What happens at girls' night...

Last night I had a girls’ night with some friends, which is always fun and entertaining. However, much like Las Vegas, what happens at girls’ night, stays at girls’ night.

Well, for the most part anyway…

A few weeks ago, over dinner with a couple of these friends, it was decided that at our upcoming girls’ night, I’d bring my dilator sets. They’d seen pictures of both sets, as well as the particular sizes I was working with, but it’s very hard to get the proper perspective from a picture on a phone.

As I was saying, over dinner with my friends the decision was made, so I packed everything up yesterday and headed to my friend’s house. Now, this isn’t something you just dive right into or whip out as soon as you walk through the door (see what I did there?), so there was no specific plan about doing some show-and-tell, with one exception. I wanted to be sure that my friend’s elementary-school-aged son had gone to bed. I’m pretty sure she didn’t want to have to explain to an 8-year-old kid exactly what the dilators were used for.

After a few hours of laughter and chit chat (and possibly a small amount of wine consumption), it was time. I mean, it took a full hour before the topic of breasts became part of the conversation (we all have them, so it wasn’t a stretch). Then another hour or so before penises came up (see what I did there again?). It figures that vaginas were the next logical topic of conversation. (What? You’ve never been part of a girls’ night?? Nothing is usually off limits.)

Now, it’s a strange thing to me to just pull the dilators out and start laying them on a table, but that’s what I did.

Not lined up on a table, but this time on a counter top. Going from left to right, sizes are 6.25 x 4.75, 5.25 x 4.25, 4.75 x 3.75 and 4 x 3.25. And smaller, of course. but I don't have those measurements.

My only request was to be careful with the pink set I have as one seems to be breaking a little and I still need to keep using it for a while yet. I knew the pink set would be of particular interest since that one vibrates. I realize people will instantly take a sexual connotation to that, but in truth, the vibration is extremely helpful in offsetting the pain of doing the stretching. It’s been helpful in knowing how the stretching with certain sizes is becoming easier when I’m able to dial down the vibration.

Some of the pink sizes match up to some of the white dilators, but some will also fall in between white sizes. It's been beneficial for me to have both sets to use.

I did a very basic explanation of the dilators and showed how the different sizes fit into the handles (because, pardon the need to be graphic, but if part of it goes inside, you still need part of it to be outside because…well, it should be obvious). Having apparently read my blogs before, they didn’t need an explanation of why I was using them or exactly how they work. Mind you, I never make an assumption that anyone has read my blogs, so it was nice that I didn’t have to go into a long spiel over what’s going on with me.

Bahahahahahahahaha Sorry. I have to laugh now that I’ve written that, because when do I have a problem with going into detail and telling people about my vaginismus? I’m just lucky that strangers on the street haven’t had to hear about this. I guess I’ve become passionate about educating people – in obviously very small ways – about this particular issue. Because, as I’ve said before, it matters. If I have to hear about erectile dysfunction nearly every time a commercial comes on the TV, then folks are going to get to hear about this.

Much discussion ensued about which sizes of dilators matched up most accurately with the average penis size. I found this rather educational myself, as I’ve seen a few penises in my time, but short of actually asking someone to do a size comparison, my knowledge might be somewhat lacking. When you have several women in a room together, you get better information.

In the end, the consensus of the women last night is that the size I’ve recently completed working with is, in fact, pretty darned near close to the average penis size.

Well. Good to know.

So, depending on who you ask, I guess my vagina is in good working order and ready to open for business! Woohoo! 

Bahahahahahahahaha Sorry. I had to write that. If you know me at all, then you know that’s not who I am or how I behave. No judgements on anyone else, but my little fling or series of hookups or whatever you want to call it with The Guy last year were an anomaly. That’s not my normal MO. I’m not into casual sex and to be honest, for me it wasn’t something casual. At least, not the decision to (attempt to) have sex with him. Oh, and let’s be clear here, dear readers. We may not have had penetrative vaginal sex, but we had sex. Even if he wanted to call it “non sex”. I was there. I know what we did. It was sex. I think folks need to really have a better understanding of just what that means.

