Threads combines quotes and excerpts (from a wide range of places including self-help publications, academic sources, zines), writings, personal stories, illustrations and images. It’s a collection of information, thoughts and ideas that were the basis of workshops that looked at the experiences and politics of the menstrual cycle and what gets called ‘PMS’, and which included information and discussion about female anatomy and sexuality. The motivation for those workshops was to share information and discussion about things as they are experienced in the broader social, political and economic contexts we are living in. The info from those workshops was all collated into the book and ideas were expanded on. Part One looks in detail at changes that can be experienced during the menstrual cycle (like changes in body fluid secretions, position of the womb/ cervix and os, changes in body temperature and changes in energy, sensory perception, dreams etc). Part Four expands on some of the changes that can be experienced during the menstrual cycle and discusses what gets called ‘PMS’ or pre menstrual syndrome. It looks at how and why western medicine defines a whole breadth of experiences women can have as illness. Part Two looks at the history of western anatomy and at different understandings of the human body (like Chinese Medicine) and then has a load of information about female anatomy and sexuality that has come directly from women’s own observations and experiences. Part Three discusses in detail how western medicine describes and defines the female body. It critiques the medical model of menstruation and looks at some different understandings of menstruation that predate reductionist western science and from different cultures. In Part Three there is also an outline of how awareness of the changes that can happen during the menstrual cycle (Part One) can be used as a method of contraception.