Part II of Detoxing From 31 Day Better Blogger Challenge: Overcoming the Urge to Douche My Vagina

As I discussed in my last post, I spent the last month participating in the 31 Day Better Blogger Challenge that was conducted by the Sits Girls community, which I explain in further detail here.

I started out with a bang as I rubbed fallopian tubes with other blogging women and felt inspired by the communal spirit.

But it didn't take long for my new found inspiration to turn sour as I became lost among a plethora of never ending recipes, crafts, organizational tips, nuclear family romanticism, and an overwhelming use of the word "mommy". That's right, I was water logged in a sea of mommy bloggers.

Before I go further into my mommy blog angst, I feel that I should clarify the following points for the purpose of self defense:

1. Some of my favorite blogs are parenting blogs, or at least blogs written by people who are parents and regularly write about their children and child rearing in general.

2. I know that child rearing is extremely important, not only in regards to the development of children, but also in regards to the overall health of a society.

3. I perceive parenting as an extremely challenging, yet rewarding commitment and I empathize with the compromises that parents make.

4. I have full respect for stay at home parents and see great value in what they do and perceive them as equally as purposeful as people who work in the public sphere. When/if I have children, I intend to stay at home with them when they're young if at all possible.

5. I am no hater of stereotypically feminine hobbies. I watch HGTV. I talk to cats in a voice that makes me sound like I am a midget high on Ecstasy. Sometimes I even like to talk about my feelings and then cry afterward and blame it on my hormones. Although I will admit that I do not like cleaning. Did you know that a bar of soap that sits unused on the edge of your bath tub can go moldy? It can. Fascinating, really.

That being said. . .

This challenge opened my eyes to a wide demographic of mommy bloggers, and I got to the point where every time I was designated a blog to visit and comment on, I would hope to God it wouldn't be another mommy blog. And it always would be. At two and a half weeks into the challenge, I found myself wanting to wrap my lips around the barrel of a gun in hopes that the misery would end.

I do understand that blogging has given stay-at-home parents, particularly moms, an outlet to express themselves, socialize, and develop an easily accessible community. Totally surpasses Tupperware parties and is way healthier than abusing Lithium. And as a result, mommy blogging has given stay-at-home moms a sense of purpose that extends beyond the private sphere, which can be perceived as progressive and empowering. But for me the blogosphere's saturation of mommy bloggers quickly became stifling as I struggled to find my footing within this demographic.

My breaking point came when I stumbled across a number of particularly aggravating blog posts. One was written by a stay at home Wiccan mother of six children.

Her blog post was an attack on those who perceive staying at home with children as being a luxury (mother's of course, not father's, because according to another mommy blogger, although women would be better suited than men to run the country (US), it wouldn't work because no one would be around to raise the kids to become good people). Her argument was that staying at home with children is the furthest thing from a luxury. BECAUSE HER FAMILY IS POOR AND LIVES ON A TIGHT BUDGET. HOW IS THAT LUXURIOUS?! IT WAS A COMPROMISE SHE MADE FOR THE BETTERMENT OF HER KIDS, OKAY? SHE ACTUALLY CARES ABOUT HER KIDS.

Cough. Not that she'd make enough money to surpass the cost of child care for six kids, anyway. Cough.

I, of course, wanted to respond with two, passionate and meaningful words:

Fuck off.

But I maintained an aura of class and refrained. Not for the sake of my own mother, because my own mother is probably thinking the same thing. And my mother's mother would have actually responded with "fuck off" if she had ever used that kind of crude language. No, I refrained because some stay-at-home moms write letters and form campaigns against popular musical artists for wrecking their children's minds. Because they enforce things like ineffectual gun control regulations that cost Canadian people millions of dollars. Because they scare me.

And then there was the woman who believes that gay marriage should be segregated from the church and religion altogether, because Jesus Christ our Savior only acknowledges heterosexual marriage. In fact, those who want to marry outside of the church aren't really even getting married, as true marriage is defined by religious devotion, so these people are free to officially unite, but should be using a different term altogether, like maybe love buddies? Special friends? It would be a simple solution to the gay marriage debate in the States.

And then there was the comment to that post from another mommy blogger who believes that divorce should be outlawed. In case you missed that, THAT DIVORCE SHOULD BE OUTLAWED. 

THAT DIVORCE SHOULD BE OUTLAWED.

