it’s amazing how radblr has invented whole cloth a canon of “radical feminist” thought that has almost nothing to do with any movement history and draws almost exclusively on a bunch of bloggers and like, five books, only half of which are by even self-proclaimed radical feminists

“I once had a patient come with a suspected ovarian cancer, ascitis and all. Turns out the tumor was in the uterus, and had legs. It was a babyoma.”

Always take a pregnancy test….

huh, cool

Ok real talk I need some advice from my fellows people with vaginas

I often get "cramps" which is actually spasms just within the entrance of the birth canal and sometimes through my whole groin and sharp stabbing pains in my cervix like someone is jabbing it with an icepick

And everyone else has either told me I'm lying because that's not what cramps are like and "you can't feel pain like in your cervix"

Or just ignores me

TBC I do also get regular cramps in my lower abdomen or lower back at the same time but the jabbing cervix pain is the worst part

Also I get ice pick pain at random times in my cycle. It's not tied to period pain exclusively though it happens more then and it's not linked to clotting because it happens even though I had an my uterine lining removed

But people have told me my entire life that my uterine pain and bleeding was normal even when I couldn't walk because of it and was fainting

So I don't really trust the medical professionals in my life

ETA my actual fucking question

Is this normal?

Does anyone else experience this?

What the fuck it?

I've had it happen since I started puberty

frank discussion of gynecological issues and frustrations with OBGYNs (especially re: chronic illness) under the cut, but I guess also potentially useful information for people who want to hear about it

so... some of you might remember when I was going to OGBYNs a little while ago. I have endometriosis and PMDD diagnoses, so going to OBGYNs isn't exactly unusual for me, but I ended up going to see more than I usually do.

this was largely because the hormonal therapy that I was taking for those disorders was starting to fail and I was bleeding a lot. like... for weeks at a time over a period of months. I had to deal with some... frustrating OBGYN advice in this time (such as the rage-inducing "well, women have to bleed") but I also discovered that like... I mean, I think I always knew that I had more vaginal pain than other people I know, but a lot of things hurt me so I just kind of... ignored it?

but they tried to put me on the nuva ring for a little while during this period and my body just... straight-up rejected it. it hurt like a bitch to put in, it kept coming out, I could feel it in there and it hurt, etc.

I ended up comparing notes with some other people I know and realized that my problems with insertion were probably more severe than I'd thought. like, it is not unusual for me to cry during pap smears and have cramping for days afterward. I cannot use tampons without massive pain. your body is not really supposed to physically expel something like a nuva ring several times a day. tmi I guess but I have not found penetration of any kind pleasant.

so I talked to... I want to say four or five different OBGYNs in this period, and none of them gave me a real reason for this. the prevailing attitude was mostly "oh yeah, that happens sometimes. lmao."

the best I could get was a diagnosis of "vaginismus" on my chart, and when I pressed for more information, they basically told me it was a psychological thing where your body is afraid of penetration so it clenches up and won't unclench. they literally grilled me on my history of sexual abuse to see if they could find the source of my dick phobia.

now... not to get too into it, but I do have a history of CSA -- but my pain problems predate it. I got my period relatively early and I've never been able to use tampons or anything like them. every time I've tried has ended in literal tears. again, cramping pain for days, even after the period itself has stopped.

so I get the dick phobia diagnosis from two different doctors, but one of them says she can do a transvaginal ultrasound if I'm really worried. we do this and it is uh. excruciating, honestly. thank god it was in California and they let me get high as a kite.

in the end, they can't find anything "physically" wrong with why I'm in pain and they send me on my way, dick phobia dx in hand.

today. today. YEARS later. I am googling tips on how to try a menstrual cup if you have vaginismus (prep for the trip abroad; I don't like Japanese pads) and I see someone saying "oh, I'm glad that treatment worked for you, my problems are because of ehlers-danlos syndrome."

you know, one of the chronic illnesses I have and one that I divulged to every OBGYN I saw.

what.

paging Dr. Google!!!

