Read My Lips

Read My Lips

Read My Lips

A Complete Guide to
the Vagina and Vulva

Debby Herbenick, PhD
and
Vanessa Schick, PhD

ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD PUBLISHERS, INC.
Lanham • Boulder • New York • Toronto • Plymouth, UK

Published by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
A wholly owned subsidiary of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc.
4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706
http://www.rowmanlittlefield.com

Estover Road, Plymouth PL6 7PY, United Kingdom

Distributed by NATIONAL BOOK NETWORK

Copyright © 2011 by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.

All rights reserved
. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Herbenick, Debby.

Read my lips : a complete guide to the vagina and vulva / Debby Herbenick and Vanessa Schick.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-4422-0800-1 (pbk.) — ISBN 978-1-4422-0802-5 (electronic)

1. Vulva—Popular works. 2. Vagina—Popular works. 3. Women— Health and hygiene—Popular works. I. Schick, Vanessa, 1982– II. Title.

RG268.H47 2011
612.6'28—dc23

2011019793

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

Printed in the United States of America

This book is dedicated to the many men and women whose stories have inspired us to think about vulvas and vaginas in complex and intricate ways.
We hope that
Read My Lips
will do the same for some of you.

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank our editor, Suzanne Staszak-Silva, for helping to turn our quirky book filled with crafts and puns into a reality. Thank you for your patience and your confidence in our work. We are enormously grateful to our fantastic agent, Kate Lee, whose advice and encouragement were instrumental. Of course, no matter how many words we used, a description of a vulva can never measure up to a picture of one. Thank you to everyone who filled this book with images: Christopher M. Brown, Catherine Johnson-Roehr, Rachel Liebert, Melissa Nannen, and Maleese N. Schick.

We feel fortunate to be surrounded by colleagues who inspire us daily. In particular, we would like to thank Michael Reece, Brian Dodge, and everyone at the Center for Sexual Health Promotion for their enthusiasm, their willingness to listen to and give feedback on our ideas, and the way they embrace our vulva puppets and other unique office decor. We would like to thank David Lohrmann and Mohammad Torabi, who have established an academic work environment in which our research and creative interests are able to thrive. We are also appreciative of the support we have received from Jenny Bass, Dennis Fortenberry, Carol McCord, Heather Rupp, Stephanie Sanders, and Shawn Wilson, among others. We would be remiss not to thank Chelsea Heaven for her careful, conscientious work.

This book would not have been possible without the many women and men who have inspired us at different points in our personal and professional development. Although not limited to the following, we like to acknowledge the work and vision of (in alphabetical order) Joani Blank, Virginia Braun, Judy Chicago, Betty Dodson, Eve Ensler, Nick and Sayaka Karras, Dorrie Lane, Rachel Liebert, Carol Queen, Wrenna Robertson, Carlin Ross, Annie Sprinkle, Elizabeth Stewart, Leonore Tiefer, and Chris Veasley.

We would like to express our heartfelt gratitude to everyone who took the time to share personal stories about their thoughts, feelings, and experiences with vulvas and vaginas, whether for
Read My Lips
or for the various research projects we have conducted over the years.

Vanessa would like to thank everyone who has supported or inspired her along this spectacular journey. First, she would like to thank her phenomenal co-author, Debby Herbenick, who made this possible. There is only enough light for everyone to share if you open your door and let others in. She is forever grateful for Debby’s encouragement, guidance, humor, and perpetual kindness. She would also like to thank her graduate advisor, Alyssa Zucker, who encouraged her to follow her passion; Laina Bay-Cheng, who continuously challenged her to think about things in new and complex ways; and Maria-Cecilia Zea, who urged her to see the potential in herself. On a personal note, Vanessa would like to thank her friends and family for all of their support, love, and friendship throughout this process. She is particularly grateful to the following: Ashley, Bindi, Geneva, Heather, Jenn, Kelly, and Marcela for their constant friendship, encouragement, and quick feedback on the cover. Vanessa would also like to thank Sarah, for being the amazing person she is both professionally and personally. She makes quirky seem normal. Russell/Thaddeus, for always being patient, proud, and the biggest bighead she has ever known. M. T. McGillicutty, for (sometimes) holding it during long writing sessions and cuddling even when she didn’t want to. Her many brothers and sisters, who inspire her in ways they can only imagine. Her aunt Bobbie, who always says the right thing at the right moment. Her belated grandmother and step-mother, for always being outspoken and strong. Her father, for encouraging her to work hard at what she believed in. Her mother, for believing in her and inspiring Vanessa to make her journey her own.

