Women who blaze trails are badasses.

They inspire us to stand tall, speak up, and lean in. We look to them for clues about how to forge our career paths, ways to balance personal and professional goals, and ultimately how to be and do better in the world.

Gail Shister fought her way into the good-ole-boys club of sports media. Jeanne Holm became the first female general in the Air Force. Justice Sandra Day O’Connor broke the 191-year streak of a woman-free Supreme Court. Physicist Sally Ride went all the way to outer space.

So what does it mean to be the only woman in a roomful of men? And what can we learn from the women who have been there?

Welcome to The Only Woman in the Room, an open collection on Medium curated by LadyBits.

We want to hear from comedians, engineers, chefs, architects, ice hockey players, chemists, surgeons, master sommeliers, Marines, and everyone in between.

You don’t have to be an astronaut, a senator, or the CEO of a Fortune 500 company to participate. (Although, hey, we’d love to hear from you, too.) And we welcome your story, even if you’re not literally the only woman in the room.

Maybe you’re one of just a handful of women in your office, or the only woman on the board of your company. Maybe you work with other women but you’re the only person of your ethnicity, or the only one with a disability. Maybe you spent your formative years in a houseful of brothers. Maybe you’re a transgendered woman who grew up going to an all-boys school.

Bottom line: We’re interested in you and your unique experiences.

What does it feel like to be the only woman in the room? What did you learn? And what advice do you have for someone in a similar situation?

We believe that by sharing these stories, we can inspire women to forge ahead undaunted despite being outnumbered. We also hope to prompt reflection among men and women who find themselves in rooms where women are underrepresented.

How this works

Anyone with a Medium account can publish an essay to the Only Woman in the Room collection and share it anywhere online.

We’ll hand-pick our favorite essays to cross-post into the LadyBits collection. Our team will offer our editorial guidance and copy editing to make sure your work is in the best possible condition. We’ll also distribute your articles through our social media channels to make sure a bunch of other smarties get to read your ideas.

You can share your story in words, photos, videos, drawings, GIFs — basically, however you want.

Our Goals

The purpose of this exercise is to provide a platform and support network for individuals interested in changing the ratio. We want everyone to better understand what women are up against. And we want all women to feel like they can go anywhere and do anything.

Our hope is that by providing people with a better understanding of the nuances surrounding this issue, we will all be better equipped to support everyone’s goals — personal and professional — going forward.

Guidelines

A lot of people have had painful experiences as the only woman in the room. This is a safe place to share the full spectrum of how you feel and the scary details of what you may have been through. It’s okay to be angry — more than okay! — but we ask that you also find ways to be respectful and constructive. We want to move forward together.

Please be judicious about identifying individuals. Any posts containing slanderous, threatening, or defamatory language will be reported.

Additional resources from the editors at Medium: Style Sheet, Best Practices Guide, Rules, etc. Send questions about the submission process to ladybitsladies@gmail.com.

In the meantime, feel free to reach out to the curator of this collection any time with story ideas, questions, comments, or just to say hi: Adrienne LaFrance is @AdrienneLaF on Twitter.

We can’t wait to hear from you.