I come to find out that folks that have EDS, because of their connective tissue issues and extremely brittle skin, sometimes deal with extreme gynecological pain. it's partially pelvic floor issues, partially the fact that the skin in your vagina is breaking.

so all those times that I said "it feels like it's cutting me" or "it feels like knives" were probably because it was fucking cutting me. all those times I said I felt scraped raw for days was probably because abrasions take a long time to heal when you have EDS.

I cannot believe. I cannot believe. that I went into so many different OBGYNs who told me that my pain issues were because I had a psychological fear of dicks and when I told them I was a lesbian were like "oh well then problem solved" when actually my body was physically tearing. I had even seen blood sometimes and it had always been dismissed as spotting.

the anger I feel rn is indescribable, tbh. I never bought that my problems were all in my head (probably because doctors used that line on me so often when I was a kid and getting other chronic illnesses diagnosed) but the fact that gynecological health science is still so fucking awful that we shrug off pain that is the symptom of dangerous chronic illnesses as "well that happens sometimes" or "have you considered that maybe you're afraid of sex?"

I JUST

this reminds me of when I had to find out from a fucking tumblr post that vaginal secretions are made from blood rather than glands, so if you have bad blood pressure/flow it'll often cause itchiness/dryness/pain. bad blood flow like... idk... maybe POTS.

so again, it was actually one of my known chronic illnesses causing gynecological issues, not any of the other bullshit reasons doctors were giving me, like age or stress.

I hate that I'm fucking 33 years old and I still have to learn stuff like this from google searches. I still don't know how my shitty body works, and it's largely because of stuff like this. what the fuck. I'm so mad. why do doctors still treat vaginas like a fucking scary mystery?

I'm well aware that Dr. Google doesn't always know what the fuck it's talking about, but apparently neither do my doctors! which is why, yet again, I'm up all night reading medical journals in the vain attempt to figure out how to actually live my life!

ugh!!!

So I have terrible menstruations and my doctor booked me an appointment to a gynecologist I've been dreading. I'm a repulsed aroace and do not want anything down there. So the day finally came, there's many different people there, some have "whatever, it's a part of life" energy, others "I'm not here, you might see me but I'm not here!", etc. So the doctor calls my name and I go in as fast as I can. So she throws one look at me and "It's a standard question, but do you have a boyfriend? Girlfriend with a strap-on or anything like that?" "Nope" I reply "so you have no interest in sex or the like?", "nope" (she looks at me as if she could see that I was aroace from a mile away). "Given what you've told me, you have no interest in sex toys either?" "no, never used them", "good, then you aren't likely to get virus and bacteria that usually sticks to those". She then prescribed a medication that might help me not get menstruations again and we agreed that I'd take ultrasound to see if there is anything wrong next appointment, and while still scary is it better than halfway lying down with my legs open and someone doing something in there.

I'm so relieved! And she was such a good doctor! It wasn't awkward, I wasn't shamed for being aroace, not told "you'll find someone eventually" or anything like that. Even though I didn't directly say that I'm aroace, I felt accepted. I was a little afraid I'd get a lecture about "you should probably have a child soon as you aren't in your prime anymore" or anything like that, but there wasn't, just acceptance and warmth.

Idk if anyone is interested but I thought I’d put it out there because the other day I was talking w my therapist and she said when people have a negative experience with something they’re WAY more likely to tell everyone they know and when they have a good or neutral experience they don’t think much of it SO I’d like to put something positive out there for anyone who might be in the position I was in.

So anyway here’s my experience getting my first pap smear, as someone with an INSANE amount of anxiety about it:

I try to keep some less than pleasant personal stuff off this blog but I’ve got a decently sized medical phobia, general mistrust of gynecology after reading too many horror stories, and some weirdness about gender/sexuality/body (???) I don’t entirely understand myself. I also understand that maintaining personal health is important even if it’s scary so when my doctor told me it was time to make an appointment with a gynecologist, I did it, then spent the next 3 weeks having nightmares, anxiety attacks, and experiencing a general sense of impending doom as the appointment approached.

Things my therapist and I talked about before hand included:

1.) save your stress for the future, if it goes good, great! If it goes poorly, you’re allowed to be stressed then . Don’t make yourself suffer unless you need to.

