“She’s never been partial to shackles or chains; she’s too old for breaking and too young to tame.” — Kris Kristofferson
If you’re an independent thinker and have never been partial to others defining who you are, Women Untamed is for you...welcome!
I’m Mary Anne Graf, and I’ve been in women’s healthcare all this life and possibly others. By age four I knew I’d be a nurse, and both nursing and a wonderful period as certified nurse-midwife and women’s health nurse-practitioner jump-started my life-long interest in how to communicate to achieve better health outcomes and healthier, happier women and families. That led to learning about effective marketing communications, and the resultant good fortune to have business success as an international consultant and VP of a regional health system. And communications also led to generations theory, my current research and speaking focus. But helping women to improve their health and lives, and the lives of those we love and guide, remains my north star, Women Untamed will blend all of that with background information from economics, finance, politics, social studies, and multiple other disciplines…what’s behind the headlines.
There are several of us anchoring this site and we’d love to have you join the party—participating in comments and chats, or as a guest writer thought leader. And when we’ve proven our value, we hope you’ll become a supporting subscriber. Either way, you keep the good in this world happening. Email us about what you like, what we should do less of, and what’s missing in our content, and please suggest topics you’d like to hear more about!
Ground rules
Our health system isn’t working well for providers or patients as recent events brought to the forefront, and the system arguably works least well for women and children. If you’re pregnant, for instance, the CIA Factbook lists 121 countries where your odds of living through it are better than here—countries like Iran, Syria and several ____stans, none well-known for enhancing women’s lives. 80% of maternal deaths are preventable. The US maternal mortality rate is ranked worst among developed countries, and declined even more over the last two decades, full speed ahead in the wrong direction. All this in supposedly the best healthcare system in the world. So, yes, this site recognizes the problem of prioritizing just about anything over the health and wellbeing of women and children—our future generations and leaders—and you’ll see echoes of that throughout.
We also have great respect for the right of other people and organizations to think and believe differently; there wouldn’t have been any business success without that. So if you have a thoughtful differing opinion on anything you see here, you’ll find Women Untamed welcoming and and fair. More:
Women Untamed is about women and our lives: Our aging parents, our spouses and partners, our kids and grands, and all those we love and guide at home, at work and in the community. Please stay relatively on topic.
We’re always looking for expertise, thoughts, and opinions: welcome! And particularly if you’d like to write a guest piece, hurry and email us, please! Same thing if you see some news we’ve missed; we'll all thank you!
We love actual data, and links to data are encouraged.
Short-term rants allowed as long as they don’t get personal. Viewers who feel a need revert to kindergarten-level name-calling will be put in a therapeutic time-out and/or referred to play elsewhere.
Let us know if we should have some other ground rules; we appreciate tips before we need to react to something we hadn’t thought of. We’re new-ish on Substack, but not to women’s health and lives.
Stay up-to-date
We’ll post news and views here for both paid and free subscribers. Paid subscriptions—which support the team bringing you this site—will start new perks in March 2025; our one page news digest will start being available to paid subscribers only then. You’re busy—we’ll watch the news for you and send you a quick view digest with links. And for immediate gratification, make sure you get the Substack app.
Why subscribe?
We’re new here—but HCI has been around for decades with clients you’ll recognize on four continents. Until you find Women Untamed meaningful, please visit and participate at no fee. But we can promise you this will be robust—it’s our primary focus now. And it’s not just mag doing all this. So anything you can chip in to support the effort will be greatly appreciated!
Join the team
Watch soon for guest writers who are thought leaders in areas that impact our lives daily…and if you’re interested in being featured, just email is; we’d love to hear from you…become an active part of a community of women who share your interests and passions.
To learn more about the tech platform that powers this publication, visit Substack.com.