Anyway, there you have it. Based on a committee of four, I’m in pretty good shape these days. I think some of them were slightly traumatized at the thought of anyone attempting to use the larger sized dilators, which are about 6 ¼ - 6 ½ inches long and 4 ¾ in diameter (in case you were wondering). I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it, if I choose to cross that one at all. Cause, y’know, it looks a little painful to me. Just sayin’…

That’s a Long Haul for a Booty Call and Other Things That Can Change Your Life

A while back I was messaging with a friend and during the conversation we were discussing how The Guy and I didn’t live close together (which in situations such as mine can turn out to be a boon and tends to happen when you live in a decent-sized city), so on the occasions when I would go to his place, it was “a long haul for a booty call”. And let’s be real here. That’s what it was. We were hooking up, not having a relationship. I make zero apologies for that, by the way, so feel free not to judge. I had fun. I’m reasonably confident he had fun. No harm, no foul. I’m not claiming I’d repeat the scenario, but I also don’t regret it. That’s such fun, by the way. Being able to walk away at the end of something with no regrets. You should try it some time.

But back to my story…

Today was my last day of in-office physical therapy for vaginismus. In truth, we could have stopped a few weeks ago, but I’d had a bad run of at-home PT before an appointment and really wanted to make sure everything turned back around before calling a complete halt. I knew going in this morning that this would be the end, though. We’d discussed it a few weeks ago and I get the feeling that my physical therapist was waiting for me to bring it up. Not that she wouldn’t have eventually said, “I think we’ve gone as far as we can go”, but she did ask me after each appointment what I thought but it was never quite phrased as “Do you think you need to keep coming back?”

I’d say it was for the best to let me come around to this idea on my own. Just a couple of months ago I’m not sure I could have made that call. The idea of the end of PT freaked me out. Now, however, I’m mentally and physically in a good place, and I think that made all the difference. I’m doing PT on my own 2-3 times a week and working with various sized dilators, introducing larger ones slowly, but surely. Even when there is pain, I realize it’s not always going to be that way and I remember how far I’ve come in the past year. It’s all good. I’ve got this.

I remember in the beginning my therapist said she thought it would take about 8 weeks. Fast forward to today’s appointment and we are 363 days into our association. Hey, I never said I wasn’t uptight! Ha! Probably 6 months ago I was saying that if we were wishing each other a Merry Christmas then it was going to be worrisome, but as that date drew closer, I let that thought go. I started telling myself that however long it took that was just fine and then…I even started to believe it. Yep. I’ve got this.

So now allow me to circle the wagons back around to the beginning and how it’s a long haul for a booty call. Changing the meaning of that a skosh, I laughed – thankfully only in my head and not out loud so that everyone around me would think I was nuts – today when I was thinking about writing something with that title. I realized that, I suppose, it could also be interpreted that this past year has been quite a long haul for, well, y’know, to be able to have sex.

But it’s not about a “booty call” or a “hook up”. I have little-to-no interest in that kind of thing (my involvement with The Guy was a behavioral anomaly, albeit a fun one). This is a quality of life issue. If I’d had sex more recently than…well, I’m not telling you specifics on how long it had been before last year because some things I actually will not share with the masses, but suffice it to say that it would have helped if I’d been more sexually active in the past because then perhaps things would have been working right. Or I’d at least have realized that they weren’t. And it would have helped if any of my doctors over the years had questioned why a pap smear was so excruciatingly painful for me. But I wasn’t and they didn’t.

