Gentlemen, please take care of your vaginas.

I’ve decided the single most useful aspect of the entire internet is the fact that I just made an appointment with my gynecologist for my annual PAP smear on-line without any actual human interaction.  When explaining to my coworkers the joy of making one more step of the awkward experience remote, the conversation took an unusual turn.  One of my colleagues told me that if he had a vagina, he “would destroy it within a day.” Destroy it?  A vagina? 

While vaginal novelty is obviously very exciting, destruction hardly seems indicated.  I have a persistent mental image of my associate sporting a smirk of giddy deviance, holding a stick of dynamite and a lighter, and skulking off to destroy his newfangled vagina.  With an unchecked need for vaginal annihilation, dudes clearly cannot be trusted with general va-jay-jay maintenance. 

Just the lead up to the actual PAP would be enough to scare most dudes away.  Where will you turn to find the person who will be one of the few people on the planet to get up close and personal with your cervix?  With which stranger would you like to discuss your sexual history and future?  What traits do you look for in a person you pay to get elbow deep in your hoohah? 

It’s funny to see what girls say they like about their gynecologist, as visiting the OB/GYN is about as comfortable an experience as the fire turds you get after you’ve eaten really spicy food.  It’s a necessary evil.  We don’t typically say our doctor is hot, funny, or fun; we don’t really want a winning personality or striking good looks in a GYN.  Two themes seem fairly persistent with the ladies whom I’ve discussed doctor choices:  Their doctor either has her own vagina as well, or their doctor does not have cold hands.  Personally, I don’t care about the gender of my physician.  I will be having an out of body experience as much as possible during this procedure.  The only quality I truly search for in a gynecologist is that he/she can keep the physical examination separate from any questions he/she may need to ask.  Please do not talk to me while you are mining for gold down there. 

Now that you have chosen your gynecologist and gone through the normal trouble of finding a time in which you are available to be violated, you get to prepare for the big event.  The morning of, you may find yourself in the shower with a razor in one hand and a conundrum in the other.  Just how much presentation do you intend to have?  You don’t want to be unkempt, but you don’t really want to dress up your cookie either.  Certainly a little kitty glitter would be over the top.  Would your doctor even appreciate the effort you put into shaving a caduceus on your pubic region?

It’s kind of like how you see your living room when people are coming over.  Normally, you keep it tidy but pay little attention to detail, however the impending arrival of visitors calls for an extra run of the vacuum.  You don’t want to spend all morning staging your vagina to impress the doctor, but you definitely don’t want to be the beaver equivalent of a hoarder’s living room.  Maybe that’s not the best analogy, but you get the gist.  Don’t ever put a vacuum on or in your vagina, even if you’re a hoarder, ladies.  That’s an awkward 911 call waiting to happen, and I know for a fact the medics will laugh at you and tell everyone they know about it. 

Once you reach the facility, you walk straight to the window and make an effort to look at none of the other patients in the eye.  You use your peripheral vision to evaluate and judge the other patients solely on the likelihood that they are there because they are a prostitute.   You decide it’s the busty redhead to your left.  Her name gets called and she smiles as she approaches the nurse holding the door. She’s comfortable here.  Oh yeah, she is definitely a hooker.  You wonder what type of health care coverage call girls get and find yourself proud of that working girl for making a responsible move in the face of herpes and the myriad of other STDs she’s faced with daily.

Once your name gets called, you smile awkwardly at the nurse and realize everyone else just assumed you are a prostitute. Fuckity fuck. 

The nurse leads you to a room where she has an absentminded conversation with you about the weather while she pulls out the equipment the doctor will need for the procedure.  She gives you a paper gown, and tells you to strip down completely, including your undergarments.  Apparently, you are not the first person who has entertained the idea of leaving the panties on.  A pair of panties has always been a poor deterrent for the boyfriends I’ve had, so I don’t understand the big deal. 

You strip down to nothing but socks (I’m a rebel like that, personally), and you don the ill-fitting stationary.  Then you wait approximately one eternity for the doctor while your attention veers to the equipment.  You see a speculum (which looks like a small scale replica of a malicious alien spaceship), lubricant, the largest Q-Tips in existence, and some tubes.  The speculum emits menacing waves of intimidation at you.  You stare it down, refusing to yield to a replica. 

The doctor comes in, and you get a good, long look at a person who has chosen to make a career out of getting all up in various vaginas.  Sure, cookies as impeccable as mine come in for the yearly exam, but people come in with problems, too.   If you really loved poonany, wouldn’t being a gynecologist ruin it?  I mean he/she has got to see some jacked up snatch.  You know Big Red from the waiting room has some miles on that taco. 

The one thing I fixate on when the doctor comes in is the fact that he/she always has a stethoscope.  I sometimes miss thing he/she says because I’m distracted by it.  What the hell are you going to listen to down there?  Where exactly do you plan on putting it?

This is the part where I like to have the question and answer session.  They want to know all about your sexual history, which always makes me feel like a loser.  Yes, I’m 28.  No, I’m not married.  No, I’m not engaged or planning to get married any time soon.  Yes, I have daddy issues.  They never ask if you ever wanted to get married, they just look at you like you’re a sad soul.  The last time I went to my gynecologist, I told him I had recently started dating someone new, and I really liked him.  He sighed, patted my knee, and said, “Well, I like to be optimistic about these things.”  I thought I heard “slut” at the end, but perhaps that’s just how he punctuates. 

Once we talk about your instability in relationships, we move on to feeling you up. You lie on your back and do the YMCA, but only with one arm at a time, while the doctor squishes your boobs around for a while looking for lumps.  He/she usually talks to you during this, but that part isn’t so bad.  At least you can see his/her face and vice versa while you converse.  He/she always asks about how often you do regular breast exams, so you get to feel like a star student for feeling on your own knockers all the time. 

Now, it’s typically time for the main event.  You have to scoot all the way to the end of the table, so that just a little bit of your ass is actually hanging off.  Stirrups come out of the table, and the nurse places your feet in them.  Your feet are the better part of a meter apart, but your knees are firmly together.  The doctor tells you to relax your knees, but you cannot relax them.  You pretend you are in a hammock somewhere pleasant and that there is no reason for your knees to be locked into position, to no avail.  The staff manages to pry your knees apart, and the doctor is ready to go spelunking.

The doctor pulls out the speculum and lubes them up thoroughly.   This is the point at which my doctor typically likes to ask me about work.  Naturally, this is a really pleasant experience for me; if there are three things that go together better than my vagina, a stranger wielding a replica of an evil alien spaceship, and emergency medicine, I would sure like to hear them. 

He/she opens the jaws of life with a loud CLICK! CLICK!  Don’t be alarmed.  While startling, that was not the sound of your vagina being broken.  The bad part goes by pretty quick.  He/she inserts the Q-Tips of cervical destruction, swabs around in there for a few seconds for a sample and gets out.  The doctor knows this isn’t a pleasurable experience for you and has no intention of making it worse.  I have no idea what’s it’s like for Red.  Maybe it’s like a vacation, so the doctor takes plenty of time to air it out. 

Once the jaws of life are removed, the doc goes in for one last round of squishing your nether regions, but this time he/she leaves the medieval torture devices out of the picture.    When my doctor does this, the pressure usually hurts a little, and I once got caught off guard and squeaked.  My doctor told me I was more sensitive than most people there because I “have large ovaries.”  I told my doctor the only logical thing in my mind at the moment: That must be where my superpowers come from. 

Gentlemen, please take care of your vaginas.  A cookie is a terrible thing to waste.