“I felt it shelter to speak to you.”

-- Emily Dickinson

I have always dreamed of ‘women at heart’ as an online community where we can interact and support each other. To bring this vision to life, I want to resurrect a ‘women at heart’ forum. There was a forum on the site some time ago, but the spammers got in and in frustration, I shut it down. But I’ve decided I’m not going to let the spammers win!

It’s particularly important that we have a vehicle for connection right now. Stress levels for humanity are very high. How do we look after ourselves when we get stressed?

Research has found that men and women respond quite differently to stress. Forgive the generalizations here, but men tend to retreat into isolation and become quiet. Women, on the other hand, need to connect and experience situations of caring.

The hormone oxytocin stimulates stress reduction in women. Oxytocin levels rise when we receive sharing, caring and nurturing from others, and also when we care and give service to others. A forum offers a perfect tool to keep our collective oxytocin high.

When we share, we usually aren’t looking for solutions for our problems. We just need to speak our truth and know that our words have been heard. We can be there for each other.

But I need your help. The structure for a new forum has been in place for one month, and already – even without promotion – it has been invaded by spammers. To my horror, it’s been primarily porn. I really don’t want to expose any of you to that. I’m also not willing to monitor the forum twice a day to keep it clean.

Do any of you know how to resolve this? Please email me your suggestions. I’m holding the vision!

~ Patrice

“Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family. Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one.”

-- Jane Howard