So yes, in the end, I suppose it’s been a long haul for a booty call. Good thing that’s not really what I’m ultimately interested in. I didn't expect this last year of my life to unfold the way that it did, but as I said earlier, I don't regret it. I've discovered a lot about myself. I'm stronger than I imagined. I have less of a filter than I always thought I did. I've let go of any particular fear about discussing pretty much anything with anyone. And I'm also pretty damned amazing. I think that last one is my favorite.

What a difference a year makes

“What a difference a year makes.” Such a simple yet complex statement. Something happens one day and it can change the course of your week, your year, your life. Every day things happen to us. We have experiences that shape who we are and who we will become. That happened to me last year. It’s been a year.

I realized the other day that it had been exactly one year since I’d discovered I had vaginismus. I didn’t have a name for it yet – that took a few more days, some time spent on Google, and then confirmation from the doctor – but there was a day in early March 2016 that I found out I had a problem. Looking back year later, I’m not sure how I feel about it all.

When I realized what day it was I wondered how I would feel. Would it matter? It’s not like it was an anniversary I wanted to celebrate. That day had not turned out as I’d planned at all. If it had, I might have been in favor of a celebration of some sort. Everybody knows how much I love cake. 😊

I paused a few times that day to take stock of how I was feeling. Was I upset or frustrated? Was I sad or was I feeling empowered by how far I’ve come in a year? Honestly, I don’t know. Maybe felt a combination of all those things. I could never get a clear reading on my emotions.

In late 2014 I’d started a personal journal after not having kept one in probably at least a couple of decades. Knowing I’d written about this, I pulled out the journal today and wanted to see what I’d been thinking and feeling in the immediate aftermath.

Huh. Aftermath. “Something that results or follows from an event, especially one of a disastrous or unfortunate nature; consequence.” That seems like such a strong word to use, but based on the definition, it’s also wildly appropriate. The aftermath of something that should have been so simple and natural and normal was anything but simple, natural or normal.

I don’t like looking back at how I felt late that night or how I felt the next day, because I felt horrible. I felt like a freak. Like something was so very wrong and I was never going to be able to fix it. When you don’t know what’s happening, all you have is fear. The unknown can be terrifying and since I had a partner who wasn’t interested in what was happening, well, that didn’t help. Maybe on some level he was as confused as I was. Maybe he was afraid in some way. Perhaps it was a shot to his manhood that no matter what he did – no matter what we did – there was no way my vagina was going to cooperate that night. I really don’t know what he was thinking or feeling as he was never interested in having any kind of conversation with me about this.

I get that on some level, but I also don’t. I remind myself that we were never particularly great friends, but more people who knew each other, though not well, for a long period of time and I thought we were friends. Had hoped we were. As I said to a friend today, it's easy to be kind and everyone deserves kindness, even if they don't know how to accept it or extend it to other people. He'll always get kindness from me, this friend of mine, even if he doesn't want it. I can be pushy like that.

Now a year has come and gone. I’ve started talking to people about something I never would have imagined I’d be talking about. I’ve gone through countless hours of physical therapy, some of which has been very painful and discouraging, but it’s better now. So much better that, if all goes as planned the next couple of days, when I go for my appointment on Tuesday I’m going to ask the physical therapist if I need to keep coming back. I’m not sure there’s anything more she can do for me. The rest is going to be up to me and I know I won’t stop. I won’t quit or give up. I’ll never stop until I’ve done all I can do to be healthy. It is, as my therapist, doctor, and counselor would all say, a quality of life issue. And I have found in the past year or so that I’m damned determined to have the best quality of life that I can. Because I deserve it.

It’s a Vaginismus Miracle!

True confessions: I stole that title. “A Vaginismus Miracle” is the title of an episode of the Netflix comedy series Lady Dynamite starring comedian Maria Bamford. Episode 8, I think. This is not something I would have found on my own, but oddly enough, The Guy told me about it.

Now, allow me to backtrack a minute because in Shannonland, you can’t tell a story without telling at least 2 stories that lead up to the main event. It’s how I roll.

