Glass Ceiling

Glass Ceiling

Sadie found the old leather bound book in her grandmother’s things while she was cleaning out the house. Her grandmother, the woman who had raised her, who taught her to be strong in spite of the ‘man’s world’ she was entering, and who was as gentle as a soft breeze in summer, had died. In her mind and heart, her voice was strong. ‘Do not weep for me for long, Saditcha. You have our memories with you.’

The book was not that old, but had been in the dusty attic for at least twenty years. ‘Witches, Midwives and Nurses’. The title was stamped in the leather. Hmm….Granny never told me about this book, but I know she had been a nurse in the old country. The ‘men’s world’ Sadie was entering was medical school where the glass ceiling still existed. She had chosen the Cardiac Surgery specialty where there was a glass ceiling that had a few cracks in it from women brave enough, and stubborn enough to challenge it’s very existence.

Opening the book to the title page, Sadie read ‘Witches, Midwives and Nurses - A History of  Women Healers.’  Her curiousity piqued, Sadie settled herself in the ancient rocking chair in the corner so she could read by the dusty, streaked light of the attic window. Odd. Florence Nightingale has never been seen as a witch ~ except maybe when she insisted the doctors wash their hands! Florence started the first nursing school in 1860. So what history is this book talking about? Flipping through the pages, the ‘witch craze’ and witch hunting was much earlier than that…..from the 14^th to the 17^th century according to these authors. 

Reading further, Sadie discovered that the book was extremely feminist in nature. Granny’s voice came into her heart again. ‘My Saditcha, read these words and remember how far women have come in this world of healers.’ Pulling an old afghan around her, Sadie kept reading. She had always thought her grandmother was too rigid in her beliefs about men and oppression, but thought, ‘She’s old and old people get set in their beliefs’. And Sadie had never felt oppressed. Her father and brothers had never put her into the woman’s work world. But this next sentence got her attention:  ‘If a woman dare to cure without having studied she is a witch and must die.” A statement from a church doctrine of that terrible time. Appalling and sad, in those early centuries there was no opportunity even offered for women to study the healing arts.

The old grandfather clock in the front hall chimed, reverberating through her Granny’s tiny home. A sound she always waited for as a child while she watched the golden pendulum swing slowly back and forth. Now it was her time. Time to challenge an oppression she had only heard about from Granny. No longer evil, women had entered all areas of the healing arts. No longer evil, women in nursing, medicine and midwifery were seen with new eyes. The glass ceiling, centuries old, but full of cracks and chips, still existed and Sadie was willing to take up her challenge.

“They were called “wise women” by the people, 

witches or charlatans by the authorities. Medicine 

is part of our heritage as women, our history, our birthright.”

~ Barbara Ehrenreich Deirdre English,  

Witches, Midwives and Nurses: A History of Women Healers

Witches, Midwives and Nurses ~ A History of Women Healers
Barbara Ehrenreick and Deirdre English 1973