pumpkin sourdough 🍂

with a side of death eaters, justice (and gratitude) 🪄

She’s crisp, yet soft and ultra (ultra!) fragrant– she’s a pumpkin sourdough bread, with a cinnamon sugar swirl.

(But today I also have for you an incredibly satisfying side of justice. And, oddly enough, not one cooked up by me– but by a group of incredibly brave women, back home in Mexico).

Pumpkin Sourdough Bread 🍂

with a sugar cinnamon swirl!

A must-make sourdough loaf if cozy vibes is what you’re after.

And since she’s veeery lightly sweetened with honey, she’s a good one for both sweet and savory parings alike– think a classic apple butter breakfast toast to one heck of a grilled cheese with smoked gouda and sage butter 🤤.

my top tip: hang out in the kitchen while your loaf is baking for the full sensory experience (and add in a hot toddy for extra measure).

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Now– if you’re also here for some tea, please note that this post does require a trigger warning (but its a sort-of-good trigger warning, as I’m getting the ending I never thought I would: one with actual justice).

in short(ish): after a long couple months this summer of dealing with some health issues (and finally finding out what’s been “wrong with me” all my life*) I was feeling a lot of feelings.

Greatly related to having been gaslighted by the medical system for an entire existence (iykyk)… but mostly due to a particular doctor who I’d seen since I was 8 years old. A doctor who I had some very serious beef with (and not just for failing to diagnose me, within his specialty, during the near twenty years I was his patient).

(*I’m being referred to a geneticist for an official diagnosis, but I should be OK besties and I’ll talk about it when I’m ready)(yes, this is something I will want to talk about even if I don’t need to).

Still. This was all in the past, I’d had years of therapy over what went down during those years… and it was time to let go and move on (or so I thought).

🎶 dung dung dung 🎶

For it was an ordinary late summer evening when I found myself logging into Facebook (for the first time in ages) and scrolling through a high school friend’s stories (who I also hadn’t seen in literal ages)… until I stopped dead on my tracks as the post read something in the lines of:

“Renowned Mexican Orthopedic Surgeon Tried For Sexual Assault”

35 Women Have Come Forward

My heart literally stopped, for as I proceeded to read the name I didn’t know whether my worst nightmare was coming to life… or if I was winning the lottery– for all of a sudden I felt vindicated that everything I’d experienced with him was real.

Ultimately? All of us have variations of the same story: a series of mystery injections and inappropriate consults (leaving it PG here).

(and I personally left many a times feeling incredibly confused… and utterly denigrated)

But today, today I felt angry beyond measure– angry that I wasn’t believed when I tried to make sense of it and speak up about it… over twenty years ago.

I was called a liar, “crazy” and very likely “bipolar” (for I had to be having a psychotic break in order to come up with such terrible lies).

(and if right about now you’re wondering if this is why I was so salty with She Who Must Not Be Named for going out of her way to create the narrative that I was cRaZy during the dissolution of our company… yes, this is why: because I shared with her that I was someone who was called bipolar in order to be psychologically, physically and sexually assaulted)(yup, by the grown ups around me)

But as my grandfather used to say– life has more twists and turns than a scorpion’s tail (or a Swedish cinnamon bun, as I like to say). And the very reason for which I wasn’t believed over twenty years ago, is the very one which ads a hefty weight to the doctor’s charges: that I was a minor when it started.

(I know… I promise I’m ok).

But that’s mainly why, after giving it a lot of thought over the past couple months I’ve decided to come forward publicly (and tell this whole cRaZy story once and for all): because for a very long time I wasn’t ok.

(and also hopefully as a friendly reminder to the grown ups targeting the quiet and pleasing little girls… that they might just grow up to become women with very loud voices… and bring them to justice).

So!

Can you believe, my besties, that the death eaters from my story are coming to life?

Doctor Luis Antonio Hernandez Robledo enters the chat 👀

Yeah, this one seriously blind sided even me (but mark my words when I say that you won’t see the actual ending to my story coming… at all)(I sure didn’t).

But for now, in this week of thanks, I mostly feel an immense amount of gratitude for the group of women who have fought for years to bring the doctor to justice and ensure he never lays hand on another woman (though he’s still practicing medicine, believe it or not).

And I suppose that’s why they say Rome wasn’t built in a day and we have a lot of work to do still– as I’m adding my voice to the group’s main cause: to find each and every single victim of the doctor, and give us all the closure we need.

(so if you have any information please reach out to vamosjuntas.vsabuso@gmail.com)

OK. I’m going to leave it at that for now, because I’ve honestly been overthinking this newsletter for way too long (and we also have a lot of baking to do this year still).

(but also thank you, besties, for reading and supporting me particularly this year through it all… so in a way, for being an important part of my story)(as someone who didn’t have a voice for years, I’m incredibly grateful that I do now).

So first up?

Our pumpkin sourdough loaf (with a cinnamon swirl):

And coming up?

Pumpkin focaccia (with caramelized maple garlic!) and apple flambé brioche cake 💁

(ask a question, post a thought 🤌🏼)(though its OK if you’re speechless today… clearly I’ve been)

xo! Paola