I can honestly say that reading this book was a pivotal moment in my life. It came through my door on an afternoon in February, the day it was published, which was coincidently World Book Day. I read it cover to cover that same afternoon. It was the first book I’d read of it’s kind and since that day my outlook on the whole grey area of Sex and Relationships Education has been changed forever. It was that day that I decided I wanted to strive to make a difference in this sector to help Sex Education be more inclusive and accessible to everyone. It’s a human right to understand our own bodies.

The Introduction and first chapter ‘A Sex Re-Education’ thoroughly shocked me and the cogs started turning. I was reminiscing my own Sex Education and realising that I was incorrect in thinking that due to being educated in the noughties that I’d be fully clued up on this topic. Surely in this day and age, I should’ve been taught all there is to know about my body? Right? Wrong.

There was so much information I had been deprived of. The Eve Appeal did a study in 2016 where 1,000 adult British women were asked to name female genitalia. Hundreds of them failed to the point where a staggering 60% were unable to identify their vulva. This statistic stuck out in my brain like a sore thumb and to this day I still haven’t been able to shake it. I was one of those women who couldn’t identify my own basic anatomy. I felt that I’d been done a massive disservice by the education system and by women-hood as a whole.

Sex education has not been working. Statistics back this statement up. As a society, we are too scared to teach people about one of the utmost important things to the human race. In science, sex is taught in terms of reproduction, purely to reproduce and create another generation. It’s a scientific approach. In PSHE it’s taught in terms of consent and safety. When will we teach teenagers about the pleasurable and fascinating side of our bodies? And what about the parts of the female body that aren’t directly for reproducing but still affect us on a monthly basis?

Lynn discusses in detail The Facts, The Hymen, The Clitoris, The Orgasm, Appearances, Periods, Pain, Fertility, Pregnancy and Menopause. So many of these essential topics are missing from the Sex Education curriculum, and there I could finally see it right in front of me. ‘The clitoris has been unmentioned, overlooked and deleted’ teachers won’t talk about it for fear of being inappropriate. Girls all over the world have their first period and don’t know what it is. Many women have never orgasmed. FGM (female genital mutilation) is more common than you’d like to believe. The hymen is seen as a symbol of virginity, but it’s not a ‘covering’ made to be broken on the first penetration. In fact, it’s not a covering at all. Women and men experience an ‘orgasm gap’ of 95% of straight men surveyed saying they usually always orgasm from sex compared to only 65% of straight women. The list of simple human biology we are unaware and uneducated about goes on and on.

I’ve learnt so much since picking this book up. I’ve now read an abundance of books about women’s health and I can confirm that women’s bodies are incredible. Reading this book has led me to become the Social Media Designer for my university’s Sexpression Society. I post on all our social platforms, educating about Sex and Relationships. We all deserve to know the truth about our bodies. I would recommend this book to anyone, men included, to educate yourself on the phenomenal things the female body can do.

And finally, food for thought, I’ll leave you with this: if you truly think that Sex Education has been equally based on women as it has on men, I challenge you to draw and label as many parts of the penis as you can. And then do this again for a vulva. I can assure you the results will be far from equal.