A Message From The Creator

Women’s News: 9 Women From Olympics Past Everyone Should Remember

The Huffington Post  |  By Nina Bahadur

Olympics fever is hitting us hard. Between the first ever Olympicwomen’s ski jumping event and the incredible figure skating routines we’re anticipating, we can hardly wait for Feb. 7 to arrive.

In the run-up to the 2014 Sochi Games, we’ve already listed some of theamazing female athletes we can’t wait to see compete. But we’re also drawing inspiration from past Olympians.

Women have been participating in the Olympics since 1900, when 22 ladies competed in tennis, sailing, croquet, horse riding and golf, and today make up just under half of all Olympic participants. And though inequality follows women even into the highest echelons of athletics — for example, female athletes aren’t always given the same sponsorship opportunities as their male counterparts — that doesn’t make these Olympians any less awe-worthy.

This group of athletes grew up in ordinary families in West Virginia, rural Georgia, and a village in the Netherlands and went on to break records in women’s sports. They rose above criticisms of their private lives and refused to listen when told they couldn’t compete.

Here are nine notable female Olympians of the past:

 

• Wilma Rudolph, Sprinter, 1956 & 1960 Olympic Games
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  In the 1960s, Rudolph was considered “the fastest woman in the world” — a feat made all the more impressive by the fact that she spent most of her childhood in leg braces. Rudolph suffered from polio as a child, and was fitted for leg braces after she lost the use of her left leg at age six. After years of treatment and determination, the braces came off — and her sporting career began.

  During the 1960 Summer Olympics, Rudolph won three gold medals in track and field.

  “I don’t know why I run so fast,” she told ESPN during her heyday. “I just run.”

• Nadia Comăneci, Gymnast, 1976 & 1980 Olympic Games
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  The Romanian gymnast won three gold medals at the 1976 Games. She was the first female gymnast to be awarded a perfect score of 10 in an Olympic gymnastics event for her routine on the uneven bars.

  “You have to have a lot of passion for what you do,” she told CNN in 2012. “To be able to work hard and to have a lot of motivation because you’re going to go to places that you’re never going to believe.”

• Alice Coachman, High Jumper, 1948 Olympic Games
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  Coachman, a high jumper who grew up in the segregated South, was the first African-American woman to win an Olympic gold medal in 1948.

  Coachman’s father didn’t approve of her initial training — which involved practicing on a homemade high jump.

  “He said, ‘sit on the porch and act like a lady,'” Coachman told NBC in a 2012 interview. “But I didn’t do that.”

• Fanny Blankers-Koen, Sprinter And Hurdler, 1948 Olympic Games
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  The Dutch athletics star won four gold medals in 1948. At the time, she was a 30-year-old mother of two, and was criticized for competing in the Games.

  “I got very many bad letters, people writing that I must stay home with my children and that I should not be allowed to run on a track with — how do you say it? — short trousers,” Blankers-Koen told The New York Timesin 1982. “One newspaperman wrote that I was too old to run, that I should stay at home and take care of my children. When I got to London, I pointed my finger at him and I said: ‘I show you.’”

• Fanny Durack, Swimmer, 1912 Olympic Games
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  Durack (left), an Australian swimmer, won gold in the 100m freestyle at the 1912 Olympics.

  Between 1910 and 1918 Durack was considered the world’s greatest female swimmer of all distances between sprints and the mile marathon.

• Helen Wills, Tennis Player, 1924 Olympic Games
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  Wills, an American tennis player, took home gold medals in women’s doubles and singles at the 1924 Paris Olympics.

  Wills was largely considered “the first American-born woman to achieveinternational celebrity as an athlete.”

• Connie Carpenter-Phinney, Speed Skater And Cyclist, 1972 & 1984 Olympic Games
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  Carpenter, the first woman to compete in both the Summer and Winter Olympics, competed as a skater in the 1972 Games and won the gold medal in the cycling road race at the 1984 Summer Olympics.
  “For me, it was everything, because I wanted to win the Olympics so badly,” Carpenter-Phinney said of her win in a post-race interview. “That was the crowning glory of a long career, and it gave me the chance to retire on top.”

