Yes, Vagina, there is a Santa Claus.

Not sure what to get your special lady for Christmas? How about a Pap smear?

Because nothing gives us womens a warm glow on Christmas morning like the anticipation of a cold speculum and an abrading Q-Tip.

Thing is, CBS, it’s kinda like taking the car in for a tune-up. If she doesn’t do it once a year on her own, giving her a coupon for $10 off a visit to Grease Monkey on her birthday is just going to piss her off. So unless you can do it for her, spare her the guilt trip.

She would, however, probably enjoy any number of the alternative gift suggestions provided in the article.

I must confess to being a bit startled by the sound of “Semi-Precious Vaginal Stones.”  Sounds like something one would pass painfully.  “Vaginal Egg” isn’t much better…makes me think of poultry.

And whattup with the “Solar-Powered Vibrator”? I’m all for environmental friendliness, but masturbating on the roof of the house, not so much.

oh hai, im ur hed, sry i esploded

I may have complained mentioned before that I’ve recently been diagnosed with otosclerosis, a disease in which the gradual overgrowth of bone in one’s middle ear results in loss of hearing. It is often accompanied by tinnitus as well as a speaking disorder called What?Huh?Eh?, both of which I also have.

It really sucked at first, mostly because of the tinnitus.  But it’s been several months and things are better.  I got through the initial Freaking the Fuck Out period with only one instance of pacing the street in my pajamas in the middle of the night, and managed to avoid getting addicted to Ambien. I’m getting acclimated to the decreased sounds in my environment and the increased racket in my head, whilst Kevin is getting acclimated to repeating everything he says at least twice.

Given how well things have been going, you can imagine my delight when a new syndrome reared its exploding head.  Yes, we lucky tinnitus sufferers are more likely than others to experience the joy of being startled out of the twilight stage of sleep by what looks and sounds like a bomb going off in our brains.  I would stop, drop and roll if I weren’t already horizontal.

To add insult to injury, apparently I am young to be experiencing this phenomenon. The average age at onset is 58.

So I have hearing loss, exploding head and gray hair.  Everything above the neck appears to be aging faster than the rest of me. It’s only a matter of time before I am sporting dentures and whimsical hats.  I am an old lady trapped in a (relatively) young woman’s (fabulous) body.

That’s not so bad, actually.

Art by Finnish painter Inge Löök via the marvelous Missive Maven.

Technorati Tags: tinnitus, exploding head syndrome, otosclerosis

Of poles and holes: Raising a generation of slutty prudes

Or is it prudish sluts? Anyway…

On the one hand, our “sex ed” classes for teens are mostly about why they shouldn’t have it; we hold “purity balls” (snicker) for girls ‘n their daddies; we suspend girls from school for taking birth control; we fund programs that remind both sexes that the burden of abstinence falls squarely on the girls’ narrow shoulders.

On the other (very busy) hand, for prepubescent and tweens, we have playdates at the spa, padded bras, thongs, high heels,¹ stripper pole toys,  and most recently, stripper pole-as-photo-opp. For teens we have sexting, t-shirts that say stuff like “who needs a brain when you have these” and sport the bunny logo, and yet more stripper poles.

Then when our girls are all grown up and can legally do what we’ve been encouraging them to do-don’t-do for so many years, we slut-shame the shit out of them (and make money off of it).

Interestingly, the only people who seem to be doing anything rational in response to this are the girls themselves, with girlcotts and lawsuits and the like.

Excellent practice to prepare them, the future Sisters of St. Hillary the Dontfuckwithme, for world domination.

or, The Madonna-Whore Complex: the Emotionally Retarded Man’s Guide to Understanding Women.

Technorati Tags: slut-shaming, misogyny, pop culture

1. I didn’t believe this one until I saw with my very own eyes a 4-year-old in high-heeled mules in Target! [↩]

The banality of sadism

It was recently announced that Plan B will soon be available to 17 year old girls without a prescription…

And surprise! the misogynists of the country have been spewing the usual crap about it ever since, which boils down to: “Now our womens ain’t gonna be nothin’ but a bunch of sluts!” whilst the usual double-standard stage-whispers from between the lines: “Condoms should be available for free to 17 year old boys because, well, boys will be boys, you know? But girls will be virgins, dammit!”

