SWEAR YOU ARE A VIRGIN!!!

Are you sexually active? Even I find it offensive at times when a doctor o rany other medical personnel asks me this question. The other day, at the University of Benin Teaching Hospital (UBTH) Benin City, Nigeria when I had to do a full body check -up with some of my coursemates, there was supposed to be a pap smear test. However, as we know, this test is not done on ladies who are not sexually active . I had gone through all the other specimen collection procedures when the attendant asked me, on my way out if I was sexually active. The rest is history. Not all of my course mates did the pap smear . Infact, I can clearly remember only one lady among us had hers done.

She was truthful about being sexually active. “I mean, what is there to hide?”, she was telling one of her friends later after the sample had been collected. ”The test is to help you know whether you have cancer cells or not. I can’t deny the fact that i’m not a virgin simply because I want other girls to call me
chaste, virtuous or because I don’t want to be judged!” My reply to the question was…err…I really can’t say that online now. Can I?

Truthfully though, it sickens me the way some doctors look when you answer the question. Say ‘NO’ and
they look at you suspiciously. It’s always the “you gotta be kidding me” look”; say ‘YES’ and you have them stripping you naked with their eyes. “He told me that I was too young to be having sex! Can you imagine?” My 20 year old angry friend said this when she left the man’s office in anger. “These male doctors sef , they won’t mind their businesses, it’s like they want to hear that a young, unmarried lady is sexually active so that they will judge her”, my other friend replied. I just smiled because I knew they weren’t totally wrong.

A doctor once asked me to do a pregnancy test and High vaginal swab when i went to complain about not having bowel movement for quite a while, I was constipated and needed him to give me drugs, injection to help but it was pregnancy test and HVS! I instantly left the clinic in anger. This one didn’t even bother to ask if I was sexually active. But I personally feel there’s nothing there to hide.

Dad and mum told you not to ‘do the nasty’ till you got married but Mr Charming came and swept you off your feet and you deemed it fit to give him your most priced gift, but must you be ashamed of it?
What if you had the cancer cells ‘making a home’ inside you? The test is done simply to help you avoid further complications but because you are so self conscious and don’t want to be judged, you decide to deny the fact that you have sex more than three times in a week. That’s so lame and stupid!

Anyway, my short blog come-back message is this…ladies, please admit that you are sexually active when you are and don’t die in silence just because you don’t want to be judged.

About Unknown

Eddy Uwoghiren is a Medical Student at the University of Benin, Benin city, Nigeria. He is a contributor to several prints and web media. He freelances with nine newspapers in Nigeria. Eddy is very passionate about medical journalism. He wants to find out why some communities are more healthy than others, develop skills needed to cover health and medicine anywhere in the world, for any audience , in any medium.