• Micheline Ostermeyer, Shot Putter And Discus-Thrower, 1948 Olympic Games
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  The French athlete and concert pianist competed in the 1948 Olympics, where she won gold medals in shot put and discus throw, and a bronze medal in the high jump. Ostermeyer had only picked up a discus for the first time a few weeks before winning the gold medal.
• Mary Lou Retton, Gymnast, 1984 Olympic Games
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  Retton, an American, was the first female gymnast not from Eastern Europe to win a gold medal in the Gymnastic Individual All-around competition. She won five medals total in the 1984 Games.

  As a child, not realizing that competitive gymnastics even existed, Retton’s ambition was to become “the finest cheerleader in the world.”

  “She always knew what she wanted to do,” coach Bela Karolyi said in the documentary “Bud Greenspan Remembers: The 1984 L.A. Olympics.”“She always had very set goals. And she was following her goals.”

A Message From The Creator

Women’s News: What My Bully Was Thinking

Leah Bieler

Teacher and writer

I was bullied as a child. Not the relentless, unbearably cruel, sickening kind of bullying that you read about only after the victim has taken her own life. It was the run-of-the-mill mean girl bullying that left me crying at home after school and being ever-so-slightly more reluctant to speak up in class — and beyond. Truly, it sucked. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. But, since more than a few kids will recognize the story, maybe even identify, here goes.

In sixth grade I was, like most girls, in flux. A straight-A student, I spent all of my hours outside of school (and studying) at the dance studio. I was an early developer, though, and was slowly coming to a disappointing realization. I was unlikely to grow taller than my statuesque 5’1″, and my once-smooth dancer’s body was becoming a little more Dolly Parton each day. No matter how well I pirouetted, I was never going to be a ballerina.

A certain girl in my school, let’s call her C, seemed to sense I was feeling a bit off balance. We were rivals in class, good students with a more grown-up sensibility than many of the other girls. We read Vonnegut and announced, to our piano teachers’ pleasure and our classmates’ befuddlement, that we preferred classical music to Duran Duran. We should have been friends. For some reason, C chose to go in the other direction.

She convinced nearly all of my classmates to participate in a game where they completely ignored me. If I asked one of them a question, they would say something like, “Is the wall talking to me? I think I heard a noise, but there’s no one there.” She even scared my closest friends into playing along. It made me feel unmoored and desperately lonely. I was miserable. Every afternoon when I came home from school, I would cry about it to my mother. My mother, helpful therapist that she is, would always say the same thing. “She’s just jealous of you.”

I did not want my mother psychoanalyzing my tormenter. I didn’t want my mother to understand her. I wanted her to acknowledge my pain and tell me how much she hated C. But every evening, as I cried until my eyes were big and puffy and my nose ran, my mother repeated her Mantra. “She’s just jealous of you.” It was maddening.

I endured the bullying for another few months, but it felt like years. Over time, slowly, kids tired of the game. They began to acknowledge my presence, then to actually talk to me. My closest friends apologized for having participated, but it took a while for me to trust them again. The other kids pretended like it had never happened. And C and I maintained a kind of stalemate. We spoke to one another when necessary, but mostly practiced avoidance. We were in a delicate dance, she and I, but we managed to make it through the next couple of years with minimal conflict.

According to some studies, as many as 77 percent of children have been the victims of bullying at some point in their school career, and nearly 20 percent admit to doing the bullying. The other 3 percent? Liars. If everyone is involved, if nearly everyone is bullied (or bully) at some point, shouldn’t that fact inform how we handle this piece of childhood?

The impulse to assert power over others is something we spend our whole lives trying to tame. From sibling rivalries to fraternity hazing to international politics, we take advantage of the moments when we can clearly see the chink in someone else’s armor. Teaching our children to find the humanity in everyone is a challenge. One that doesn’t disappear when childhood ends. The simple act of pausing and imagining the pain a bully is feeling will not magically make him your friend. But it may give you just enough distance from your own pain to not take the bully’s words to heart. And if we can’t imagine their pain, best to remember that the fault doesn’t lie with the bullied, the defect is in the aggressor.

“She’s just jealous of you,” my mother insisted. It still felt like a crock.