2.) know what accommodations you want and be prepared to ask for them confidently and clearly. I wanted the smallest speculum, a warning BEFORE any and all touching, and to be able to stop at any moment.

The appointment eventually did arrive and while I was still a ball of nerves I got myself there and obediently went through the steps of registering as a patient and remaining sane in the waiting room, I was called to the back (if you have a support person you want to bring with you you can but I went alone) and chatted with the nurse about health history etc, this pretty much resembled your standard doctors appointment, they take your heart rate, BP, etc. the nurse wrapped up and told me the doctor would be in in a minute, I should undress from the waist down, and showed me a cloth (which was basically a really big napkin) I could cover my lap with. I definitely went pale at this and if my high blood pressure didn’t tip her off she definitely knew I was internally freaking out. She offered to have the doctor come in first if that would make me more comfortable and I declined.

I was left alone to undress, it feels really weird to take off your pants in an office with fluorescent lighting, after a minute the doctor knocked then came in (there’s also a curtain in front of the door so nobody walking past can just see you pants-less) she was a very kind woman who asked me some questions about it being my first time, at this point I was prepared to say my demands but I was very shocked when she beat me to it! She outright offered the smallest speculum and said “I’m going to show you the tools, we’ll talk through the procedure, and we’ll decide if a Pap smear is something we want to do today” which made me instantly feel so much better. My other surprise was how SMALL the smallest speculum was! It was about the size of my pointer finger. If it had been larger I honestly don’t know if I could have done the procedure but once I realized it was tiny I knew it’d be ok. (Also side note: it feels really weird to talk with someone while pants-less and holding a big napkin over your crotch)

I was instructed to lay on the exam table, which was really low to the ground when I got on it then raised up like a dentists chair, the little foot holds popped out from underneath it and I was instructed to put my feet in the holds and scoot all the way to the edge, I kept looking at the doctor through this and was told that during the exam I would have to look up at the ceiling. She warned me before even the slightest touch (“I’m going to put my hand on your thigh now”) asked if I was ready, when I said yes she inserted the speculum, which felt weird but not painful, it didn’t even feel painful when it opened. Just strange. Then the doctor took a cell scraping which felt REALLY weird for a part of the body not used to that sensation at all. It felt scratchy and then for a brief second their was a bit of pain (I’d rate like a 3 out of 10) and I thought “if this lasts any longer I can’t do this” but it was really only a split second and the worst moment was also the end. The speculum was quickly removed making the Pap smear a total of like 30 seconds max. Then the doctor told me she would check my uterus and ovaries and (still maintaining consent and giving warning) inserted a finger and pressed with her other hand hard on my stomach, this didn’t hurt either and the pressure/rubbing on my stomach made it so I wasn’t thinking about her other hand at all! Then I was allowed to sit up again, close my legs, the doctor asked if I had any questions and I was out of there!

Anyway hopefully this can help someone out there I tried to include all the details I had wanted while doing frantic research before hand, if you’re in the same boat, you can do this!

From hero to villain, activists have rewritten the narrative surrounding Dr. James Marion Sims. Discover the shocking reality behind the so-called “father of gynecology” and his inhumane treatment of enslaved African American women.

“Unlike a drama queen called the testicle, the ovary is very grateful and loves to come back to life after you uncoil it.”

Trans men & transmascs of Tumblr, I need advice from anyone who has undergone a gynecological exam, pap smear, IUD insertion, etc.

Any tips on managing discomfort & dysphoria for this kind of procedure?

(Feel free to respond to this post or DM me directly. I understand that this can be a pretty personal topic, but any responses would be appreciated.)