Because that, of course, would remedy things like domestic abuse and spousal murder. And of course children being raised in households with parents who hate each other but cannot escape each other and are perpetually filled with rage and lose all will to live is a great environment for children to be raised. And suddenly I found myself gripping my computer monitor. Violently. And overwhelmed with the urge to douche my vagina, again and again (and again) for no other reason but to cleanse myself of the shame I felt in that particular moment for being a female blogger.

Instead, I closed the window and walked away from my computer. And I officially became emotionally detached from the Sits Girls 31 Day Better Blogger Challenge. So while I still finished the e-book on my own time, I stopped posting on the forum and participating in the community.

I dropped out.

I deeply debated writing this. Discussing topics related to female domestication are things I have learned to steer away from-- the "don't go there" topics. Because I haven't endured labour, and because I don't want to  march myself to my own stake burning. I am all for people sharing their views, but when conflicting view points seem to be perceived as anti-social and the only responses to these posts, which I will now refer to as "bubble posts", seeing as how many of these women seem to live in bubbles, are complacent ones, and agreeable ones, and fully supportive ones that offer no further discussion or deeper dialogue, I start to feel like my soul is being smothered by a pillow. That is adorned in a home-made, floral pillow case.

So I soon came to the realization that for many women participating in this challenge, blogging was more about celebrating motherhood as a bourgeoisie, middle class idealism than anything else--  mass masturbating to a mid-century celebration of a time when a woman's identity was revolved around cooking, cleaning, child rearing, and other stereotypically feminine interests like fashion, trinkets, keeping house, consumerism, and ignoring the negative social attributes historically bred from that one-dimensional role.

And while these women pow-wowed in celebration (and defense) of their choice to stay at home with their children, I was disturbed at how they had unknowingly created a limited paradigm (that I believe they originally intended to avoid) by reinforcing narrow notions of what it means to assume the role of stay-at-home mom, like arguing that they are not trying to adhere to a house wife ideal by weighing their worth on things like house keeping, then boasting about how awesome they are at house keeping in a 1000 word blog post. And then posting a ten point list post about house keeping strategies the day after. And then 65 other women leave comments about how the post was so insightful. Ironically, while celebrating their own life choices, which, more often than not, seemed to be made possible by the financial stability of the men in their lives, they seemed to overlook the fact that their boisterous pow-wowing was alienating women who had made other choices, or women who have no choices at all.

According to many of the mommy blogs I visited (and don't get me wrong, maybe I just had really bad luck at which mommy blogs I was designated to hit), poverty doesn't exist beyond budgeting within a one income household. Women who have to work to keep themselves and their babies fed? Apparently they don't exist. Single mothers? What are those? Domestic abuse? What's that? Undependable, unsupportive husbands? Huh? The fact that so many of these women seemed ignorant to what's going on outside of their own rosey suburbanism demonstrated that they do experience luxuries that many women don't. And that's great, except for the fact that many of them are oblivious to their blessings. And that makes me want to hold a Tupperware burning.

And I would if Tupperware wasn't so practical.

And expensive.

And if lighting it on fire wouldn't release toxins into the atmosphere.

Obviously I don't fit in within this niche.

In fact, I don't fit in with a lot of women. During this challenge I started having my recurring nightmares about my best friends from high school, and I have finally realized why I have those dreams.

I have women issues.

It's taken years to make this correlation, but now I know that my nightmares about my old best friends aren't actually about my old best friends. They're about my feelings of alienation from some of the women is my life. Now. Currently. Like Mommy Bloggers. And in a way, that's a relief, because I was starting to wonder if I had marinated into some sort of woman-baby who was unable to get over her ex-girl friends. No. I just have women issues. Obviously my old best friends symbolize female rejection to my subconscious.  And ostracization.  And because I don't feel like I fit in with a lot of women, and then endure this fucked up, inner tug-of-war between frustration, guilt, and a repressed wish that I could just belong, I end up feeling really shitty. And dream about torture. I mean my last year of high school.

I've been at this fork in the road before, where one path leads me to fakin' it and fitting in, and one path leads me to staying true to myself even if it means being lonely sometimes, or at a disadvantage at promoting my blog in the women's corner of the blogosphere. Inevitably I always choose to stay true to myself because deep down I know that throwing myself in with a bunch of women who make me feel frustrated will inevitably just make me feel more frustrated. So, I made the decision to follow the churning in my gut, and accept the fact some women may be offended that I am challenging what I perceive as the revival of the cult of domesticity, and may not want to read my blog or be my friend.