C and I saw little of each other after middle school. I wasn’t entirely sorry to be rid of her. Then, in our 20s, we found ourselves at the same party. We waved from across the room. I hoped against hope that that would be the end of it. I did not want to chat. But C started moving towards me, riding the wave of the other partygoers. We said hello, talked for a few minutes. It wasn’t nearly as horrible as I had been anticipating, of course. C had grown up. The conversation came to a lull and I contemplated my exit strategy. C looked at the ground.

“You know,” she started, “I’ve been wanting to say something to you for a long time. To apologize. I was really mean to you when you were kids. I’m sorry. I don’t know why I did that stuff. I was kind of sad. And I think I was jealous.”

Damn. My mother was right. Quite a revelation. But the flood of emotions that followed contained the true epiphany. Hearing her say it out loud really did make a difference. It was never about me at all. What a gift. My heart felt light. The dancer now mostly locked inside me wanted to leap in the air. I wish it on all bullied kids, everywhere. If they never have a moment like this, so surprising, so affirming, so freeing — they can borrow mine.

Read More:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leah-bieler/what-my-bully-was-thinking_b_4632637.html?utm_hp_ref=women&ir=Women?utm_hp_ref=women&ir=Women

Inspiration Of Style: Maternity Clothes Are Actually Some Of The Most Stylish Clothes

The Huffington Post  |  By Michelle Persad

It is a common misconception that maternity clothes used to be… well, awful. People think that once upon a time pregnant women only wore oversized shirts, shapeless dresses and not much else. And while those items were constantly in the maternity repertoire, pregnancy clothes have actually always been stylish.

Looking back at maternity style over the years, it’s clear that no matter the decade, moms-to-be always took fashion into account. In the ’60s, it was all about Peter Pan collars and short hemlines. In the ’70s, floral prints and shift dresses were major. While in the ’80s, shoulder pads and neck ties were the must-haves.

We dare you to scroll through these photos of expectant mothers dating all the way back to the 1950s and tell us they weren’t some of the trendiest ladies around.

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Read More:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/28/maternity-clothes_n_4675980.html?utm_hp_ref=style&ir=Style?utm_hp_ref=style&ir=Style

A Message From The Creator

A Message From The Creator

Women’s News: A Life Lived In 9 Decades and Nearly 9 Years

Carrie Goldman

Author, BULLIED: What Every Parent, Teacher, and Kid Needs to Know About Ending the Cycle of Fear

I can hear her voice, the characteristic cry of “aaahhhh!” at the end of a funny story. The word “aahh” rises in pitch and intensity for two or three seconds before leveling off into a big laugh, her brown eyes sparkling with delight.

Some of my clearest memories of early childhood take place in her home. My sisters and I were probably the only people in the country who thought it was a fantastic idea to leave Florida and fly to Minnesota in the dead of winter. The trek north meant we were heading to Grandma’s house, where the center of joy was located. Endless games of cards, unlimited pieces of chocolate candy, and hours of storytelling awaited us.

As I think of Grandma, the images and sensations flood my brain, activating memories in the areas of sight, smell, taste, touch and sound.

Sight
I am 6-years-old. I wake early and tiptoe through the house, curling my toes into the long shag carpeting. I settle onto the floor in the little room behind the living room, where Grandma stores piles of photo albums.

I sit there for an hour, looking through years of photo albums, carefully examining every single picture and reading Grandma’s slanted cursive writing on the backs of the pictures. I could recognize that handwriting anywhere. It is the familiar script that appears on envelopes in my mailbox several days before every birthday, Hanukkah, and Valentine’s Day.

Smell
I am 18-years-old. I pull open a dresser drawer in dad’s old bedroom, looking for a place to store some clothes while we visit Grandma. The scent of mothballs hits me. I breathe in deeply. The smell is not unpleasant at all. It is Grandma’s house. Clothes and shoes and purses are wrapped and stored in every drawer. I walk out of the room and down the hall to the kitchen. The dizzying scents of butter, eggs, bread, and cinnamon sugar mingle together, beckoning me to get in line for a piece of Grandma’s French toast.

Taste
I am 24-years-old. I peel the thick layer of frosting off the fudge-topped brownie, saving it for last, and begin to eat the cake part. It takes only two or three bites. Then I pick up the soft rectangle of frosting, anticipating the explosion of chocolatey sweetness. Grandma’s brownies. Ten million times better than Betty Crocker.