So the articles are pretty much run-of-the-mill, yawn-inducing claptrap… except the one by CNN commentator Mike Asshat Galanos. His seriously creeps me out.

Oh, most of Asshat’s comments are the usual asshattery, ranging from the simply duhduhdumb…

Timing is essential to the drug’s effectiveness, Plan B supporters say, so getting parents and doctors involved would unnecessarily delay the teen’s ability to pop the pill the “morning after.” Does it really take that long to get a prescription?

[Uh, yes, it can, especially when some pharmacists are refusing to dispense it.]

…to the willfully ignorant:

Think of a 17-year-old girl. Most of the time she’s a high school senior, still living at home with Mom and Dad. She still needs her parents in the tough times. But they will be cut out of a traumatic situation.

[I know you might find this hard to believe, Asshat, but choosing to prevent a pregnancy is often not traumatic for women! And when trauma is involved, such as in the case of rape, I’m pretty sure most women think that bearing the child of their rapist would be A HELL OF A LOT MORE TRAUMATIC than taking two pills.]

But these comments just rouse a kind of good-natured “what an idiot” reaction. This is the comment that actually creeps me out:

We are making it available to high school girls. We’re enabling teenagers to act carelessly with an easy way out. […] With Plan B, they can do it now and deal with it later.¹

A chill went up my spine when I read that, and not for the reasons Asshat was hoping.

Lets not for a minute assume Asshat’s use of the word “teenagers” includes boys. The article never once discusses the male’s role in the need for Plan B. This missive is clearly about high school girls.

So essentially Asshat is saying, “We cannot allow girls to get away with sluttish behavior. If she has sex and gets pregnant, she deserves all the life-destroying consequences she gets. We as a society need to enforce that.”

Asshat. Listen. You need to look at your desire to ensure that women suffer when they do not conform to your own ideas of morality. Don’t take the easy way out - don’t put the mask of Concerned Elder on your head and stick it in the sands of righteousness.  Deal with your sadistic misogyny now.

Technorati Tags: slut-shaming, Mike Galanos, sadism, Plan B, birth control, morning after pill

1. Ignoring for now the fact that this statement completely contradicts his earlier argument, as “trauma” is rarely premeditated. [↩]

New Year’s resolution for men: Be more like women.

The feminist and anthropologist in me is always interested in gender-specific social behavior, so this tidbit in the Boston Globe caught my eye:

In category after category, women do a better job of taking care of their health. They smoke less and drink less, and they’re less likely to be overweight. They eat more fruits and vegetables. They have their cholesterol tested more regularly.

…..

To be sure, the gap between men and women varies in magnitude, depending on what’s being measured. It’s fairly narrow when it comes to tobacco use, with 17.3 percent of men identifying themselves as current smokers, compared with 15.5 percent of women. But men are dramatically more prone to report problems with weight and alcohol use.

The psychologist in me wants to know why are women, on average, healthier than men?

The article speculates maybe it’s because our social messages teach men “we’re stronger than depression, we’re stronger than alcoholism, we’re stronger than cancer or heart disease - or we should be.” So they are less likely than women to conscientiously engage in activities such that help prevent those things, like eating well and exercising.

Maybe. But perhaps it’s because our social messages teach women we’re supposed to be thin hardbodies, so we are more likely to eat well and exercise. Healthy insides are a side effect of hottie outsides.

Not that I’m complaining. Women can only rule the world if we are healthy, and why not look great doing it?

Technorati Tags: women’s health, men’s health

Wanna be a loser? Exercise your brain.

Though I’m passionate about being Uppity Fit, I read very few fitness or health blogs or mags. Why? Because they’re largely a waste of time.

