From the category archives:

Women

Quo Vadis?

December 11, 2009

I  am rarely ever able to take advice. And, despite what you may be thinking, this isn’t a roundabout way for me to say that I listen to Papa Roach and fasten my pants with a belt buckle shaped like a gun. Instead, it’s a way to express that sometimes I am just a different kind of moron.

When I was in middle school, I made myself look like Eddie Munster’s twin, only with more hair product and eyeliner. My dad, as delicately as could be, suggested I go the more natural route. However, that only caused me to increase the amount of hair spray I used, which curiously seemed to have a direct relationship with the number of people who would be willing to see my boobs.

When I was in high school, my parents pleaded with me to take driver’s ed so I could get my license and have a life outside of watching Shipmates and fashioning dildos out of tampons. I refused, mostly because I was too busy taking Latin online. As a result, I got my license at the age of 21.

When I was in college, I was urged to major in anything other than Art History in order to ensure that my degree would mean more than my ability to offer up the history of the paper it was printed on.

But, I own my mistakes. I would even go so far as to say that I cuddle my mistakes at night and seductively whisper in their ear that they’re not mistakes in my eyes and they’ll be all like ‘You’re just saying that’ and I’ll just kind of smile since they have no idea. Because for me, my mistakes comprise a chain of the happiest accidents I could ever hope for. I was hideous for years, which meant that it didn’t matter that I had no life in high school, which then led to me majoring in Art History because really, the only thing more tailored for losers would’ve been ‘Anime’, and here I am – grateful for all of it.

This is why I think Steven Ward should be hung by his scrotum from a meat hook and forced to drink Clamato while watching re-runs of Night Court. If you’re unfamiliar with the name, I don’t blame you. But, Steven Ward is a self-proclaimed matchmaker who asserts that he is, “on a mission to bring love into peoples’ lives one soul at a time.”  Since bringing love into peoples’ lives goes hand in hand with having a reality show on VH1, guess how I know about this poor man’s Matt LeBlanc?

Sexualtension

They're totally fucking.

He, along with his mother JoAnn, host Tough Love – a show full of so much bullshit, it makes Dick Cheney look like the kind of guy you’d go out drinking with and trust to drive your car back at the end of the night. The premise is simple – assemble a group of women who can’t find men because of commitment issues, career obsession, body image or all of the above. Then, he fixes them by instructing that they all stop being such sluts. With its assumption that women need to take it upon themselves to keep a relationship or risk being thrown away like an old pair of underwear because the elastic has broken, Tough Love is a feminist’s worst nightmare. Luckily, I’m not a feminist. I’m just kind of irked in a way that makes me uncomfortable. The differences may be negligible, I understand, but I don’t want to harp about slut shame or how this show, along with Tucker Max, hurts society.

My issue is that choice is stripped of these women all so they can find a man with just the right amount of tribal tattoos as to be bad ass, but at the same time employable. They are advised on how to conduct themselves in the company of men (usually this means that they don’t say anything at all) and since most of these women are both dependent on alcohol and estranged from their child’s father, it is not pessimistic of me to assume that they will make mistakes along the way. The biggest one most likely being that they signed up to be on a VH1 reality show. But they’re Steve Ward’s mistakes as delivered to him by the umbilical cord he undoubtedly still shares with his mother.

Point is – never take anyone’s advice seriously. Unless of course it’s coming from a 20-something who just ate a sleeve of Oreos in her Snuggie. Only then does it make sense.

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SILS: The Diva Cup

June 21, 2009

I’ve mentioned this before, but I’m moving. Since this is less like the kind of move where you are offered a job and compelled to leave your familiar yet comfortable surroundings because 150k plus benefits is just too good to pass up, and more like the kind where you are completely nauseated by the fact that there are at least 15 cash advance establishments nearby and need to get out as soon as possible even though there’s no guarantee of employment or housing, I feel the need to save money wherever I can. So far, I’ve gone back on birth control to cut out the cost of condoms, and now, I’ve finally dropped $20 on a Diva Cup so that sinking $5-7 a month in tampons can be a thing of the past. The money I save not buying condoms and tampons equals out to about $300 a year ($240 for condoms*, $60 for tampons), which means one less month I have to pimp out my boyfriend to service the fine gentlemen of the Pacific NW.