CMedical

To a surprising degree, healthcare today still focuses on aspects of the science that were adopted during the witch-hunts: the spirit of aggressive domination and the hatred of women; belief in the omnipotence of science and of those who exercise it, but also in the separation of body and mind, and in a cold rationalism, shorn of all emotion. To begin with, the medical realm tends to perpetuate the impulse to dominate and subjugate, the beginnings of which Carolyn Merchant plots out in her book. And sometimes this is taken to cartoonish lengths: in December 2017, a British surgeon was tried for lasering his initials onto the livers of two patients during organ-transplant operations. And this attitude can be at its worst in practice on female patients. First, as Florence Montreynaud notes, "Women's organs are mapped out with men's names," like flags affixed to various parts of our anatomy. She explains:

“The canals connecting each ovary to the uterus were, until 1997, known as the Fallopian Tubes, after the Italian surgeon who first described them in detail in the sixteenth century—before they became the uterine tubes. The little sacs inside the ovaries where, between puberty and the menopause, an ovocyte matures every month are the Graafian follicles, named after Regnier de Graaf, a Dutch doctor in the seventeenth century. The glands that secrete liquid moistening the vulva and vaginal opening are called Bartholin's glands, after the seventeenth-century Danish anatomist. Worse still, in the twentieth century a pleasure zone within the vagina was given the appellation the ‘G-spot,’ celebrating the initial of the German doctor Ernst Grägenberg.

“Imagine the equivalent for men: Garrett Ander-son's corpus cavernosum or J. C. Wright's canals . . .”

Men's stranglehold on the profession is far from a broadly abstract force, either. The world of healthcare—especially when it comes to gynecology and reproductive rights—seems keen to exercise ongoing control over women's bodies and to ensure its own unlimited access to them. As if in never-ending reiteration of the joint project of taming nature and women, it seems these bodies must always be reduced to passivity, to ensure their obedience. For example, Martin Winckler questions why, in France, the annual gynecological check-up is considered an "immutable ritual," a "sacred obligation," from puberty onward, even if were in perfect health. According to Winkler, there is no justification for this practice.

“The idea that we must undergo ‘from the onset of sexual activity, and then every year’ a gynecological exam, a breast exam and a smear test ‘so as not to miss anything’ (i.e., in order not to miss a cervical, ovarian or breast cancer) is medically unsubstantiated, especially for women younger than thirty, among whom cancers are very rare and, in any case and as a rule, tend not to be discovered in generalist check-ups. And then, a year later, if the patient is doing well, the doctor can renew her contraceptive prescription without examining her! Why? It's quite simple: if the woman is feeling well, the likelihood that the doctor will find ‘something’ is almost nil. Then, frankly, why harass her about the check-up in the first place?”

Why indeed? This ritual turns out to have some grim stories associated with it. Winckler recounts the case of two adolescents whose doctor (also the mayor of their local authority) insisted on a gynecological and breast exam every three months. But the point of the institution, whether annual or more frequent, appears to be ideological more than anything else: it's about maintaining surveillance of women's bodies. Blogger and journalist Marie-Hélène Lahaye notes the eloquent title of a French obstetricians and gynecologists newsletter which, in June 2016, opposed widening the remit of independent midwives: the doctors denounced measures that would damage women's "medical surveillance . . ." For Mary Daly, this ritual perpetuates a state of anxiety in women from all walks of society—a situation comparable to that born of the pressures of beauty conventions— and constitutes a substantial drain on their resources.

Many doctors are so sure of their rights that they can cross the line into illegality without even noticing. In 2015, an internal note sent out by the South Lyon medical faculty inviting its gynecology students to practice vaginal examinations on patients sedated for operations was picked up online. On social media, as Marie-Hélène Lahaye reports, numerous doctors and students were offended by reminders that every medical action requires the patient's consent and that the introduction of fingers into the vagina meets the legal definition of rape. Some of them protested that there was "nothing sexual" in the practice and that they took "no pleasure at all" in it, thereby offering a brand-new and daring revision to the definition of rape. Others jumped from frying pan to fire by arguing that, if they were to respect procedure and request the patients' authorization, the latter might well refuse it. After reading and hearing from these quarters that vaginal and rectal exams were neutral acts without any sexual aspect, Lahaye suggested on Twitter that, in this case, the medical students could train in this work by practicing on each other: "I admit this was not received with wild enthusiasm."

