"I used to be a girl without a vagina": How I live with vaginismus
Vaginismus, or involuntary contraction of the vaginal muscles, still poorly understood, while taking it as a disease that doctors are actively correcting. However, as with any condition about which little is known, an ultimatum point of view can not only help but also harm.
Vaginismus does not allow for gynecological examinations, but not everyone is concerned about this, but the impossibility of vaginal sex, although this kind of intimacy does not have to interest everyone. We decided to find out what other opinion exists on this feature, and talked with Sasha Kazantseva, the author of the telegram-channel “Washed Your Hands”, about lesbianism and sex, about how she lives with vaginism from an early age and does not consider it a problem.
Even in kindergarten I was scared to wash away, so I tried to do it quickly and think about something else. Mentions of sex or genitals were also unpleasant - sometimes I felt a muscle spasm or chill in the lower abdomen. Before my period began, it seemed to me that I was a girl without a vagina, and that was completely fine with me. When they arrived, it was very disappointing. I read that many women with vaginism found it when they first tried to penetrate - in my case it was not so. I always knew that I didn't want to have vaginal sex. When they touched my vulva, I felt scared, and the vaginal muscles were contracting - at the same time I could rub it about the thigh of my affiliate and not feel discomfort.
I learned the term “vaginismus” in high school and was very happy that there is a special word for my peculiarity. Since then, I have been able to talk about my sexuality to others, without going into complex details. The basic information that I read then exhibited vaginismus as a disease that can be, or even necessarily treated. It seemed strange to me: why do I need vaginal sex if I do not want it? Lovers of penetration seemed aliens to me, while my own peculiarity was something natural.
All people have different abilities and abilities. My vagina does not allow penetration, but I can sit on the splits - while many cannot sit on the splits, but because of this, they are not considered inferior. By the way, vaginism rarely bothered me: for example, it was only during a couple of very heavy menstruations in adolescence that I felt the movement of the endometrial pieces inside me very clearly - it was unpleasant.
Once I discussed one of sexual contacts with a psychotherapist, mentioning vaginism in passing. She suggested that he might not be so much a psychological problem as a vegetative problem, such as a birth injury. I was glad when she suggested it - now I think that you can not dig into yourself, looking for what happened to me until four years.
I came to the first gynecological examination, when I was already an adult - as a result, I was accustomed to negatively answer the question whether I live sexually. In this case, the doctors do not put anything inside, but inspect the outside and through the rectum. For a long time, going to a gynecologist was a great stress for me: when the doctor's hand approached the vulva, I started to get very excited - and the gynecologist along with me; so everyone wanted to finish the procedure quickly. Then I began to specifically look for LGBT-friendly gynecologists, with whom I was able to speak openly about my own characteristics and worry less.
I was attracted to sex from the beginning of puberty, there was also the experience of child masturbation at the age of five. In general, it did not occur to me that vaginismus could somehow interfere with pleasure.
Yulia accepted my peculiarity, but afterwards, gently, without pressure, she offered to try penetration. I agreed, although I doubted a million times - the whole process took about three months. At first she tried to touch the vulva, stopping so that we could discuss the sensations - I got used to it for about a month. Then we tried to inject a finger - sometimes it became scary to me, and then we stopped. Sometimes he would enter only up to a certain limit, and then it would hurt and bleed. Sometimes it was, on the contrary, interesting, so over time the fear retreated completely, and I began to enjoy.
We talked a lot about my concerns about the effects of penetration, but one of the most frightening things was the fear of losing identity. I used to be a special girl without a vagina, and then she began to "appear." Well, now I will become like everyone else? But in the end, the experiments turned out to be more attractive than doubts, and now I am not afraid to include penetration into sexual practices. I am polyamorca - sometimes I have several relationships at the same time. Now the situation is this: in some I never allow penetration, in others it happens quite regularly, and in the third it happens from time to time.
I recently wrote a post about vaginism in a telegram channel, and I received a lot of messages in the spirit: "Thank you, I realized that everything is fine with me and I do not have to have vaginal sex." I think that vaginismus doesn’t always need to be “cured”: women need to correct it only if they themselves want it. If someone wants vaginal sex or, for example, to have a child, of course, you can work with the body. But there should be no room for violence and the word "disease".
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