I’ve contemplated the Diva Cup for years now, lurking on the many forums dedicated to it, trying to figure out if it was something that could work for me. I’ve noticed a lot of apprehension about it–concerns about whether it would actually fit, stay in, or even work properly without causing leaks. It’s easy to get behind the fear associated with something that can only be found in between the patchouli oil and cacao nibs at Whole Foods, but I assure you it’s unwarranted.

divacup1

There are a lot of wonderful things about the Diva Cup, but the name and package design aren’t among them. For a product that is ahead of its time in health and environmental consciousness, it is way behind in debunking the myth that women will buy anything pink and will pay double for anything with flowers on it. That aside, since the Diva Cup can be used for up to 10 years (although they recommend that it is replaced once every year), there is an undeniable economic advantage over tampons and pads . Other more comforting aspects include the fact that you’re no longer promoting the growth of landfills or putting yourself at risk for Toxic Shock Syndrome. As far as comfort and insertion are concerned, I can’t say that I notice much of a difference. I did have to learn a new method of insertion by folding the Diva Cup into a ‘U’ shape, but after a few tries, it became second nature and is now just as comfortable as a tampon. As an added bonus, I can use the Diva Cup after sex as a semen catcher which automatically makes it worth double the original cost.

I admit that part of me mourns the loss of the overly pink and perfumed feminine care aisle, because while I wouldn’t say I was proud to buy tampons every month, it was a tradition that involuntarily became part of my identity as a woman. As superficial as it is to buy a box of tampons displaying an unnaturally happy woman doing a toe touch and call it being a woman, it was something I was able to relate to, and in retrospect, something that I am ultimately glad to be rid of.

*If you happen to be in the market for an obscene number of condoms, I recommend  http://www.undercovercondoms.com/ and more specifically, the Trojan Supras.

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I had a dream I came up with a good title for this post but I forgot it

May 19, 2009

In this installment of “reasons why I should emancipate myself from my vagina”, I just found out I have a yeast infection. My pap results came back, and it was a good news, bad news situation. Good news–I don’t have cancer. Bad news–I have a fucking yeast infection. I was instructed to cure it with an over the counter 3-day treatment, but I resisted since I didn’t think I had any symptoms relating to a yeast infection, and as was implied by my doctor based on the scant amount of yeast found, I figured it would go away on its own. Of course that wasn’t the case, and I’m clearly missing a few chromosomes for thinking that my doctor was just chewing the fat when she was on the phone with me, you know–trying to fill the awkward silence with a real conversation starter like, “you have a yeast infection.”

picture-4

I resisted treating myself because I was convinced that my UTI was, as usual, still loitering. I stand by what I said a few months ago about legitimately having a UTI, because my urinalysis came back with a +3 reading of blood, which is apparently as high as it gets aside from “dead.” I was given a week long course of antibiotics, and even though I still experienced a very slight burning sensation when I peed, I shrugged and thought, “Can’t win them all.” I think what happened (and I DID pass Biology with a C so try to stay with me), is that my UTI and subsequent antibiotic treatment seamlessly transitioned into a yeast infection, which just convinced me that I still had a residual UTI. Since I’ve dealt with UTI symptoms for all of my adult life, I got used to it and started popping Macrobid , which considering that I actually had a yeast infection the whole time, was kind of like treating a heart attack with pizza.

It’s my first one (that I know of), and I’m surprised because I always thought having a yeast infection was kind of like having crabs but less taboo. Sure, everyone experiences the symptoms differently, but the Monistat commercials would have you believe that having a yeast infection is the modern way to have a child out of wedlock. This usually means that you’re required to wear cashmere lounge-wear, stare out of the rain soaked window pane of your beach house as you cozy up to a Danielle Steele novel and ride it out with a scarlet “Y” firmly affixed to the front of your Burberry Nova Check robe. Fortunately, I haven’t experienced any clumpy discharge (goodbye forever, appetite), and surprisingly, I haven’t even been afflicted with the meth-addict level itching. I admit to using the vulvar cream that came with my 3-day pack, because there was some itching, but (in keeping with the general theme here of “I’m a dumb ass”), I attributed it to the fact that a week of Spinning had my vagina making babies with a bike seat.

Anyway, I cheaped out and bought the generic drug store brand pack, because when I saw that Monistat was $25 I was like, “What the fuck, I’m not dying.” I really didn’t know what to expect, and when I got home to study the directions for 2 hours, I had flashbacks to the first time I put a tampon in or used a pregnancy test. It was just another one of those things that falls into the sickeningly labeled feminine care category where the commercials are put through a Disney filter and are therefore, so sterile that they could be selling car insurance or Mentos. I know there’s a fine line between selling feminine care products and…porn, but showing the box from 13 different angles and repeating words like “Fresh”, “Carefree” and “Gentle” is doing it wrong. Do you know how I know this? Because when I found out that the ovule had to be pushed into the vagina as far as it will go with a plunger that resembled E.T.’s finger, I felt supremely cheated, wondering why I had to lie on my back with my knees up near my ears to prevent leakage while it seemed that all of the other women who used this got to giggle and take their Yorkie to the dog park while they engineered a way to exercise their new found vaginal freedom by chatting up the cute guy with the Great Dane because of course he has to have a Great Dane since the size difference between the Yorkie and the Great Dane is charming and makes you really root for these two.

