”, which leaves me perplexed and feeling adrift.

Read More
HerstoryAbbas Qasim