I write critical blog posts like this in honor of the people in my own life whose voices tend to get lost among the buzz of the bandwagon: my mother, who also shares critical views about cookie-cutter, mommy culture; for my home girl Laura, a separated mother of three young kids who works night shift with me and who I have seen so exhausted that her eyes don't properly align;  for my best friend who is a lively and successful career woman who craves life partnership and worries that she will never find it; for my boyfriend who lives in camp three weeks out of the month and stresses that if he becomes a father he will be a stranger to his child; and for myself and my own clumsy struggle to get where I so desperately want to go. I salute all the people out there who have tripped and fallen and forged ahead on bloodied knees, and despite uncomfortable disappointments, still laugh, joke, share, speak honestly, and find pleasure in the simple things, and even though we may bitch, and moan, and lose our shit and cry sometimes, we still appreciate our blessings, although diverse and sometimes unequal, and we realize that there are so many people out there who have is so, so, so much worse.

In my next post titled, Part III: Life After Rehab, I will discuss some of my own blessings and struggles, and how they relate to my experience participating in this challenge. I will also go into further detail about trying to find my place within the blogosphere, or if finding a place to fit is even necessary, and the difficult road ahead in my attempt to transform my aspirations into something more than just a hobby.

In the meantime, I will overcome the urge to douche my vagina.

Detoxing From 31DBB Challenge: Part I

So I didn't complete Feel Good Week 2010. I have been too busy experiencing my 100th relapse into quarter-life crisis.

And all I can muster the energy to do is eat gummy sours and watch HGTV.

I blame the Sits Girls 31 Day Better Blogger Challenge, which wrapped up last week and left me with an uncomfortable case of creative constipation.

And a temporary sense of doom.

The challenge was based on a really positive premise: complete the 31 Day Better Blogger work book within a community of women with a focus on networking and supporting each other's blogs. It sounded really great, and for many women it was really great. Unfortunately the sign-up page should have noted to proceed with caution if you are not a stay-at-home mommy. Or Tipper Gore.

Here is some back story.

I am a frustrated writer-- a true, rebellious creative type, with a job-market unfriendly arts degree and numerous years under my belt working the graveyard shift at my glorified retail warehouse job.  In retrospect, my education has made me a better writer, and my job is perfect for writing, and for those things I am grateful. Nonetheless, I don't exactly feel like I have reached my potential.

A few years back, after half a decade of failed attempts to score a professional career, I also abandoned the notion of getting more practical education, mostly because I couldn't clearly decipher an area I would excel in that would require low-committal upgrading and would be a positive, financial alternative to my current work situation. So I took it as a sign and decided that I would pursue my passion, which is something that has always played a dominant role in my life, anyway, and that passion is writing.

At this point I had already done casual freelance work for local newspapers, and I had no idealisms regarding a legit writing career. Writing about shit you don't care about just for the sake of writing sucks geriatric elephant balls. And you can't even write things like "geriatric elephant balls". WHAT'S THE POINT? I knew I would be happier putting energy into my own writing, even if it were only as a hobby, instead of writing piece after piece of mindless dribble for a wage that is on par with a monthly welfare cheque. Bottomline, I discovered that my desire to write is based on expressing myself through written word, not simply the act of writing itself.

Since I had already been blogging for years, I made the decision to treat blogging with more seriousness and to learn whatever I could in hopes that maybe someday I could use my blog as an entrepreneurial starting point for making money through my writing. The Sits Girls 31 Day Better Blogger Challenge was a huge learning experience for me, and strangely, the work book took a back seat to the lessons I learned from participating within the community. Unfortunately, the lessons I learned sucked.

When it comes to the blogosphere, networking is everything. And networking is largely dependent on belonging to a niche. The ability to network within a niche is also key to scoring advertisers and actually making money.

What's your niche?

Good question.

It became apparent to me that the majority of the women in this challenge had blogs based on pretty narrow, stereotypically feminine niches: motherhood, parenting, cooking, organization, crafting, home decor, fitness, nutrition, fertility, infertility, house wifery, etc., and the fuel behind their momentum were each other. Due to this challenge, my Twitter account has become Female Domestication Cyber-Hell, and I have about 250 people I need to delete before I can free my account of tweets marketed towards 1950s housewives and resume reading communications that are actually relevant to me. Those of us whose blogs did not adhere to specific, stereotypically feminine topics were left floundering on the forum posting threads like, "Help! I can't figure out what niche I belong to!"

