To keep true to my personal beliefs, I will now share a slightly embarrassing and entirely disturbing incident from the very recent past that will make you feel better about your own abnormalities.

If you didn’t already know, my fiance Josh and I were each others’ firsts. Our first time was January of this year. Well, for my part, it didn’t hurt at all - which surprised me. And I didn’t bleed until the second time, and even then, it was only a tiny bit. But who was I to complain?

Then I went to the gynecologist a couple of weeks ago for my first pap smear. Everything felt fine afterward, and our next session of coitus was as enjoyable as ever. But then we had an oopsie and there was Plan B involved and we decided to wait until I got my first Depo-Provera shot to be intimate again.

After the shot, we started getting busy again. But this time, it felt different for me. It didn’t exactly hurt… it was more like a chafing feeling. And the next morning it still felt weird when I flexed (you know, the kegel exercise). The next night we did it again, and I had the same chafing feeling. Afterward, there was a little blood. Then Josh told me he felt a weird skin flap-type thing fairly deep inside my vulva, something soft and fleshy. I had no idea what it could be.

Then I went to, you know, clean myself up. Well, while I was in the bathroom, I noticed a very unusual discharge on the palm of my right hand. Except it wasn’t really discharge. It was a brownish-red color, with tiny darker dots throughout and more clear edges. It didn’t smell. When I touched it, it didn’t smear - it was like rubber paste, it just kind of balled up and moved around. I finished cleaning up and went to bed, my vulva still sore.

I woke up the next morning, and as if by magic, I didn’t hurt AT ALL. Not even when I flexed. I decided to talk to my mom about it, because I am fortunate enough to have one of those moms (plus, she’s a nurse). Once I described the chafing feeling and the weird gooey thing on my hand, she made the unofficial diagnosis of Hymen Removal.

Apparently, the time Josh and I had sex after my gyno exam probably knocked the major part of my still-attached hymen loose. So the next couple of times, it continued tearing while it flopped back and forth, causing the uncomfortableness. And that last time, it broke off entirely (hence the blood). And that thing on my hand?

That was the remains of my hymen.

I feel privileged. I mean, not every girl gets to play with her hymen in her hands before it’s gone for good.

I almost wish I’d taken a picture.

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I would consider myself a smart girl. I was that girl in high school that told everyone else what to do. DON’T do drugs. DON’T have sex - wait until college. DO your homework in advance. DON’T smoke… anything. DON’T drink too much. DO let me eat your french fries.

I’ve put great effort over the years to remain a good role model. I’ve never smoked anything or done any other drugs, I’ve kept my alcohol intake to a moderate level since I was 13 (minus those few times in college), and I didn’t have sex until I was 20 years old. I mean, do you KNOW how big a deal that is? Especially for someone from Kentucky? Where everyone is pregnant before they graduate high school? Forget the fact that I’ve remained a non-smoker despite the fact that every single person in my family smokes. The real accomplishment is not losing it as a teenager. My mom got pregnant when she was 16 (my dad: “You can’t get pregnant the first time!”), my sister when she was 18. I am quite the family freak.

But, despite my ability to control my hormones (or rather, my ex-boyfriend’s vow to wait until marriage), I am now concerned that the other tradition of my family will come true… that my family will begin unexpectedly and not when desired. I really don’t want kids until I’m closer to 30, after I’ve had time to enjoy my adulthood and time with Josh. So, now that I’m sexually active, I am constantly freaking out.

Our only method of protection is spermicide-coated Trojans. Which, statistically speaking, should provide very little opportunity for a baby to be made. But still, accidents happen. This is why I desperately need more than one form of birth control to feel safe. I need some PILLS, dammit.

Well, I don’t have insurance here in Dublin. I don’t have insurance when I’m at home. I won’t have health insurance again until September, when I’m back in school in New York. So until then, I can’t afford a gynecological exam. Which reeeally sucks. When I first got to Dublin, I was freaking out because my period was late and I had developed new symptoms (which are just apparently new parts of my PMS grab-bag. Hooray for sore boobs!). It finally came.

But then there was Josh’s visit over Spring Break this month. And my period is supposed to start today. And I don’t feel it starting. And my boobs aren’t hurting enough, and I don’t really have any other symptoms except moodiness which I’m always moody because I’m overly emotional and almost 4,000 miles from home and I don’t want to be here–

So yeah, I need birth control. And I think it should be cheap and readily available to any girl who needs it. It would cost me at least 100 Euro to get it here (roughly $150), which I can’t afford. I’m hoping that if I try Planned Parenthood in Louisville when I go home, they’ll give me the prescription without saying I need an exam first. I promise I will get an exam when I go to school justpleasegivemethepills.

And then I keep thinking about the fact that about a third of women continue to have a period-like cycle during their first trimester of pregnancy. So that sure as fuck doesn’t help. I COULD ALREADY BE FERTILIZED FOR BOB’S SAKE.

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This is a long one, I suppose to make up for the lack of posts the past few days.