As I said, The Guy is the one who told me about this show.  I remember being in his house one afternoon, sitting on the couch, talking. Well, I was forcing some conversation. Hey, if you want to touch my boobs, you have to talk to me afterwards. It's the price you pay. 

From the look on his face, our conversation was literally painful for The Guy. Physically and likely mentally, too. Seriously. He was very much “Why in God’s name do we have to talk about this??” and said that he did not understand why someone would talk about this kind of thing. I assume that by “this kind of thing” he meant sex in general. I would argue, of course, that if more folks talked about it then there might be less problems like mine in the world. Just a thought…

Anyhoo, I initiated this particular conversation because it was important to me that he knew that what was happening with my body wasn't his fault. That it was nothing he did or didn’t do. That he couldn't have changed things. (Or could he? Perhaps if his attitude and demeanor had been different then things could have worked differently, but we'll never know. And the two times we actually did attempt to have sex, we hadn’t really had any kind of conversation about what was happening with me because, y’know…naked. Oh, sometimes naked just happens. Not that I’m complaining.) 

During this conversation, he asked me if I had Netflix or access to an account. I said yes, so he told me to find Lady Dynamite and watch Episode 8. I asked why, but all he'd say was that I'd understand when I watched. I said I'd try to watch soon and he said, “No, go home and watch tonight.” Um…ok. Guess he really wanted me to watch. 

Since it seemed to actually matter to him, I did find it on YouTube and watch the next morning. While I don’t care for the comedian or the show particularly (from what I’ve read, she’s very much an acquired taste), it was interesting to see this topic sorta/kinda addressed there. (This posted was edited to remove the video of the show because YouTube had to remove it.)

The show talked about how the day of “Vaginismus” came around once a year as the day that Maria (comedian and main character) needed to have sex in order to keep everything working right “down there”. So while it got the word out to people – literally, the word “vaginismus” – it didn’t exactly tell folks what the disorder is, but I’ll bet it had people Googling to find out if it was something real and by that happening, people were educated. I found a recap show on YouTube about this episode and they actually discussed how the host had thought it was a made-up word until he looked it up and found out it was a real disorder.

Lady Dynamite is about someone dealing with mental illness (bi-polar disorder) and let me be honest here, vaginismus is a mental disorder. It’s a physical one too, but my OBGYN likes to say that “it’s at least 90% mental”. I tend to disagree with that percentage simply because if so much of it is mental, I should be in a better place physically now because my mental state is SO much better than it was a year ago when all this came to light. I think for some people it can be mostly mental, but I’ll always argue that it’s also very much physical as well. And, of course, everyone and every body is going to be different. For a lot of people, it’s about upbringing and how sex was – or wasn’t – discussed in the home and if they were taught that sex was something bad or secretive, then it may have precipitated a problem like this. And that’s a subject for another post on another day. I’m always seeing squirrels and getting off track.

My mental health counselor has said in the past that she believes my body was reacting to my subconscious mind knowing that The Guy was the wrong person for me to be having sex with. That my body shut it all down because deep in my mind, I knew he wasn’t someone I should be with. Hmmmm…interesting idea, I suppose, but I can say unequivocally that I wanted to be with that man, doing what we were doing (or trying to do) and wasn’t nervous about that at all. Heck, I was naked before I even really realized my clothes were coming off and I did not care. DID. NOT. CARE. Well, not in a negative way, at least. Ha! I was all “Yes, please! Let’s get naked!” But it’s certainly nice to care on some level if you’re naked with someone or maybe you shouldn’t be naked with them to begin with. Just sayin’…

That said, I can at least partially buy into the notion that my mind was causing my body to react the way it did due to knowing it wasn’t the right person. My MO is definitely not to be casual about sex and while this was a casual situation, it’s safe to say that I didn’t feel overly casual about it. Oh, it was a bit of a speedy decision to get together, from discussion to decision to actual connection in a matter of maybe 4 hours or less, but we’d been working up to that for a while. I suppose he was “grooming” me, for lack of better wording. Working me around to the place where I’d decide I wanted to have sex with him, rather than making it seem like he was pushing me towards it. He never pushed. He never pulled. Not overtly, anyway and I am well past the age of doing anything that I don’t want to do. That’s why the mental aspect has been a harder thing for me grasp because my mind was a-ok with what was going on, but my body…not so much.