There’s so little news about fitness, the industry media has to invent it in order to have something to publish. Even mainstream journalists will sensationalize or twist information about fitness because they need copy that will sell papers.

It’s rare for fitness “personalities” to talk about this, afraid as they are of getting bad press in retaliation. But a few righteous Ribs do, like Tom Venuto, which is why I read his blog. ¹

Venuto, the hottie there on the right, writes frequently about the importance of analyzing critically the info on health rather than just believing everything you read.

His latest post is about the media’s ridiculous reporting on a new study published in The New England Journal of Medicine titled, “Weight Loss With a Low-Carbohydrate, Mediterranean, or Low-Fat Diet.”

Venuto points out how totally wrong most journalists got this study. Most of them said - in big, splashy headlines - that it proves that low-carb diets like Fatkins are superior to low fat and “Mediterranean”-style diets for weight loss.

Wrong! But thanks for playing.

The study actually shows that none of the diets worked very well. The weight loss was minimal: 6 to 10 pounds in 2 years.²

In addition, this study proves nothing because the diet data the researchers used was all based on participant reports. Food diaries are hardly scientifically controlled. (Like memory, estimating one’s food intake is notoriously error-prone.)

There’s lotsa other things the journalists got wrong about the study, but you get the idea. As Venuto says:

Please, please, please learn how to find and read primary research and take the news media stories with a grain of salt. If you want to know who died, what burned down or what hurricane is coming, tune in to the news – they do a GREAT job at that. If you want to know how to lose weight or improve your health, look up the original research papers instead of taking second hand information at face value.

Amen and pass the sourdough.³

Technorati Tags: fitness, health, journalism

1. So does Mistress Krista of stumptuous.com. Check her out, too. [↩]
2. And who knows how much of that was actually fat and not muscle. [↩]
3. Interestingly, the study reported that the rate of adherence was the poorest in the low-carb group, proving that man cannot live on bacon grease alone, at least for very long, no matter how good the idea sounds at the time. [↩]

For that not-so-fresh feeling…

My acupuncturist gave me some Chinese herbs for my allergies. Inside the box is a catalog of the rest of the manufacturer’s products.

The product descriptions are in Engrish, but for most of them, I can at least determine with some degree of certainty what the herb is supposed to be a remedy for (heartburn, PMS, stomach ache, etc.).

But I gotta say, this one’s a stumper. And I really need to identify it, because god knows I need the cleanest, most attractive adulation I can get.

Technorati Tags: Engrish, chinese medicine

Swing low, sweet chariot

On the plane home from Hawaii, Kevin and I had for a row-mate a hacking, sneezing, writhing mess of a man.

“Don’t worry,” he said to Kevin, just before take off. “I’m not contagious.”

Bull. Shit.

Kevin was sick all last week, and as usually happens, I developed the symptoms a week later. I am now a hacking, sneezing, writhing mess of a woman.

And I can’t stay home from work tomorrow because they are moving me to a new desk on Wednesday and I need to pack.

I think there should be a special section on the plane for sick people and crying babies. Or they should have to pay a fine. Why should those bastards get to torture the innocent with impunity?

Sorry, it’s the cough syrup talking.

i can haz cleen undees now?

A friend of mine sent me the link to Jezebel’s latest LOLVogue with a note saying, “May you pee your pants laughing before you are overcome with disgust at the Vogue fashion editors.”

LOL jezbel ur so funni ok bai

Technorati Tags: fashion, modeling, Vogue, anorexia, gynophobia

Because thirty-six years ago, “choice” was just another word for nothing left to lose.

I couldn’t find the place at first. I drove around and around, checked my directions a dozen times, but it wasn’t there.

At the spot where the clinic was supposed to be was a building that looked exactly like the 1970s-era apartments I lived in when I was a kid - the kind of building that looks like a motel, with stairways on the outside leading to each floor.

Not knowing what else to do, I parked and walked over to the building. The doors all had numbers on them, but no signs. Windows were closed.