Debby would like to thank the following individuals for their particular support of her vulva and vagina outreach: Vanessa Schick, for bringing her talent, brilliance, and spunk to Indiana University, and for being an amazing co-author on this book; Stephanie Sanders, for being the first mentor to support her interest in vulvovaginal research; June Reinisch, for pointing her in the direction of positive vulva references in historical texts and for her enthusiastic mentorship; the late Joe Miller, for his support of her initial research about attitudes toward women’s genitals; Tyra Banks, for inviting Debby to share her vulva puppet and vulvovaginal information with her television audience; Kareen Gunning, for her commitment to educating the masses about women’s health and sexual health; Patty Brisben, for her passionate support of research and education related to women’s sexual health; Dan Savage, for enduring assorted vulva-related conversations and puppetry; and Annie, Debbie, Joyce, Mary, and Paulene, for their steadfast support, dependability, and good natures. In addition, Debby would like to express her enormous gratitude to her mother and sister for their consistent support during the past decade-plus of her vagina/vulva outreach journey. She would like to acknowledge the memory of her maternal grandmother who encouraged her in the study of women’s sexual health and vulvovaginal perceptions, and her father who was one of her biggest sources of support in all areas of life. She is grateful to Jezebel, who stayed up late with her while writing, to those who have helped her to love her vulva and vagina (including the dozens of women, such as Jada, Sarah, and Jessica, with whom she worked on
The Vagina Monologues
), and her gynecologist, who has helped her to care for it. Finally, Debby would like to thank Ariane, Brooke, Brandon, Rachel, Kate, Tom, Ben, Susie, Erica, Roberta, and Jimmy, all of whom have shown their support by listening to vulva/vagina stories, helping to select cover designs, or making space for her to write this book. No one, however, has listened to as many vulva stories or made as much space for this work (or for vulva craft projects) as James, for whom she is eternally grateful.

With much vulva love to you all,
Debby & Vanessa

Introduction

It was a warm November evening as the sun set in San Juan, Puerto Rico. The ocean crashed in the background as a light breeze swept through the air. If this sounds like the makings of a magical night, it was indeed: this is the night that we (Debby and Vanessa) first met. But this isn’t a love story—at least, not the kind you might expect.

We were both in San Juan, Puerto Rico, attending the annual meeting of the Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality. Although the field of sexuality researchers is small, the number of people who study social and cultural issues related to vaginas and vulvas is even smaller and was almost non-existent several years ago. Therefore, we assumed that like other conferences, we would probably be the only vulva researchers there. We were wrong. We had been at the conference for just minutes when a colleague who was familiar with both of our work introduced us. It took just one phrase to bond us instantaneously, and it went something like this: “You two should meet— you both study vaginas.”

So yes, this is a love story about vulvas and vaginas.

Once we met, it wasn’t long before we realized how much we had in common: we had both conducted our dissertation research on women’s genitals, and we both have stuffed vulva puppets and books with titles like
Cunt
and
The V Book
lining our office bookshelves. With these mutual interests, it was only a matter of time—less than a year—before we found a way to work together, thanks to Vanessa taking a position at the Center for Sexual Health Promotion at Indiana University, where Debby had been working for several years. Shortly thereafter, the idea for
Read My Lips
was born, and after much work, brainstorming over lunches, and 2 a.m. email exchanges, it’s now in your hands.

This book is for anyone who has a vulva, loves someone with a vulva, has come from a vagina, or is just plain curious about these parts. Through our research and education efforts, we try to better understand the diverse ways in which women’s genitals are talked about (or not), and we try to help women and men learn about this important part of the female body in terms of health, sex, pleasure, culture, and art. In addition to working as scientific researchers, we also feel passionately about spreading the word to others, which is why we decided to write a book to share with the world. We like to refer to this as vagina and vulva “outreach.”

What does this mean for you? It means that your journey will be filled with the unusual combination of empirical scientific research, quirky humor, and vulva crafts. In addition to assembling some of the most interesting scientific research we could find, we also turned to more than one thousand other experts on the topic of vulvas and vaginas: YOU! These pages are filled with funny, heartwarming, eye-opening, and sometimes challenging stories from women and men who live all over the world, ages eighteen to eighty. We chose stories that we felt best represent the complexity of what it means to live life with these body parts: to take in what parents and friends say to young girls about their bodies, to witness how lovers respond to vulvas and vaginas, and to experience the ways in which these parts change during menstruation, after giving birth, or as one ages.

We should note that even though women, vulvas, and vaginas almost always go together, this isn’t always the case. Some women don’t have vulvas or vaginas from the time they were formed in the womb (they may have what are sometimes called a disorder of sex development or intersex condition) or because they are male-to-female transgendered people who may identify as women but who have not had surgery to change their genitals to female-typical genitals. For similar reasons related to development or gender identity, some people who have vulvas and vaginas are men, not women. Although we tried to be sensitive to these issues in our book, we often use the phrases “women’s genitals” and “female genitals” to refer to vulvas and vaginas even though these are not always interchangeable. We did this for two reasons: (1) most of the time they are interchangeable, and so this will make sense to most readers of our book; and (2) to avoid overkill, we varied the terms we used. This is also why we sometimes use genital slang such as “coochie,” “twat,” “snatch,” “v-parts,” “down there,” “private parts,” “lady parts,” and other such words. Just because we know the technical terms for the vulva and vagina doesn’t mean that we always want to use them. Sometimes we like using fun words, too, just like the one-thousand-plus women and men who completed our survey and told us about the many words that they use for vulvas and vaginas.