Pop. When you've had a ski accident and your knee has blown up to the size of a watermelon, a doctor will probably ask you what sound your joint made when you fell. Snap, crack or pop? Snap or crack is good. You've probably just broken something. Pop, and that's a ligament gone. In my case, an anterior cruciate ligament.

While surgeons and physios can do brilliant things rebuilding your body for the slopes, rebuilding confidence is another matter. And if it's confidence on piste you lack, there really is only one place to go - the US.

Europe has atmosphere, chocolate box-style chalets and instructors who can show you faultless, sublime technique (including how to ski backwards smoking a Gitane and talking into a mobile). But Stateside, it's less about how you look and more about how you feel: they build you up from the inside, make you feel good, then make you look good - Chicken Soup for the Snow.

In Stowe, Vermont, they've taken things one step further for female skiers like me in search of a bit of TLC. "We noticed that women seemed to be losing interest in skiing," says Kristi Robertson, head of Women In Motion, Stowe's exclusive ski programme developed by women for women. "Maybe they had been scared by a difficult run or fall and started thinking that skiing wasn't a sport for them any more. We wanted to offer women something to boost their confidence, maybe move them off their 'I'm never going to improve' plateau."

Unlike most ski schools, which make you perform a small (and often humiliating) selection of your best turns before grading you into groups, Women In Motion sessions start with a cosy meeting. Over coffee and blueberry muffins, you're greeted by lots of Martha Stewart-style tips on how to keep your boots toastie with homemade warmers (sew two squares of fabric together, fill with rice and heat for two minutes in the microwave). Group stretching on the floor of the Tex-Mex restaurant follows. Then you're asked not about your ability but what you want to get out of your tuition.

Being a little nervous - this was the first time I'd put on skis since the accident - I decided that I'd like to conquer "intermediate runs, no bumps". None of the over-60s, of which there was a good mini-bus full, joined me. They were already eagerly securing bifocals into their goggles for the "double diamonds, extra bumps" group.

For some reason, the slopes in New England, from Killington to Stowe, have earned themselves an unfounded reputation for being "easy". But this isn't entirely true. While Stowe may not have the dramatic peaks of the Alps or Rockies, it does have a respectable amount of diamond (black) and hairy double diamond runs spread over 480 acres - hence the Women In Motion Piste Pounding class for speed demons. But if "easy'" means that 59% of the mountain is given over to intermediate terrain that is so well marked and groomed you never accidentally find yourself on the top of a 90-degree vertical drop o, then I'll take "easy" any day of the week.

This just adds another feather to the Women In Motion's confidence-building cap. There's plenty of stuff to start you on gently, without ever having to risk dipping your ski tip into the psychological trauma of a black run. And patient guiding is guaranteed. There's no more than seven pupils to an instructor and no chance of children or blokes with big egos joining in - this is strictly women only.

The three others in my class were, comfortingly, the same standard as me, and we exchanged stories of injuries, falls and admitted to the odd weeping fit on particularly bad ski sessions. All of us had partners who were good skiers, and we often felt we were holding them up when we skied together. "I hear this all the time," says Robertson. "We've found women tend to ski differently and not always to their true potential when skiing with men.

"Often when men are around, women succumb to fear - maybe because they are pushed a bit too far, a bit too soon. This fear stops them progressing. They reach what I call the 'Yike Zone'. They find themselves on a tricky piece of terrain and think 'Yikes, I can't do it.' The reason Women In Motion has been so successful is because other women understand what it's like to be, sometimes irrationally, scared. We'll completely secure a skier's trust before taking them into the Yike Zone, then we'll ski it with them and prove to them that they do have the skills to get through it. And once they've done it, they'll know they can do it again."

But progress is slow. Once we'd done a run, we'd do it again and again, trying a small technique and improving it each time. Instructions were kept precise but simple. "Knees to the trees" to help curve a turn. "Nose, knee, toes, keep 'em in line" to ensure good posture. "It's not ice, it's just loud snow."

This softly, softly approach is designed to commit the technique to muscle memory, and while it may seem a little dull to do the same thing over and over, by the second day I did find my turns becoming easier, the technique becoming more natural. Remarkably, the bad habit of zig-zagging that I'd unwittingly developed over the years began giving way to rounded curves. By day three, I found myself badgering our instructor, Cynthia, to let me try some tougher runs, to test out my improved technique. For the first time in my skiing career, I actually wanted to take a look at the Yike Zone (just a little bit). My competitive side was coming out. If the other women in my group could do it, then so could I.

The evangelical amateur psychology of Women In Motion, however schmaltzy, works. It's worth flying for seven hours and then driving another three just to get there. The fact that you can relax in the spa at the Stoweflake after a session, soak up the New England charm (and maple syrup) in family-run restaurants and hotels, bargain hunt at the outlet stores in Manchester, visit the home of Ben & Jerry's ice-cream, snow shoe, ice skate, sleigh ride, you name it, makes Stowe the perfect women-friendly destination.

Way to go

Getting there: Inghams (020- 8780 4433, inghams.co.uk) offers seven nights' room-only at the four-star Green Mountain Inn Hotel from £425pp including return flights and coach transfers. A pre-bookable six-day adult lift pass costs from £212, six-day adult ski and boot hire starts from £102 and three days' ski school starts from £86. Women In Motion ski clinic is bookable locally and costs from $65 per day.

Further information: Vermont Tourism (020-7771 7022, skivermont.co.uk). In Stowe,+ 802 253 3500, stowe.com/services/lessons_women.php.
Country code: 00 1.
Time difference: - 5hrs.
Flight time London-Boston: 7hrs.
£1 = 1.58 dollars.