Another problematic ritual: the parade of medical personnel who show up when a woman is in the midst of giving birth and each in turn insert two fingers into her vagina to assess her cervical dilation, without requesting consent nor even informing her beforehand, and sometimes without being overly gentle either. Lahaye invites us to imagine the equivalent for other body parts: you are at the dentist and, at regular intervals, unfamiliar people come into the room and insert their fingers into your mouth; or you are seeing a specialist for a rectal exam and a dozen people take turns putting their finger into your anus . . . "Such a practice," Lahaye concludes, "is inconceivable in any of the medical disciplines except obstetrics, the one that's all about access to women's genitals." We see here, in an extreme form, the assumption that women's bodies belong to everyone but themselves, which is found to differing degrees throughout society and explains why we are not expected to kick up a fuss over the odd pat on the bottom.

-Mona Chollet, In Defense of Witches: The Legacy of the Witch Hunts and Why Women are Still on Trial

putting under a cut so people can read the tags first or ignore completely, i want people to have the chance to not have to look 👍

by “physical exam” i’m referring to being touched by your doctor “down there”. asking because i have, no malpractice took place, being touched down there was just kinda awful for me. even if you haven’t cried i’d like to hear if you consider it especially awful and are comfortable sharing, i just feel really alone in this as every adult i go to (meaning my mom and grandma essentially) say suck it up.

i’m terrified about doing this yearly when i’m 18, which it happening this year, and i have another appointment about period problems in the morning and i expect a physical exam to be necessary.

ok i'm annoyed

probably mentioned it before but i'm from germany. in germany you can pretty much get cervical screening done as soon as you're a teenager. it's even recommended and pretty normalised to have it at that age. i think i started going when i was 18. and every single time i had it done i got some results about weird cells or something and to come back in 6 months. i did, and it happened again. it happened 3 times in total. the last time i couldn't go back because i moved to england soon after. i thought i'd just do it here.

well, fucking wrong.

i moved here in late 2019. my 6 months were over in march 2020. i think we all know what happened there. so i thought fuck it, i'll have to wait. april 2021 is when i called my gp about this. they told me i was "too young" to have cervical screening (i was twenty-fucking-two. lots of germans get it done at like 16). i told them about my previous weird results. they asked for the letters.

so i had to call my old fucking german gyno to get my letters and then i had to get them translated. i gave them to the receptionist in person and booked an appointment. i legit thought that appointment would be a cervical screening but it was a waste of time. they told me again i was too young. they didn't have my letters either because somehow they fucking lost them. i said i'd give them to them again. i was told they'd send the letters to a hospital and let them decide whether it's necessary or not and get back to me.

well, no one ever got back to me.

idk if they lost my stuff again or just never sent it or never told me what the hospital said. but at that point i was done trying to get them to take me seriously (plus i was also on the long odyssey of trying to get mental health care).

guess what i got in the mail today, over 2 years later? a fucking invitation to cervical screening since i'll be turning 25 in december! oh fucking great. they lose my shit, tell me i'm too young and now act all concerned when i've been walking around with fuck knows what.

and this is the worst possible time because normally i'd ring them immediately to get an appointment but i'll be moving soon and idk how long it takes to get the results and the change of address might fuck it up.

(also the secret trans hope that something is wrong with my cervix and uterus so they just take it out)

Hey if you have a uterus and a cervix I have information that you need to know

I did not know, until the infection has spread, that thrush (also known as a yeast infection) if it's high enough inside it might not present with stereotypical symptoms

I did not have any of the normal thrush symptoms which are:

Whitish, odourless vaginal discharge

Persistent burning

Itching

Redness

Swelling,

Soreness of the vagina and vulva

I had NONE of those

Instead I had pain in my cervix

It felt like someone was squeezing my cervix in a fist at first and later like I was being stabbed in that area. This was my ONLY symptom and because it was so high up it spread to be all over pelvic pain

So if you're experiencing unusual pelvic/cervical pain and it's not really bad it's useful to get a swab from the doctor and/or try treating it for thrush. If you're in severe pain go to the doctor/hospital. This is if it's just discomfort or mild pain

I just want to share this information because I had NO IDEA this could happen until it happened to me so I'm sure I'm not the only one