Sound
I am 30-years-old. My phone rings (and we do not yet have caller ID). “Carrie, this is Grandma,” she always announces. She need not have said anything. I can tell it’s her during the pause between picking up the phone and hearing her voice. I know her by the very breath she takes as she starts to speak her first syllable.

Touch
I am 39-years-old. I’m sitting on the couch in Grandma’s new place, watching Grandma talk and visit with my husband and three daughters. My 6-year-old cannot stop touching Grandma. The little girl takes the 98-year-old woman’s hands and strokes them.

She places her cheek against Grandma’s cheek. She rubs the age spots on Grandma’s arms, gently exploring the paper-thin skin that hangs from the fragile bones. Curiously, I reach out to touch Grandma’s hands. I can feel the birdlike bones. I wonder at the unimaginable softness of her skin. Like my daughter, I touch Grandma.

The 6-year-old curls up next to her great-grandmother. The two of them are both frail in appearance, whisper-thin with large brown eyes, yet their tiny frames belie an unbreakable toughness. The beauty of them sitting together is exquisite. I find I am holding my breath as I watch them. One with the flawless skin of extreme youth, the other heavily lined with decades of living into extreme old age.

All three of my girls gravitate towards Grandma, holding her hands as we walk down the hall and out to the car, escorting her proudly as she walks unassisted through the restaurant to our table for lunch. I watch my Grandma watching my children as they eat, her smile wide and delighted.

We do not know it then, but it is the last meal they will share with her. I am the lucky one. In the fall, I stop in Minneapolis to do some publicity as part of my paperback book release.

October 2013
I haven’t told Grandma that I am coming to town. I want to surprise her, but I know she prides herself on always dressing beautifully, and it is best to give her time to get ready. So I call from the airport to tell her I am here and ask if I can pick her up for lunch in an hour.

She comes to the door, hair and makeup freshly done, perfectly dressed. We talk about my sister’s upcoming wedding, about Grandma’s new friends in her apartment building, and about where we should go for lunch.

“Can you believe you will turn 99 in April?” I exclaim. She laughs and replies, “I only need to hang on for one more year after that, and I’ll reach a hundred! When I ask my doctor what I should be doing, he says, ‘Ruthy, I should be asking YOU what I should be doing!'” Her eyes glitter as she shares the story proudly.

January 2014
I buy a ticket to visit my grandma. The travel date is for 10 days from now. The day after I buy the ticket, my mom calls. Grandma has died. I sit on an airplane with my children and my husband, flying to Minneapolis in the middle of winter, tears streaming down my cheeks. Toward Grandma, the center of joy.

Seventeen of us, just a fraction of the number who have flown into town, are congregated in my hotel room. Six of the great-granddaughters are jumping on the bed, laughing and screaming with happiness at being together. The adults are sharing stories about Grandma Ruthy.

Her death is not a tragedy. She lived a long and full life. But her death is a great loss, especially because she was mentally sharp and competent until the end. I lost the grandma I knew. She was a woman who always chose life.

Born in April of 1915, she lived through a great amount of history, and even when she faced hardships, such as the loss of her own mother at age 12 and the loss of her first husband when her boys were young, she moved forward with grace, dignity and hope. She was a survivor who created a world of happiness and stability for her family. She was always up for a good story, a little mischief, and a lively party.

It seems impossible that she is not here. I look around to make sure it is true. And then I know. She is here. She lives on in the family she created, in the love we share, in the legacy of her children and her children’s children, and her children’s children’s children, all who knew her and loved her. May her memory be for a blessing, now and always.

Follow Carrie Goldman on Twitter and Facebook
Check out Carrie’s award-winning book

Read More: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/carrie-goldman/a-life-lived-in-nine-decades_b_4599082.html?utm_hp_ref=women&ir=Women?utm_hp_ref=women&ir=Women

Inspirational Woman Of The Day: Natalie Gouche’

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Natalie started her career in social media as a frustrated small business owner looking to expand her global reach. She used social media to attract customers, grow sales in her health business and brand her name. In less than 6 months Natalie was able to quit her corporate job and triple her income using only online strategies. It was then that she decided to train and empower others on how to effectively use the social media-marketing platform to grow their business. She can be found around the Los Angeles training, speaking and teaching as well as doing webinars for her international clients.

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A Message From The Creator