It has been hard to accept the now obvious reality that successful blogging isn't based on attributes like quality, originality, or even interesting writing. Just like the real world, selling a blog has more to do with whoring a commodity or commodifiable lifestyle, or ideally to do both in conjunction. However, what has truly disturbed me is what is commodifiable among these women in the blogosphere, which is predominantly house wifery.

Unfortunately, I've been putting a lot of weight on this blogging stuff. And I've gone from feeling like I was ascending up a very steep hill in a wheelchair to battling Mount Everest without legs. While riding a skate board. And at this point, I don't have a plan B.

Over the next week I will be discussing my detox from the 31 Day Better Blogger Challenge in more detail with Part II: Overcoming the Urge to Douche My Vagina, and Part III: Life After Rehab.

I Shaved My Cooch For THIS?!

Having strong European genes has made hair removal one of the biggest challenges in my life. Earning a university degree? Yeah, whatever. It doesn’t compare to the in depth research I’ve done regarding Nair, wax strips, five bladed razors, bleach, shaving creams, and hair removal aftercare. I am still waiting for my tax rebate to show up in the mail, the Awww, We’re Sorry That Society Discriminates So Harshly Against Wolf Children, So Here’s Some Money to Help With Those Gillette Razors That Cost $20 For A Pack Of Six rebate.

Summer has rolled in, which means that hair removal is a more prominent thought on women’s minds. When a popular blogger recently wrote about “the hair down there” on her website, many of the responding comments echoed the same notion: “I keep my cooch shaved, but I do it for me.“

“. . . . but I do it for me.”  The least desirable, naively regurgitated phrase to leave the mouths of women, ever.

The notion of hair removal being a feminist issue was also raised, but most of the commenters seemed baffled as to why it would be considered a  feminist issue.

A feminist issue is an issue that pertains to a specific gender, that gender usually being female, but not always. In an ideal world, the word “feminist” would no longer exist, since all feminism represents is the belief in gender equality: the idea that women should have equal rights and freedoms to men, and that men should have equal rights and freedoms to women. Unfortunately, the word “feminism” still has an extremist stigma attached to it, largely because it is ignored by the public education system and continues to be narrowly associated with man-hating, sex-negative women.

Indeed, hairless cooches are a feminist issue, but not in the sense that bald beavers are non-feminist, and wild, pube jungles are feminist. This does not mean that shaving the cooch bald is bad, either. It’s simply a cultural phenomenon that is worth pondering and discussing in an honest way that is free from “but I do it for me” bullshit. That kind of limited thinking is counteractive to making mindful and empowered decisions.

Besides the very basic, life necessities, and possibly tending to our inner passions, most of the things we do in our lives are in adherence to cultural conformity, not some innate, natural desire. Especially when it comes to aesthetics. When people are confronted with the label of conformity, they often become uncomfortable and defensive, as if admitting to basic acts of cultural conformity is a sign of weakness. As a result, people tend to crank out justifications for these seemingly shallow adherents, and the only reasonable excuse they can come up with is, “. . . but I do it for me.” As if the widespread conformity to these fleeting, cultural trends is merely a coincidence.

Right. And I only have to shave my legs once a week.

My Own Experience with Shaving the Cooch

There are things I like about shaving the cooch, and things I don’t like about shaving the cooch. For example, a freshly shaved cooch can intensify a sexual experience. However, it can also destroy my nether regions to the point where I am out of commission for days on end, and consequently want to punch all men in the face. Repeatedly.

I was first coerced to go bald when I was eighteen. At the time my lady parts were nicely manicured. Cute, really. I did go bald for that lover a few times, but the week of pain following my close shaves were almost unbearable. Eventually I made a deal with him: I would keep “Kitty” shaved bald for a month, as long as he, too, would keep his package shaved bald for a month. Three days later he cried in pain and uncomfortably picked at his balls as his rash-infested grow-back crippled his will to live.

That was the end of that debate.

Nowadays I view a bald beaver as a treat. Something that I will do every now and then. Something for special occasions. Something that I will do when I know that my lady-parts will be under wraps for the week proceeding so I can keep the crime scene of my vulva’s recovery to myself.

Over the years I have mastered a system of shaving that works for me, and after discussing the topic with my female friends, some of them practice the same method:

• Shaving the bikini line
• Shaving the under belly
• Keep a manicured “porn patch” on the top

Do I do it for me?

