Musician Anoushka Shankar recently underwent double hysterectomy and has now decided to share details about it with her fans. Shankar wrote in a long post on Twitter on Saturday titled, ‘LADY BITS, by Anoushka Shankar’ and added, “Swipe to read about why I no longer have a uterus, and why I decided to tell you.”
She began her note with details about the surgery: “As of last month, I no longer have a uterus. I had a double surgery: a gynaecological-oncologist performed a hysterectomy due to my large fibroids, which made my uterus as big as if it were six months pregnant, and an incredible surgeon removed multiple further tumours from my abdomen (which I blessedly then heard were all benign). One tumour had grown through my muscles and was visibly protruding from my stomach. There were 13 tumours in all.”
She also opened up about how discovering her illness left her depressed and worried about her kids. “When I found out a few months ago that I needed to have my uterus taken out, I went into a short-term depression. The news triggered fears about my womanliness, my possible desire to have more children in the future, the fear of dying in surgery and leaving my kids without a mother, the effect the changes may have on my sex life and more. I spoke to friends and family about my news and was shocked to discover how many women had had hysterectomies although I’d never known they had.”
She further wrote, “I wondered why the surgery wasn’t talked about more if it was so common. When I asked, one woman, said in response, ‘Well, we aren’t exactly going to flash our lady-bits everywhere, are we?’”
“I look back and grieve for my younger self and all the girls I knew, for how much we were expected to cope with in silence. I’ve always thought of myself as someone who comfortably shares most thoughts and experiences. Yet I look back and realise I allowed my internalised embarrassment and shame around sexual health, and my period, in particular, to remain unchallenged all these years,” she wrote.
Read the complete post here:
Anoushka shared more details on her gynaecological history and went on to reveal that she effectively bled for half her teenage life - “ten days at a time every 20-25 days”.
Anoushka is the daughter of Pandit Ravi Shankar and was married to British director Joe Wright for seven years before they decided to get separated early last year. They have two kids.