Close Read

By now, everyone's heard the urban legend about the woman who tried to "freshen up" before going to the gynecologist by spritzing herself with what she thought was perfume (apparently a shower hadn't occurred to her) but turned out to be ... glitter body spray! And so when the gyno peered beneath the hood, he uttered a reverent cry of "Fancy!" (Cosmopolitan attempted to spin this well-worn tale as true as recently as a year ago.) Har, har. But ... so unprofessional! Gynecologists would never say such things!

Or maybe it's that no woman would actually be stupid enough to put glitter body spray in her nether regions. Because if she had, it's not unlikely that a gynecologist would say something in response! Something wacky! Gynecologists have been known to say some rather inappropriate things while their subjects are splayed out on the examination table, feet in stirrups, grimacing as the doctor inserts pointy metal objects into their vaginas. It's not exactly a time when women feel like carrying on a conversation ... much less hearing about, say, some positions they may find pleasurable during sex. Not okay.

We asked women around the country to share their tales of being the ultimate captive audience for aspiring comedians or just otherwise awkward practitioners of the vaginal arts. These are their stories.

---

THE FLATTERER
"I once had a (female) doctor tell me my cervix was cute. Not sure what that means, but I took it as a compliment."
Kate, 28, Seattle

"My gynecologist recently told me I have an adorable uterus."
Sarah, 32, Brooklyn

"My gyno took a look and said, 'You know what? I'm going to use the baby speculum.' For a long time I thought it meant that I was special, but a few weeks ago a friend was telling me a story where her gyno said the same thing to her. I think it's just a gyno line. I'm not even sure that there are baby speculums, now that I think about it."
Ruth, 31, New York

THE CONNOISSEUR
"Looking at a vagina while you're getting an exam is like having a baby cow on display outside McDonald's right before you get your burger. No one needs to see a bunch of vaginas while the instruments are up there""At the gyno I go to, you are lying there and you look up and there is art overhead, like right where you stare up at the ceiling while cringing. It's African folk art of women spreading their legs with direct shots of the vaginas. Looking at a vagina while you're getting an exam is like having a baby cow on display outside McDonald's right before you get your burger. No one needs to see a bunch of vaginas while the instruments are up there."
Karen, 24, Miami

THE SKEPTIC
"I was in the stirrups and I had a big long scratch on my thigh from my cat. My gyno said, 'What happened here?' I said, 'My cat scratched me.' And he said, 'Riiiiiight.'"
Zoe, 25, Chicago

Original here