No. I never Bic the entirety of my privates with a razor strictly for myself. I do it for the aesthetic pleasure of the man I am with.

I know, girls. Finally, a token of honesty.

Here are some hair removal tips I've honed after almost two decades of shaving. Yes, I've been shaving my legs since I was ten.

Lojo's Most Successful Hair Removal Practices and Products:

1. Gillette Fusion - Five Blade Razor

No, I haven't found any gender specific razors marketed towards women that are on the same level as Gillette's man razors. Apparently Gillette hasn't made the correlation between men's sensitive faces and women's sensitive snatches. Maybe the CEO of Gillette is a baby boomer who is ignorant to the new found pressures women face thanks to porn culture. Maybe he (or she) is a family man/ woman who attended Woodstock in 1969. Sweet, really. Reminds me of the sweetness of my mother. But seriously. Lets get with the program.

2. Nivea for Men Shaving Gel

I don't think Nivea even has shaving gel for women. Like women have body hair, anyway. But I will totally settle for smelling like my boyfriend if it means experiencing the luscious awesome-ness of Nivea's shaving products.

3. Skintimate Shave Cream

The only shaving product marketed towards women that I truly love. Mix this with a little Nivea shave gel and you have created the ultimate shave lube to protect yourself from The Burn. Or The Bleeding. Or accidental body mutilation.

4. Gillette Thermal Face Scrub

This is a product that I recently stumbled upon while grocery shopping with my boyfriend. "You don't need that," he said, "just shave it all off." Why didn't I think of that?! If I shave it all off, then I WON'T have to buy ridiculous products to alleviate razor burn. Silly me!

Aren't men cute? I love them.

The warming scrub is used pre-shave to exfoliate the skin by opening  pores, loosening hair, and making way for a smoother shave. And it really does warm on contact. But be aware that there is a warning on the back that instructs to avoid contact with the lips. And as my boyfriend so eloquently noted, "I am sure that means to avoid contact with your other lips, as well." So if you're using it to shave your cooch, make sure not to get too intimate with it.

5. Vitamin E Ointment

I also came across this in the grocery store and find it is perfect for poon-shave after care. It works great for soothing the "under belly" of your lady parts. Particularly when lace underwear are thrown on afterwards. And a pair of tight jeans.

Boys, you have no idea.

6. Talcom/ Baby Powder

Talcom powder works great for reducing those oh-so unattractive red bumps that tend to show up along the bikini line and ontop of the "pork taco".  Evidently this reduces the moisture and inhibits that lovely rash that so many of us women are accustomed to.

Additional Tips:

• Avoid underwear that is tight around the crotch, as this will cause chaos by chaffing the sensitive areas you've just shaven. Same goes for scratchy lace.
• I also try to avoid cold temperatures following a close shave. I find that if I get chilled and get goosebumps immediately following a shave, then the once smooth, loveliness of my shave turns into a not-having-sex-for-a-week battlefield of rashiness and in-grown hairs.

Now let's discuss. What are your opinions on shaving the cooch? What hair removal practices do you use? What works for you and what doesn't? How do you think strippers do it? And since I haven't brought up waxing or electrolysis, any insights on those methods? If you're not comfortable with publicly commenting on this subject matter, then feel free to comment anonymously.

And for the male readers, feel free to share your opinions, as well. What are your thoughts on women going bald? Do you go bald yourself? What are your shaving practices?

Now I challenge the men reading this to do the Shave Down There - Nut Sack and All challenge for the next three weeks. No, I don't mean buzz it with a pair of clippers. I mean Bic it. Bic it all. And when stubble starts to grow back, Bic it again, bitches.

I tell ya, it would change women's lives.

An Early Birthday Present to Myself

Technology has come a long way over the years and continues to send us to amazing places that we never thought we would be.

I tend to be a bit slow at adopting new forms of technology, mostly because I am cheap and stubborn. I didn't get a cell phone until two years ago when I canceled my land line solely based on my hatred for Shaw. And I didn't learn how to send text messages until my twenty-fifth birthday when I sat in Winston's Pub in Saskatoon and D-Dub tried to give me a texting tutorial which lead to twenty-minutes of drunken button pushing until I got to the point where I became so disoriented that I asked my best friend, someone who, I might add, passed the LSAT and is now a lawyer, how to spell the word "eighth".

I wasn't buying ganja. I was referring to a street. So don't get all excited. We Canadians don't do those kind of things.