There are too many thoughts to keep going in this post since the original point was about the episode of this TV show. While not totally on point about vaginismus, the big takeaway for me from this was that The Guy was actually paying attention. No, he could not talk to me about the problem. He’d made a few comments when we were together at times, but wouldn’t discuss it when I tried, so I had sent him some very simple information about what was going on, not knowing if he’d really read my messages or not. Telling me about this let me know that he actually had paid attention. Oh, I don’t imagine he sat around giving it a lot of thought overall, but he heard me, even against his will, so to speak. No, that doesn’t make him a hero, but I’ll give him a few points for that. I always say that if talking about this educates just one person, then it’s worth putting my life on display and he verified to me that he was paying attention. Even if only a little bit. I can live with that. I sure hope he can, too.

The scariest thing that happened last year

A lot happened in my life last year, not just my medical diagnosis. I started buying (and wearing) dresses. Lots and lots of dresses. Mostly blue, which is only strange because my favorite color is purple. But I can rock the blue and so I do. (Bad rhyming is quite deliberate, I assure you.) I tried to be more social, which is always a challenge for me. I auditioned for (and was cast in) a play. Ummm…I’m sure I did other things. I must have.

I’ve given this some thought, however, and there is one thing that is overwhelmingly frightening about the past year and this entire experience with vaginismus…the fact that at some point I let a man see me naked.

Nothing scared me quite so much this past Halloween season as the fact that I let The Guy see me naked. I apologize for putting the vision of me naked in anyone’s head, so it’s ok. Scream and get it out of your system. I can wait. *pausing to put in ear plugs to avoid actually hearing the screams of the masses*

When I stop and give ANY thought whatsoever to this, I'm slightly traumatized. Oh, not because we were naked – that happened so fast I’m not sure I realized it until my clothes were off – but because I’m not sure how the sight of my large, white derrière didn't blind The Guy for life.

I don’t know anyone who seems really comfortable with someone seeing them naked for the first time. Maybe those people exist and I may even know some of them, but I can’t name names (because most sane people do not talk about this kind of thing). Allowing someone to see you that way is allowing yourself to be very vulnerable. You are literally putting it all out there without being sure how the other person is going to react.

Of course, if you are in a romantic moment, then one can assume that the other party is going to react in a positive manner or, at the very least, be so caught up in the moment that they don’t react in a negative manner. Once again, since The Guy seems to still be alive and well with all vision intact, I’m going to assume he survived any possible trauma.

Does it really matter what someone else thinks? Well, sure it does! Nobody wants to believe they were found lacking and certainly, if anyone treats you that way it’s time to move on. I mean, if you can’t appreciate what you see, I’m not letting you look anymore. It only seems fair.

That said, still…I’m quite surprised I was ok with letting a man – someone who was, in many respects, a stranger – see me naked since it had been a while. Having been involved in community theater since I was a kid, I actually don’t have any big qualms about changing clothes in front of people, male or female. It’s simply doing what needs to be done to get the show on the road. But taking every stitch of clothing off my body and letting someone look at it? Well, yeah…it still kind of freaks me out.

But I recovered and I’m better all around for the experience. What another person thinks of my body isn’t nearly as important as what I think of it and I’m quite proud of my body. Oh, I have NO plans to run around showing it off to anyone. I am infinitely more modest that one might assume. But I know how hard I’ve worked to lose weight and tone up places. I have more places that need some toning up, but I’ll get there and if I don’t? Well, so be it. Plus, I conquered the fear of letting a man see me naked. Heck, I might even consider doing it again some time. And that, my friends, is what I think we can call body confidence.

