“Why is it that all gynecologists are men?” asks my mother, sounding concerned. “Doesn’t that seem a bit weird to you? I mean, what’s the incentive there?” My mother has an OBGYN appointment this afternoon. Her gynecologist is a small Chinese man whom she despises. As per normal, she’s called me up the hour before, attempting to psychoanalyze Dr. Cheng. “I don’t want that creep looking at my you-know-what.”
“Why don’t you just change doctors if you hate Dr. Cheng so much?” I ask.
“I know,” she sighs, “I should. But there’s just no point. They’re all men and they’re all messed up in the head.”
I’m in no place to criticize. I’m twenty-two and have never been to a gynecologist. I’m far too skeptical of the entire situation. All those strange metal tools resembling ancient torture devices have no place in my vaginal canal. I shove enough weird stuff up there as it is. I don’t need some evil bastard in a lab coat pulling my labia apart with an eggbeater. Fortunately, however, I have managed to muster up the courage to attend a sex health clinic on multiple occasions. I have a paralyzing fear of STDs…
“You’re going to have to go someday,” my mother would say whenever I refused to schedule a vag check-up. Up until recently I avoided the situation by telling her I was still a virgin. She believed this because she wanted to. Dumb bitch.
See, for my entire life my mother has been an avid preacher of abstinence. For real, sometimes I feel like she gets more enjoyment out of teaching me the evils of sex than she does actually having it. When I was younger, her favorite thing to do was to tape programs about chastity off The Eternal Word Network (aka The God Channel), then force me to watch them while she sat down next to me nodding her head a lot. They all had names like Why I’m Prepared to Wait and Just Say No For Jesus. I can’t remember much about them, except that once she taped a two hour documentary about the Virgin birth over Buffy The Musical. I cried for two days.
High school was even worse. Being the devout Catholics that they are, my parents refused to allow me into any situation where I could potentially kiss a boy, let alone have sex with one. If I invited a boy over to the house, we were allowed to spend time in communal rooms, but never with the door closed, and never under any circumstances were we allowed in my bedroom. If we wanted to watch TV, it was okay to sit on the couch next to each other, but not to lie down because, “lying down is what you do when you have sex.” It was like growing up in a Thai prison. And it didn’t end there. My grandparents were just as bad. On one occasion I can remember my grandmother actually saying the words, “You don’t need to know about sex darling. Your husband will teach you all about it on your wedding night.” Nightmare.
Little good all these ridiculous rules did. All it meant was that I had lots of sex in the back seat my car and in the bathrooms of my high school. To this day my boyfriend still isn’t allowed in my bedroom. Last Christmas Blaine slept on the sofa.
Having said all this, however, over the years I have gotten used to my mother’s frigid ways. Sex just isn’t something we talk about, and you know what, I’m ok with that. I don’t want to know about the love her and my father make (if any), and she doesn’t want to be informed about the details of my first foursome. It’s cool. I get it. This is why, a few days ago, when I received a package in the mail from my mother stuffed full of extra-large, ribbed condoms and an instructional pamphlet entitled Five Things You Should Know About The Female Orgasm, I was slightly taken aback.
Now, let me get this straight. My mother DOES NOT do this sort of thing. It’s just not in her nature. She also doesn’t have a sense of humor beyond that of Everybody Loves Raymond, so I knew this wasn’t some bizarre excuse for a joke on her part. I was left with no other option than to assume she was on drugs.
Rather than freaking out about it, however, I decided to ignore this massive laps in character, and was prepared to pretend it never happened. Let sleeping dogs lie, eh? (Lie? Ly? Lay? Fuck sleeping dogs.) That was until I got the phone call.
“Did you get the condoms I sent you?” she chirped down the phone.
“Uh… yeah. Thanks mom, I guess,” I muttered. “Although you do know they sell condoms in England too, right?”
“I know,” she said, “I just had some lying around and thought you might need them.” Had some lying around? What does that even mean? Had some lying around where? In the kitchen drawer stuffed between the sandwich bags and all the old Christmas cards you refuse to throw away? I just don’t understand.
“So,” she continued, “how’s your sex life?” This was too much.
“Oh my GOD mom, I don’t have sex, ok? I think it’s disgusting. Is that what you want me to say? Is this making you happy? IS IT?” This must have been some sort of fucked-up attempt to get on my level, but I just wasn’t into it.
“Well, I just want you to know that you can talk to me about things if you need to,” she pressed. “You know, like if you’re having any problems, or if you’re suffering with any moral issues.”
Please bitch! The only moral issues I’m suffering from is whether to give or receive head first. Ugh… I assume my mother has some excellent, long stewing reason for committing this cheap Jesus-crippled paranoid fuckaround, but you know what? I have enough stress in my life without my mother trying to be my sex BFF, or fuck with my head or whatever it is she’s trying to do. This is like a bad episode of Six Feet Under.
How hilariously odd that your mum is suddenly spending so much time thinking about your sex life….I was a victim of the *no closed doors policy* too. Hence why the dark room in my high school’s art department saw a lot of action in the late 90’s.
Oh man, that is hilarious! I can’t imagine my mother being like that. Wait no, I can. She constantly asks me if I’m having sexual relations with anyone. Like your mother, my mother is also a devout Roman Catholic. Sometimes I think she’s psychotic with all of her boy policies.My mother’s gynecologist is a woman… at least around here in California, they’re mostly women as from what I’ve seen. Which brings me to another point, my mother is forcing me to go see a gynecologist. Perfect.
the next night we ate whale
O.B.G.Y.glen – just a cock looking for a hen.