As I've hesitantly inched my way into the world of modern technology, I've also come to realize that technology really does make my life better. If not better, more efficient, and necessary in getting ahead in today's world. My net book alone has increased the amount I write by at least two-fold. And it's just a little piece of poo that barely functions half the time!

There is one area where I have been extremely slow at progressing into the twenty-first century and I currently reside at least ten years in the past, like one of those silly, almost twenty-seven year old women who still wears baggy camouflage pants and pyramid belts. Phhfftt.

While blog surfing I came across an ad for a Seattle based store I am familiar with thanks to Bitch magazine called Babeland. Within two minutes a product had called out to me so passionately that I decided to gift myself with an early birthday present and ordered it the next day.

This is where my Mom can stop reading.

Introducing The G-Ki:

The G-Ki can be used for both couple play and as a boyfriend substitute if you have a man who works out-of-town for three weeks a month with its easy, five speed controls, and velvety delicious, waterproof body. More importantly, the G-Ki has a firm, adjustable curve that can lock in any three of its offered positions. One-year manufacturer's warranty against breakage or defects!

The price was relatively steep for my G-Ki, which I have named George (pronounced with a Bostonian accent). George will take the place of my now outdated companion, RODney. But as Laura assured me, "it's a wise investment."

No, I won't be writing a follow up review about George. I need to at least get paid to write something like that. And not have a mother. Or a boyfriend. Although according to Bear, he told all the men at his work that I can **** a ******** through a ****** ****, so he'd almost, kind of deserve it.

A Birth Control Update: Recovering From Oral Contraceptives in the Bell Jar

The weather is gorgeous outside and the inside of my apartment is sick. Not sick as in, "dude, those are a sick pair of aviators," but sick like the boogers on the wall of the men's bathroom at work.

Being a Canadian, my body intrinsically thinks party! and vacation! when it's nice out. At minimum, time to get drunk and run through the sprinklers. But most of us have to continue with the bullshit of our daily lives-- bullshit meaning work a job-- despite the rarity of gorgeous, summer days.

The Pertards have started getting their summer sponge baths again and I have cut off Snort's mullet. She detested, but I assured her that practicality must come before fashion and that she could grow it back in the fall. I am waddling around in my new mini dress, stopping in front of the man-fan every so often to get a shot of cool air up my fanny. Then I grunt like a man. And scratch my balls. But it's really not as titillating as it sounds. Mostly because I have a layer of Proactive Refining Solution caked to my face.

It's my second month of being off of the oral contraceptive, Yasmin, (click here for back story from a previous post), and the state of my womanly matters are less than peachy. My first cycle off Yasmin was a success. I was five days late, but since it was my first time being pill free, moderate period dysfunction was expected. My skin immediately cleared up and I temporarily resumed my career as a super model until May rolled in and my skin broke out again. Hence the Proactive Refining Solution caked to my face.

There are things I miss about the pill, like the bouquet of cleavage it gave me, and the almost-painless periods that gently reminded me that I have a functioning uterus instead of the abrasive monthly gift that reminds me that ALL MEN MUST PAY. I also miss the convenience of knowing exactly when to expect my period. But at least I am not dead, or missing my gall bladder. Yet, anyway.

Click here to read about Alberta women joining the class action suit against Bayer (Yaz/Yasmin).

This month things have gone to shit, and by shit I mean that I am on day thirty-seven of my cycle (I am usually a twenty-eight day kind of woman) and I still haven't gotten my period. If it was normal for me to miss the odd flow, I'd be giving two thumbs up that I get the month off, but I haven't missed a period since. . . ever. And no, according to First Response, it's not that, so you can all resume a normal blood pressure rate.

In five days I will be twenty-seven years old. Like the disappointing men who have come in and out of the revolving door of my heart, nothing in my life has fallen into place. Mentally preparing myself for the possibility of an unexpected pregnancy, and then realizing, no, my fertility is just fucked from that stupid birth control pill that everyone is suing is something I don't need. And now I am wondering if I will have to spend the next year in complete disconnect from my body as I plow through the mind torture of late and/or missed periods. Read about other women's post-Yasmin period experiences (or lack there of) here.

And I wonder when the time comes that I am ready to plan a child if the damage will be done and I will be too late. I wonder if I will have to live with those consequences for the rest of my life. All I ever wanted was to do things right. Now I don't even know what right is. All I feel is loss.

And that, dear internet, is as much honesty as I will ever share with you.