Ok. Now when does the funny stuff start happening?

I decided to start this blog on kind of a whim, I suppose, but also because I wanted to be able to put the stories I tell some friends into a more public forum with the hope that some people may find them funny and also that perhaps they will find them helpful. Maybe even inspirational, though I’d beg to differ if anyone ever called me that. Let’s go with “supportive” as possibly a better word.

Maybe folks will read this and maybe they won’t. I will likely never know, but I’ll have put metaphorical pen to paper and shared my journey. Plus, my friend Ruby will totally laugh. I think I collect most of the stories for her benefit. I’m grateful to have an appreciative audience and a supportive one as well. Goodness knows I’m full of enough nonsense and if I’m lucky, perhaps a little good sense as well. Time will tell.

When I first publicly shared my story in a blog with a link posted to Facebook (and at last count, the entry had nearly 650 page views, which is so cool), a friend of mine created the hashtag #allupinmyvagina. Oh, I laughed and laughed and laughed when I saw that. I wish I could remember what I said exactly that prompted that, but I must have said that I didn’t really want to let everyone all up in my vagina. And yet…I kind of am. 

Talking about the problem helps educate people. It makes it less taboo and hopefully someone out there who knows me or knows someone who knows me and has heard about my situation will be able to get the help that they need because they were educated. Because they heard the word “vaginismus” for the first time and looked it up and realized that’s what they are dealing with too. 

Laughing about the problem, well, that’s necessary to me. You either laugh or you cry and I’d much rather laugh. Oh, I have cried now and then because of the frustration or because of the pain, but I laugh A LOT about the whole situation.  I keep threatening to develop a stand-up comedy routine all about this, but we’ll see. I could see it all lending itself to being a monologue or two for some kind of performance, but we’ll see. Right now this blog will work.

I still laugh when I think about the first night I went to The Guy’s house with the intention of having sex. Having sex with a man I had not seen in YEARS and who I had never thought about in that way until a few months prior. Someone I never had known very well and still didn’t, in spite of flirting and texting and sexting. (Yeah, that’s right. I said it. I’ve been sexting. But…y’know…not lately or anything. Which is kind of depressing so I’m going to stop talking about it immediately.) But yet we thought nothing could possibly go wrong with this plan. I’d show up, we’d get naked and have a good time, I’d go home and life would go on.

Bahahahahahahahahahahahahaha 😂😂😂😂😂

I’m sorry. Gimme a minute. I’m going to start crying I’m laughing so hard.

There’s a saying that goes something like, “How do you make God laugh? Tell him what your plans are.” Oh yeah. God was laughing that night. Not in a mean way, but at my naiveté. At the notion that nothing was going to go wrong here. I mean, why would it?? Doesn’t everyone decide to get naked with someone they really don’t know very well? Doesn’t that always end well? Suuuuure it does. Now lemme sell you this bridge I got in Brooklyn.

I could beat myself up about all that, but what’s the point? I’d say “all’s well that ends well”, but it didn’t end well. Not that night. He wasn’t happy. I wasn’t happy. Various parts of our anatomy were definitely not happy. 

But you know what? I’m happy today, right now, as I write this. Because if it hadn’t been for that night nearly a year ago and if it hadn’t been for The Guy (yes, that’s how I’m going to refer to him because if he’s reading this he knows who he is and I can’t say that anyone else needs to but me) I’m not sure when I’d have found out about this problem. So things might not have ended well that night, but they will end well ultimately. Oh, not because we’ll ever be saving sex, because that ship has sailed, but because knowledge is power and I’m going to get this sorted out. And start telling lube jokes the next time I post. Y’all really have no idea how many funny situations can happen due to the use of personal lubrication products. If you’re reading this, I hope you’ll stay tuned for future updates. I think it might be worth it.