It’s the last time I buy generic, that’s for sure.

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I Will Be Your Father Figure

May 14, 2009

I started birth control because my really abrasive Eastern European doctor, knowing I was sexually active, asked me what form of birth control I used at the time, and when I said, “condoms”, she replied with, “…and you think that’s wise?” Without giving me time for a rebuttal (which probably would’ve been something like, “your mom”), she had already written me a prescription for Alesse. I was on that for about one year and I remember none of it. I know I had a lot of sex and was thrilled that I didn’t have to mess with latex condoms anymore, but adverse side effects are hard to pin down because any irritability could’ve been attributed to the fact that I was living in Washington D.C. and hated the fact that the nearest Target was at least 30 minutes away in a car I didn’t have.

After my prescription for Alesse ran out, I wanted to try something different. Luckily, I had a new doctor who didn’t have a portrait of Mikhail Gorbachev staring back at me as I spread my lips for someone who, if given the chance, would’ve probably used a scythe instead of a speculum, so I was able to explore my options. My impulse was to try a new method with one of those trendy commercials of professional women dancing to contemporary music with their friends, staying out late and drinking appletinis because they can. However, that same impulse sometimes urges me to buy The Lizzie McGuire Movie on DVD and watch until the Cheetos run out, so I squashed it immediately and just stuck with a prescription for Yasmin. I was initially impressed with the purple velour packaging, and its defense against PMDD, but the honeymoon soon wore off once I realized that I hate velour and PMDD is complete and utter bullshit. I was on Yasmin for about 6 months, and stopped the day I vowed to never beg my then boyfriend to fuck me again.

I refilled what was left of my prescription nearly one year later, once I started a new relationship. At first, we were both thrilled at the idea of being able to fuck anywhere with little to no preparation. However, as tension grew between us, it became apparent that the birth control was altering my mood and causing us to have more conflict than what would be normal for two people, one of which was still living with an ex, the other who was out of the dating game for years and therefore having a hard time figuring out how to make room for someone else in their life. If this sounds off to you, you’re onto something because it’s more laughable than David Hasselhoff’s music career. Our problems eclipsed the Hindenburg in explosiveness, because I needed constant support and reassurance while he was used to a solitary life of Corn Flakes and The West Wing.

hasselhoff_with_puppies

We both bickered back and forth about the fate of my uterus, he cited some of its negative side effects and I resisted, knowing that it was of no consequence for me to go off birth control, but a good feminist didn’t listen to any man (this, I’ve learned, is more popularly known as shortsightedness). While I didn’t believe that birth control was entirely to blame, it was the only bargaining chip I had and the only way I could conceivably excuse myself for being a major cunt, so I quit taking my pills. I didn’t feel optimistic about anything at that point, knowing that it was very possible that we just weren’t compatible and were going through a trial of heartbreaking hopelessness, resting our expectations on the elimination of a dose of hormones.

Of course now I realize that our respective emotional IQs didn’t even add up to cover bus fare, but at the time, we needed something to control and choosing whether or not to take a pill was the easiest option. We were simply avoiding the inevitability of actually having to talk to one another and in the process, putting our concerns and insecurities out on the table. One of the hardest things I’ve had to do is share with someone who could identify my pubic hair in a lineup that I was irrationally afraid of being cheated on or worried that our relationship would morph into a sexless and tepid platonic bond. For me though, I knew I had to do it to explain my derisive outbursts, because ultimately it would’ve been even more difficult to watch a relationship that I truly cared about unravel due to my own inability to be an adult and claim my own, sometimes grotesque, humanity.

I’ve recently gone back on birth control, this time with Ortho Tri-Cyclin Lo, which is a low dose pill that should produce fewer side effects. It’s understandably a sensitive subject in my relationship, but it was openly discussed and for the first time in my reproductive history, I’ve been able to make a command decision to do what’s best for me and my individual circumstances. I don’t necessarily relish the thought of putting synthetic hormones into my body, but I feel it’s the right choice to make as someone who will soon be voluntarily and indefinitely unemployed. I know that being pregnant and broke in movies means that you can have a baby in Wal-Mart and somehow meet the love of your life, or at the very least Seth Rogen will show up to smoke pot and rent a shitty apartment for you to live in, but something tells me I won’t be so lucky.

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