Memoirs

What if everything women were taught about their bodies was incomplete, or dangerously wrong? In Stuff I’d Tell My Sister, Dr. Miriam Mutebi, the first female breast surgeon in Kenya, breaks the silence surrounding breast cancer, women’s bodies, and the systems that too often fail them. With extraordinary clarity and compassion, she takes readers from her childhood in Nairobi to the operating rooms where she confronts not only cancer, but silence, shame, and systems that fail women. She introduces us to young mothers diagnosed while breastfeeding, brides whose futures fracture overnight, grandmothers who have never been taught to touch their own bodies, and surgeons who must fight to be seen in spaces never designed for them. This book is a radical act of sisterhood. Dr. Mutebi speaks directly to women, as a doctor, as an African woman, and as a sister who refuses to let fear or myth decide who lives and who dies. She dismantles dangerous misconceptions about breast cancer, challenges cultural taboos surrounding women’s bodies, and equips readers with practical knowledge about breast health, self-examination, and self-advocacy. Part memoir, part medical guide, and part call to action, this book is a life-saving conversation African women have been denied for far too long. Written with surgical precision and deep moral courage, this book will change how you understand cancer, how you understand women’s bodies, and how you choose to listen to your own.