When I told my husband I had an OB/GYN appointment on Thursday afternoon, our life momentarily became an Airplane! sketch.
"A doctor's appointment? What is it?"
"It's when you visit a nice man in a white coat who uses a cold speculum to look up your hoo-hoo, but that's not important right now."
My cleverness garnered me the rolled eyes that Dave reserves for when I've exceeded my smart-ass quotient for the day, but I was actually pretty pleased with myself for my quick wit. Also, the use of the euphemism "hoo-hoo" was entertaining, since it isn't something I normally say. As an adult and a woman who is proud of and happy about her gender, I generally call a spade a spade and don't screw around with cutesy pseudonyms for this, the center of my womanhood. I'm not ashamed of my body, and as an heir to the "My Body, My Self" generation I refer to everything by its rightful name
You know. My naughty bits.
There are so many alternate names for female genitals that it makes my head spin. I'm not going to go on a whole tirade about the host of demeaning names because that's another essay. But the innocent ones are pretty funny if you take a minute to think about them. Coochie, cha-cha, hoo-hoo, cooter - these are things you could call your pet if you never took it outside and had to make it return to you (can you imagine yelling out "Come Coochie!" Hee!!). These are names intended to minimize, names to make the genitals sound like something completely other than what they are, make the region sound cute, non-threatening, and somewhat cloying.
They're not the kind of names I would use when talking to my gynecologist. "How's the cha-cha looking?" is not the way to start any conversation, even with a licensed professional.
I'm actually unlikely to say much during the real exam. I haven't in the past. I don't really want to distract the guy checking out the plumbing, because if he gets caught up in a discussion of the U.N. and Iraq, he might get so carried away that he forgets to take the speculum out, and even after it's warmed up it never gets really comfy after they ratchet it open. I always feel like The Human Holland Tunnel during the exam, which isn't a feeling I want to prolong.
Despite this, I like my gynecologist. The first time I met with him, he sat me in his office - his real office, the one with the books on the shelves and the wooden paneling. It looked just like a TV doctor's office in the scene where the overly blessed main character gets told she has a debilitating disease that will forever alter her outlook on life and she'll have to summon all their courage to fight it. I found it disconcerting to be in that office, since I hadn't even been examined yet. He couldn't possibly be preparing to tell me I had elbow cancer or something similarly shocking.
In fact he just sits down like that with all his new patients, simply to ask them if they have anything they want to ask or discuss and to generally shoot the breeze a little before he asks you to strip down. It's supposed to make you feel more comfortable so that when the real exam starts you and your doctor know each other a bit and you're not baring everything for a complete stranger. It's a nice gesture, but it sort of backfired with me. I can deal with a clinical exam from someone who wouldn't recognize my face on the bus the next day, and I can deal with a session of up-close-and-personal with someone I love, but there's a huge chasm between the two (no pun intended). For me, it's more difficult to let someone I "sort of" know check out the goodies than it is to let a stranger, assuming the stranger has a medical degree. After a brief introduction to my gynecologist, I felt like I was letting my mailman check out the "center of my womanhood" - I've talked to both my mailman and the gynecologist for the same elapsed amount of time!
I'm weird. It's not news to anybody.
In spite of the psudo-closeness, as I say, I like my gynecologist. The office staff tries hard to make you comfortable and not keep you waiting forever on the exam table with nothing but a huge Brawny paper towel over your lap. The first time I went to this office, I couldn't stop laughing at the oven mitts that they had put over the stirrups. I don't know if other offices do this. They didn't at Kaiser, and between Kaiser and this office, I've never been anywhere else. It's actually a good idea since the oven mitts are a little cushioned so you're not resting the weight of your legs directly on hard plastic. Plus, an oven mitt is warmer than plastic. But, man, I'll tell you, the first time around it was really tough to set my feet into their waiting, empty palms and not giggle.
Because you don't want to be giggling during the exam. I mean, come on, the only time you should be giggling when someone is checking out your crotch is when there's some Barry White on the CD changer. It's just not right otherwise. Beyond the inappropriateness, there's another reason I don't want to be laughing. I have a terrific secret fear of farting during an exam. It's never happened, and I've never even come anywhere near close, but still I harbor a phobia of sudden loss of control just as the doctor's pulling up his little stool and settling in for a quick peek. I have no idea if this is a normal fear or if I'm a complete wingnut, but it doesn't really matter. The concern is still there because I've got to believe it's happened to somebody somewhere. I mean, statistically speaking, this must have occurred at some time in the past, right? And how exactly would you recover from something like that? You can't just ignore it, but on the other hand you probably don't want to cry out, "Someone catch that elephant!" either. A simple apology seems somehow like it wouldn't be enough. You can't just whip out an understated "Sorry" as though you'd simply jostled the doctor on the train. I think you'd almost have to change doctors out of sheer embarrassment after such an incident, and since this office is really close to my house, and I'm lazy, I don't want to have to change doctors. So I worry instead.
For those men in the audience still with us (and I know there's not a ton of you, so I salute those of you strong enough to stay with today's program), you may not know this but a standard exam also consists of a breast check. The doctor mashes your breasts around checking for lumps and asking about things like your Thanksgiving plans or telling the nurse that he's almost out of prescription pads so she should order some more. There's an enormous effort to make it seem as though it's completely normal for this guy to be fondling you in an excruciatingly bright room with a witness. It's one of the least sexy things on the planet - not that I think it should be sexy or anything. I'm just reporting the facts here. The last time I had an exam, they had a tactile aid - a plasticy, siliconey breast - that they placed on my chest between my real breasts. The object of the Boobepalooza game was to locate the lump in the fake breast, a modest B cup with a perky little nipple.
I failed miserably.
This didn't make me feel like I would be able to detect any potential lumps in my own D cups. I knew there was a lump in the fake boob and the fake boob had only about half the area to check as my own boob and there was only one fake boob and last time I checked I have two real boobs. This means that I have at least four times the mass to check out monthly, and there's no guarantee that there is or isn't a lump to be found, though of course I assume it's the latter. To further increase my confidence level, my gynecologist has told me I have "fibrous breasts" which means they're sort of naturally lumpy when you start poking around, so telling a real lump from natural texture would be difficult at best. Best to get checked often.
I can't tell you how much that news thrilled me.
I know I'm making it sound like a visit to the gynecologist is the worst possible hour in the medical world, but it's really no worse than going to the dentist. In fact, it's less traumatic because there are no pointy objects inserted into any orifices at the gynecologist and I can't exactly say that about the dentist. Plus, you have to see the dentist every 6 months and a trip to the gynecologist is only a once a year extravaganza for most of us. So all in all, it's not so bad.
But if you're a guy? I don't want to hear you bitching for one single second about having to wear a damn tie. You don't win.
Not by a long shot.
- KNP Nov. 11, 2002
