Tales from the Gyno

It started out innocently enough on the eve of Thanksgiving. A twenty-escalator climb at the AMC to see Volver, a bottle of cabernet-shiraz blend at the closest thing you can get to a quiet bar in Port Authority, four youngish girls who no longer have stars in their eyes and therefore harbor no illusions. Two are failed writers, one a financial expat, and the other a future gynecological-obstetric resident. Topics moved from the film we just saw to current films, to Thanksgiving plans, to employment, and then, fueled by our cab-shiraz, one of us said to the ob-gyn, "Is it true that you shit yourself during labor?"

Things your mother and/or sex-ed facilitator never told you:

10. Yes, you can, joyously and without restraint. For the one who holds the video camcorder, take care and stay out of the line of fire. Or as one of the party proclaimed, "If you ever want your husband to go down on you again, keep him by your head and hold on to his hand."

9. Some of us received an education on the importance of exercising the PC muscle, otherwise known as performing Kegel exercises. You can do this anywhere, anytime. All you have to do is squinch in your twat muscles like you're trying to hold your pee, and release. Repeat.

8. Elaborating further, this is one of the tenets of the ancient practice of tantric sex. Otherwise known as sex for lazy geniuses. In middle age, the Kegels will also prevent your uterus from hanging outside you like an udder. If you have incontinence issues, the Kegels will allow you to hold your peepee longer, Iron Bladder.

7. Practically everyone has herpes in some form or another.

6. Thick dicks stretching out the twat will not leave you with a flapping pouch after the jewel thieves have come and gone if you do your Kegels. No, truthfully, the ob-gyn proclaims, the vagina is a very muscular and resilient organ. Amen.

5. Make no mistake, heed the insinuations from your sixth grade sex-ed instructor. Syphilis is nasty. Looks nasty. Smells nasty. Damages the penis nasty. It will eat your flesh. Just ask Queen Elizabeth.

4. Speaking of smells, do your ob-gyn a favor and wash your pubes before hopping into the stirrups. No hot tuna here.

3. One of the best things you can do to prevent a UTI is to take a leak before and after you get it on, which should really enhance your amorous inclinations.

2. Pregnancy is forty weeks long. Not thirty-six weeks. Not nine months. But fucking ten months. Liars. Which leads our dear Tiresias to say, "This line will die with me. The soothstaying stops here."

1. If your healthcare professional uses the word cauliflower when describing your genitalia, you are a back alley ass pirate, dancing for money, whore.