8.10.10

Sometimes I’m okay with the fact that guys don’t have to deal with this. It’s a strange motherly instinct that makes me want to keep them so carefree. But when I’m wrapped in a paper tablecloth and spread-eagle with a metal car-jack shoved in my vagina, I’m not as sympathetic.

I bled orange for a week after my last colposcopy. All things considered, the ordeal wasn’t as horrifying as I’d anticipated, but being told there was a .5% chance I had cervical cancer made the “statistically harmless” mild dysplasia something to throw up about. And now I have it again?

But I got the shots. I stored the trio at less than 50 degrees Fahrenheit. I waited 2 months after the first shot and 6 months after the second. I scheduled the appointments exactly within the allotted 7-day windows for maximum effectiveness and I still managed to smile in public. What man would diligently execute such a fragile plan without complaining about the pin-prick? Or the frightening news after – that it might not have worked.

At my last visit, I told them to check everything. Aside from wanting piece of mind, I knew that I’d easily get 4 vials of blood drawn before any guy signed up to plunge a Q-Tip in his dick. And why would they? If girls are the ones being poked, swabbed, scraped and drained to ensure the highest quality of sterility, what’s left to worry about? I’d appreciate it, too, if I were them. But that’s what’s so unfair. They can’t appreciate what they don’t know.