Sunday was quite possibly one of the most stressful days of my life. I got up early and got ready all over again, then headed out to the bus stop because Josh hadn’t answered my text asking if he was doing okay. I waited in Spar for about an hour… No sign of Josh. I walked back to my room and Skyped his brother, Bobby, to tell him I was worried. Bobby couldn’t get in touch with him either.

After walking the ten minutes back and forth from the bus stop four times, I finally found out that Josh’s plane had landed 80 minutes late. I also realized that his phone probably wasn’t working here in Ireland. But I still couldn’t find him. His plane landed at 10AM, and come 2PM, still no Josh. I had no idea what to do, and I was freaking out.

The fourth time I walked back to my apartment, I saw a message from Bobby saying that Josh had called his grandma collect to tell her to tell Bobby to tell me that he was going to wait for me at Trinity College - about ten yards from where I’d just spent the last hour standing, hoping to see him. So I grabbed my shit and RAN back down to Grafton St.

I found my poor baby doubled over, sitting on his carry-on suitcase in the entrance of the college, freezing to death. I started crying, he started shaking, but then all was well. I walked him back to my room - where he had apparently walked to, passed, and left to go back to the college earlier that morning. I didn’t care; he was here with me now.

I warmed him up, made him some toast, let him talk to his brother, and put him to bed. I got some groceries while he slept and made some mediocre pasta and garlic bread that he said was fabulous. Then we went to bed and passed out next to each other on my hard, tiny twin mattress. It was fabulous.

When he first got here, he gave me some stuff my sister had sent for me, like magazines and vitamins and chapstick. Then, he said, “I was gonna wait but I’m just going to give you this now because I’m already too stressed.” He handed me a beautiful purple box. I half expected it to be earrings or something, I guess so I wouldn’t get my hopes up. I opened the box, and there was a beautiful, absolutely perfect ring inside.

No, he didn’t propose. But it is a promise ring, and he said someday I’ll have to move it to my right hand when he has a new one to put on my left. I am quite happy.

I wish I could tell you about all the not-so-exciting touristy shit we did while he was here, but we really didn’t do anything. We ate at some good restaurants, including the Hard Rock Cafe, and looked around the National Photographic Archive. But he didn’t feel well the first couple days, and after that, he said he was just happy to be with me. Now, this is important. This is a new discovery of something else we have in common: When we’re on vacation, we don’t like being made to feel that we should do certain things because of where we are. We don’t like learning about various histories and shit; if it ain’t a beach or an amusement park, forget it. And let’s face it: Dublin is not Islands of Adventure. So we both happily lied around the apartment most of the time he was here, soaking up each others’ hormones. And boned.

Oh yes, there was boning. And it was fabulous. And I’m pretty sure Kate and her friend Janet heard it Tuesday night.

So what was the actual plan Josh had to execute while he was here? Let’s just say it’s not appropriate for children. But I was right about one thing - he gave me a ring. And I am loving having this thing on my finger.

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It really isn’t bad enough that Josh isn’t going to be here until tomorrow morning. Or that the hotel he had to stay in last night cost $109, because all the cheap ones were booked, thanks to several flights out of Chicago being canceled. Or that I shaved my legs this morning for NOTHING.

No, no. My roommate Kate is helping make this weekend more and more like I would imagine sex with an elderly priest would be: unexpected, torturous, and disappointing. Instead of traveling the rest of Europe during part of this week while Josh is here, she’s going to be here pretty much the whole time. She’s going to be here tomorrow. She’s going to be here Monday and Tuesday, because she has to work with children for some stupid community arts project (do children really matter right now? No, my boning schedule does). If I’m lucky, she’ll leave Wednesday so that Josh and I have that evening alone. I have never met such a cock block. I know it’s not all her fault, since those damn children need her. All I have to say is, she’s lucky I’m not the one in the top bunk, because her presence may not be enough to stop the forces that lie within my vagina.

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Josh is on his way to the airport in Indianapolis. My mind is so frazzled with joy I can’t really do anything productive. I can only stare blankly at the TV, or my computer, or my crotch, or whatever I happen to be facing.

The weird part is, I’m all nervous about seeing him again. Obviously, we are going to have sex like whoa. But we didn’t start doing it until just a week before I came to Dublin. So since that first wonderful week, I’ve had two months away from him to build up all the same old anxieties I had before about being naked in front of him. And all that other stuff that happens when you’re naked. I realize it sounds cheesy, but being apart for so long is going to make this time together feel like our first time all over again. We didn’t really get a chance to fall into a groove yet last time, and we won’t get to this time, either, since he’s only going to be here five days. So that means when I go home for the summer, I’ll probably be all nervous again the first time we do it.

So in the morning I will go through the same basic routine I did before our first time together of making sure everything is fresh and clean and hairless (for the most part - don’t get me started on the waxing fiasco of four weeks ago). Of course, I’m sure that after we do it once when he gets here, I’ll be as comfortable with him as I was right before I left for Dublin. We’ve just got to brush off the cobwebs that have collected the last two months.

I realize that sounded a bit gross, as if my vagina has eight-legged creatures spinning away inside it. I’m pretty sure this is not the case, but you know what I mean.

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