Activism
Sarah Le Blanc
Writer, Trainer, Consultant, Activist - at Le Blanc Maison
United Kingdom
I have a few projects through which I'm working towards more open communication about all matters related to our mental health and wellbeing.
United Kingdom
I have a few projects through which I'm working towards more open communication about all matters related to our mental health and wellbeing.
Activism
I'm increasingly losing patience with female friends who adamantly opposed to quotas for women in job roles where we're currently under represented. They're worried about getting a job they don't deserve over a more qualified man just because they're women. If they 'make it' they want to feel like they did it based on their...
There are people all over the place at the moment objecting to trigger warnings but I don't think those people actually understand what it means. A trigger warning is exactly the same as putting this on the back of a DVD box; only in this context it's being used for words related to trauma rather than...
I used to be a bad feminist. Like, a really bad feminist. In that I called myself a feminist, because I thought that's what everybody did who thought that women had as much right to vote, and go to school, and own their own things as men, but further than that I wasn't actually a...
Women
Do you need to get your thyroid checked? I only ask because I had no idea that I did until after I had it done, last week. I had a series of blood tests and they all came back fine except for the thyroid function one, which showed that my thyroid is under active and that I need to start taking levothyroxine to replace the amount of the thyroxine hormone that it is no longer making. I had no idea. Well, I mean, I thought I had a problem in my neck. It just didn’t feel right. But I...
So, I had a conversation the other day with the lovely Karina about menstrual products and how applicator tampons aren’t really a thing where she lives in Germany, while they’re pretty commonplace here in the UK. Midway through this conversation it occurred to me that I had no idea how anyone besides myself handled their periods. No how they felt about them, what products they used, or anything. This piqued my curiosity. So, me being me I decided I’d better ask some people. And ran...
Relationships
I have this friend – who to the best of my knowledge has never seen the rom-com I’ve just quoted – who gets really annoyed by people who only have sex with someone who means something to them and who they are in a committed, monogamous relationship with. He gets frustrated by what he sees as their stubborn refusal to realise that a single instance of sexual intercourse is no more significant than a game of tennis; and that there is therefore, no sensible reason for anyone to not approach the...
Everyone you ever love will hurt you. And you have to decide that you’re going to be okay with that. A good friend recently asked me how he was supposed to get over his fear of falling in love again. His last relationship ended very painfully and he wanted me to tell him how to stop believing that he would get hurt if he let someone else in. While it’s perfectly natural and understandable that he’s scared, the truth is that if you decide you’re going to love someone you have to...
Right, back to our #haveyouhadanorgasm series. (I don’t recommend reading this at work or anywhere that your grandmother might read it over your shoulder during your festive family gatherings.) As we talked about previously our education and our societies offer only a narrow idea of what constitutes sex; and I think this is keeping many people, particularly women, from enjoying as satisfying and orgasmic sex lives as they could have. We also suffer from a paucity of language with...
Mental Health
1. I’m not going to treat you any differently because you’re sick, and you know you wouldn’t really want me to. Well, no. What you’re really trying to say here is that’s you’re determined not let my illness impact on your life, isn’t it? Since I’ve told you, repeatedly actually, that I need to you to act just a little bit differently so that you stop triggering me. Dick. People with PTSD have their own specific things which trigger their anxiety or cause them to act out. If you want to...
Some time earlier this year, I can’t remember exactly when, around the time that Germanwings pilot deliberately crashed his plane, I decided that I couldn’t be bothered to hide my mental health problems any more. Not even in the office. It was just too much hard work. Since covering it up involves being economical with the truth, if not outright lying, you have to be constantly vigilant about the language you use to describe how you’re feeling or how you’ve been. You have to remember...
I’m nowhere near as anxious now as I was for the first, oo, maybe thirty years of my life; when I was walking around with a permanent knot of fear in my stomach constantly threatening to unravel itself into a flat-out panic, but I am still considerably more anxious than the average human being with nothing all that much to be anxious about. I have generalised anxiety disorder. And anxiety is also a facet of all my other disorders. So… Anyway, one thing that all this anxiety has taught...
So I’ve been out of work, suffering with severe depression and anxiety, and basically living like a hermit since November last year. But over the past few weeks I’ve had to start venturing back into the world again. I’ve needed to look for work, to look for somewhere to live, and to start just spending time with other humans again. All these things, but the job hunting in particular, have required a level of confidence that I don’t necessarily feel right now. I’ve been really quite...
Products
So, you know how I mentioned the other day that I dressed up as Regina the Evil Queen from Once Upon A Time for a fancy dress party? Well, I decided for my costume I was going to need a new, gothic shade of lipstick, and then popped over to Superdrug to buy the closest thing I could find. I was after a dark, blood-red kind of colour but they didn’t have one, so the nearest thing that would do was a plumy, berry type colour – Divine Wine by Maybelline. I only bought it because it fit the...
"U Buffet - West Street A selection of starters from the all you can eat. I enjoy this place, although I think more so than most of my friends. Of the..."