Hasitha Adhikariarachchi
“Was your partner a virgin before you met him?” the GP at the Medical Centre asked me.
“I don’t know. At least that’s what I like to think…” I answered, puzzled by his question.
“Australian couples cheat all the time. They say they don’t, but they do. That’s why we recommend a pap smear to all sexually active women.”
That was a real conversation I had with a GP who was annoyed when I asked him,
“What is a pap smear?”
It seemed like he got angry when I popped that question. He looked disgusted and didn’t want to answer me, so he decided to be rude instead of elaborating. Even in 2020, even for doctors, female genitals are still locked away in the closet.
The first time I read that women are moon goddesses because our menstrual cycles are 28 days, just like the lunar cycles, I was fascinated. Before that, I used to think the moon could only make women grow mermaid tails at Mako Island. (You know that TV show…) Now, I’m more and more fascinated by what our vaginas and the rest of our reproductive organs are capable of, whether we are goddesses or not. But I’m saddened by how reproductive health topics are considered taboo by some people.
I was glad when Carmen Maria Machado wrote about ‘tickling the very end of a balloon’s string’, referring to clitoral stimulation. I’m grateful for the bestselling She Comes First, a guide to pleasuring women, and the age-old book Kama Sutra. We need more fearless and beautiful descriptions of sex rather than titillating our imaginations, because porn is teaching both men and women about sex and hardly any of it is true. Even speculative fiction like The Handmaid’s Tale is a source of truth, but there’s only so much writers can do.
Back to my pap smear! The nurse who booked the pap smear was sweet.
“Do you prefer a lady doctor?” she asked, as if she had read my mind.
“Yes, oh yes.” After the unpleasant conversation with the doctor that day, I had made up my mind: I was going to stick strictly to female doctors.
The morning of the exam, I shaved my lady parts to make them presentable to the doctor. Then I went to the doctor’s office at the Medical Centre, wearing a skirt. Once I arrived, the doctor directed me to the consulting room.
“Could you remove your underwear and lie down on the table?” the doctor instructed me.
Done. But then I got all these thoughts running in my head. Why do tampon commercials use blue liquid?
The doctor covered me with a white sheet and instructed me to spread my legs while keeping the soles of my feet touching each other.
I could not stop hearing my own voice in my head. There will always be a mansplainer who exploits virginal insecurities of a woman as a weapon of control. He will instruct her how to clean her vagina because it is too gross, all based on his locker-room discussions on human anatomy.
I sensed the doctor examining my outer vagina, and the voice in my head went off again. Why do some men expect women to have intimate parts with no dark patches, no wrinkles, no hair, almost like that of a little girl? Do all these men have disgusting pedophile fantasies?
“I’m going to start the procedure now,” the doctor informed me.
There will be a woman lecturing another woman that she might be too loose down there for her man after having children.
Although I couldn’t see what was happening between my legs because of the white sheet, from the pressure in my pelvic area, I figured that the doctor was inserting the speculum.
Huh! Who’s going to tell women that pelvic exercises can tighten after giving birth or a C-section?
“The procedure is completed now. Thank you. You should get test results after six weeks.” The doctor sounded very kind.
One unpleasant conversation with a male doctor made me choose female doctors for my entire life. Was I stereotyping men?
I got dressed and sat on the chair next to the doctor.
“Doctor, is it true that the ‘husband stitch’ is still practiced in Australia?”
The doctor stopped what she was doing and looked at me in surprise. Her eyes met mine, and I knew we were both on the same team.
“I don’t believe so. I have an older patient who told me that she heard the midwife telling her husband that she had put in an extra stitch for him. After childbirth, repairs are sometimes necessary, but an extra stitch is utter nonsense. It’s not the size of the opening to the vagina, but the condition of the vaginal walls themselves that impacts on tone and tightness.”
“Then hasn’t that practice been born from a misconception? Why don’t more people talk about this in public?”
“Such an open culture must be nurtured. In the end, though, you can’t legislate for culture. But each of us women can certainly help.”
I sighed. I knew the doctor meant well.
But being intimate and open about our intimate parts is a burden we must take upon ourselves, as always. Society is not prepared to stop hiding and call things by what they really are.