I checked the suite number I had been given, then followed the doors until I found the one marked 213. It was tucked far back from the street. I tried the door handle. Locked.

I must have the wrong directions, I thought. I was just about to leave when I saw a sign in the lower corner of the window, so small you’d miss it if you weren’t looking for it: Women’s Health Clinic.

I pushed the door buzzer and a woman’s voice answered, “Yes?”

“I’m here for an eleven o’clock appointment,” I said, and gave her my name.

The door knob clicked and I pushed it open. The waiting room was tiny, empty, and eerily silent. No patients wandered in and out. No sounds of sick kids crying in exam rooms or medical personnel talking in the halls. Not even any musak playing.

The rather grim-looking woman behind the reception desk looked up as I entered. She handed me paperwork to fill out and return. Soon a nurse called my name and we went through a door into the bowels of the clinic.

In another tiny white room with two chairs and a rack of literature, the nurse and I discussed the purpose of my visit. She asked me a few questions, but it was clear early on that I was well-informed and had made up my mind, and she didn’t try to dissuade me. She actually seemed a little relieved and I could tell she was skipping entire sections of a well-rehearsed speech.

Finally she explained the procedure to me briefly, then told me the doctor would see me now.

We went to a tiny exam room, where she handed me a paper gown and left. As I undressed, I looked around. The room seemed over-stuffed with furniture and equipment, but that was probably because it was so small. There was nothing unusual about the room’s contents, I thought, until I noticed the contraption in the corner.

It looked like an alien, with a dull green reservoir and a long tube snaking out the side, and I admit I did not relish the thought of playing Ripley.

The doctor entered a few minutes later. He was short and stocky, with dark hair and mustache. He spoke very little to me and made no eye contact. His movements were brisk and he performed his exam at lightening speed (compared to others I’ve had, anyway). He confirmed the diagnosis, turned on his heel and left.

I got dressed and after a few minutes, the nurse came for me and we went back to the reception desk so I could make my next appointment. I told Grim Lady I wanted to have the medical procedure.

“You are just in time,” she said. “One more day and you’d have to have the surgical.”

I nodded, remembering the alien.

She clicked her pen and scribbled on her calendar. “August ninth.”

I smiled at the irony. My birthday.

Grim Lady gathered up some paperwork and handed it to me. I took it and turned to leave.

“Wait, one more thing,” she said, handing me a bulky manila envelope. I looked at her quizzically, but she dropped her gaze and busied herself with her work.

As soon as the door shut behind me, I opened the envelope. Inside was a VHS tape labeled “From Conception To Birth, A Fetus’s Journey.”

On the way to my car, I dropped the tape into a street corner trash can.

—

Two days later, on my birthday, I came back to the clinic and got a shot in my hip. I returned a week after that for the final step: two tablets placed as close to my cervix as the doctor could get them.

As I sat up on the exam table, the doctor took me by the shoulders and for the first time, he looked into my eyes. I saw compassion in his.

“OK?” he said.

I smiled and nodded. He let go of me and walked out.

—

Not so long ago, the health care clinic I went to and the procedure I paid for were illegal. In a town like Salt Lake City, with its uber-conservative origins, they are still at risk of annihilation in some way or another.

A sobering thought for me, a thirty-something Seattlite who took for granted her shiny liberal bubble until she left it.

What would it be like to be an unhappily pregnant kid living in a community so filled with misogyny that its “women’s” clinics must be hidden to keep from being bombed?

What would it be like to go to work each day knowing that you could be shot at with jihad-like zeal by people who pledge to love thy neighbor?

What would it be like to be a doctor whose patients often have such guilt and fear that you must distance yourself from them, allowing only a brief moment at the end to show you care?

Today I’m Blogging For Choice in the fervent hope that these questions will someday soon be made unthinkable, just as 35 years ago, “Pregnancy or jail and possibly death?” was for me.

Never forget how precarious Roe v. Wade really is. Use your vote to make sure a woman’s right to sovereignty over her own body remains the law.

Technorati Tags: abortion rights, Blog For Choice