you to fix it, okay?”
She freezes halfway through sitting down on her rolling doctor’s chair. “I’m sorry?”
“Two years ago, you told me I had vaginismus. Well, I still have it. There has to be a pill by now, right? They have, like, fifty different kinds of Viagra. Tell me someone has stepped up to help ladykind out on this one.”
Dr. Snow finally sits all the way down and looks down at her high-tech tablet medical chart. “Okay, give me a minute to catch up here.”
She starts scrolling through my medical history, and I swing my legs nervously on the exam table. I look around the room, desperate for a distraction. On the wall is a large full-color poster of a uterus with a full-term baby lodged inside. I’m probably overreacting, but I feel like that baby is judging me a little bit.
“Okay,” she says finally. “Yes, two years ago I diagnosed you with secondary vaginismus. And—”
“Wait, secondary? I don’t remember that. Is there a first kind of vaginismus?”
Dr. Snow squints at me as though she’s not sure if I’m being serious. I put my hands in my lap and try to look composed. “Secondary means you haven’t always had the condition. You, at one time, were able to have sex without pain. This was something that developed.” She crosses her legs at the knees and balances the tablet on her leg. “Patients with primary vaginismus have never been able to have intercourse without pain, or possibly at all. Some aren’t even able to have pelvic exams or wear tampons, depending on the severity of their condition.”
I involuntarily clench my knees together. That sounds horrible. Here I am, making a screaming fuss over two years, and there are women out there dealing with a significantly more hard-core scenario than me.
This isn’t my finest moment.
“Can people with primary... I mean, can they fix it?”
She nods, and my knees unclench. “The treatment is the same, and in most cases, a full recovery is possible. As is my expectation with you.”
I exhale sharply. “Okay, yes. Say more things like that, please.”
Looking at me sternly, Dr. Snow continues, “So, that was two years ago. You’re telling me you’ve been unable to have sex this entire time?”
“Sort of,” I say, smoothing my gown down over my legs. “I kinda just forgot to deal with it.”
She blinks at me. “You forgot?”
“I was busy! I was getting a new business off the ground, so it wasn’t a big priority, and the whole intimacy thing with my boyfriend sort of took a back seat. Then I realized it had been almost two whole freaking years, and oh my god, that’s a really long time. So I tried to do the therapy like you told me, and it’s not working very well, and I would just really like to get past this and have sex so I can move on, please. I need your help here.”
She’s still blinking at me. “You...forgot to have sex.”
“It slipped my mind,” I say, sighing. “But seriously, though! Tell me what to do.”
She shakes her head a little. “When you say the therapy isn’t working very well, what do you mean?”
“Well, it hurt really bad, for starters. And at first I was able to do it, but then I couldn’t get anything in there at all. I don’t know what I’m doing wrong. I have a bunch of printouts. I’m following all the directions. We got all the things, like it said on the website.”
“‘We’? You and your boyfriend?”
My stomach flip-flops a little at the word boyfriend, and it makes me all the more uncomfortable. “No, me and my friends. It’s been a group effort. Well, I mean, I’m doing the therapy alone, obviously. But they’re cheering me on. One of them actually went through this herself years back, and she’s been giving me advice. The whole ‘two years’ thing hasn’t gone over well for anyone.”
“You seem really focused on the ‘two years’ aspect of this.”
“Because it’s been two years, Doc.”
“That’s a lot of pressure to put on yourself,” Dr. Snow says calmly. “How long have you been doing the therapy?”
“Well. Technically, I started last night,” I admit. Then, a little defensively, “Why do you keep blinking at me?”
“Kat,” she says, setting her tablet down on the counter beside her. “This is a process. If you sprained your ankle, I wouldn’t expect you to have full motor function in a day. It takes time. You can’t rush it.”
“I do know that,” I insist, feeling really pitiful. “I do, but you can’t blame me for being a tad impatient, okay? Look, is there anything I can do to, like, speed things up a little?”
“I don’t recommend speeding anything up beyond what your body is telling you it is ready for,” she says in a measured tone. “If anything, it will make the situation worse. And honestly, it doesn’t sound like you’re approaching your therapy with a calm demeanor, which might explain why you’re having trouble.”
“You’re telling me I should have committed to the soothing music and scented candles, aren’t you?”
“They wouldn’t hurt. This is about retraining your muscles, yes, but it involves your mental state just as much. If you’re anxious, your vagina will be, too.”
Reflexively I pout. “Okay, yeah, that makes sense.”
“Are you sexually active with your boyfriend or anyone else at the moment?”
I narrow my eyes and use every ounce of will I have to push the burning feeling that’s creeping up my neck back below the paper gown. “Not exactly.”
“What does that mean?”
I sit up a little straighter. “Well, I’m not yet, but I’d like to be, and I sort of have plans to get, um, active.”
“I’m actually afraid to ask, Kat.”
“I just mean I’d like to give things another shot in bed with my boyfriend without it ending in a car crash of flaming vaginas.”
“That’s...very colorful imagery.”
“Thanks, Doc.”
She waves her hand in front of her. “That’s a great goal. Of course, I urge you to practice safe sex, and I’d like to discuss birth control options with you before we finish, as I see you aren’t currently taking anything.”
“Okay.”
“Most important, you need to take this very, very slowly. This isn’t a race. I understand your desire to take control of the situation, but if you try to push this beyond what you’re ready for, you’ll make things worse, Kat. Your partner will need to understand that, as well.”
I nod, ignoring the screaming voice in my head that keeps chanting twenty-eight days left. “Okay. Got it.”
“Did
