Every time my brother-in-law drove me home, I would black out and wake up sore. My husband just laughed and said I was out of shape. After the fourth trip, I hid a voice recorder in my purse — and that night I heard a phone call that made me realize the blackouts had never been accidents.

I told them what I knew, which was not very much.

I asked to be examined. I asked for the full set of tests, including the ones that look for what might have been in a bottle of water, and I told them it had happened four times.

The timing was poor and they told me so, gently, straight away.

I was more than seventy hours out from the fourth drive. Nearly three weeks out from the third. Four months from the second.

They did everything anyway.

They were extremely kind to me and not one person in that building made me feel foolish.

A nurse called Delphine sat with me for about forty minutes and did not once tell me to calm down, and she brought me a tea I did not drink.

The examination found nothing.

I am going to say that plainly because it is the single most important sentence in this account for a great many women who are going to read it.