Vaginal lip question

[Zxcvbnm]

Okay. So I know everyone asks questions about this. But I've been freaking out about it since I was 7. I am now 19, and have never had a relationship because I am too scared of how my vagina looks. One of my inner lips hangs down and is dark and wrinkled. Lately I've been looking up pictures of vaginas to see if any looked like mine and if it was normal, and I was slightly consoled. However, today, my roommate was talking about vaginas for whatever reason and was like "I heard about plastic surgery on vaginas, and I looked up pictures, and that's so gross!! Like how does it get that messed up? What do you have to do? It looks like roast beef who would touch that?" And it literally crushed me because I had to laugh along and now I'm right back to square one of being to insecure to ever have sex... Please help

[Sam W]

Hi Zxcvbnm,

I'm sorry that your roommate made those comments, especially after you'd taken steps to start feeling better about your body. Something to remember is that labias come in all shapes and sizes, like any other body part does. There isn't some ideal form of genital that we should all aspire to have. Too, if you have a partner who won't have sex with you or is a jerk because of how your labia looks? That person is not a good or respectful partner. Does that make sense?

If you haven't seen this piece yet, I think it would be a helpful one to read: Give'em Some Lip: Labia That Clearly Ain't Minor

[Heather]

I also want to add that it's not at all uncommon for people with labia to have negative feelings about them, and sometimes people who talk like your roommate are saying what they are from a place of their own insecurity about their own bodies. It certainly doesn't make what they've said and how they're saying it any less upsetting, of course, nor any less insensitive. But it may well be that what she was saying she was saying just as much about herself as anyone else, rather than as some kind of attack on you. After all, it asks for a lot more vulnerability for someone to say, "Man, looking at these pictures makes me feel really insecure, because what they're showing as bodies people felt needed to be 'fixed' sure looks a lot like my body parts."

[Zxcvbnm]

Thank you, that helps a lot. I guess, just all the videos I've ever seen a girls vagina is practically invisible, and I won't even let guys get close to me because I'm afraid I'll be the first person they're with to have a different looking one and they'll be freaked out like I was. It's so hard and it's so much extra stress and prevents me from feeling in control of my body

[Heather]

So, if you're looking at videos of vulvas, it's pretty likely that what you've been looking about are videos made for sexual entertainment purposes. And any kind of porn tends to be a terrible place to get ideas about what's "normal" or most typical, when it comes to body parts, including genitals. For instance, in most porn, actors tend to have much larger penises than people who don't work in porn do; actresses tend to have less pubic hair, and smaller -- or "tidier," labia, and surgeries are often in the mix with this -- than people who don't work in sexual entertainment do.

Just like sexual entertainment isn't a good place to get ideas about sexual dynamics in real life (including for people who work in porn when they're off-screen!), the same goes with bodies and their parts. Make sense?

[Zxcvbnm]

That makes a lot of sense. I'm just still scared because if that's all that's shown in stuff like that it seems to set it as the norm and that anything different is gross or not taken care of. I would just hate to finally be confident and for a guy I trust to think something's wrong because it's not something that's talked about anywhere. Thank you again for your help I really appreciate it

[Heather]

What I'd say about that is that most people are both humane enough and smart enough to want their sexual partners to be like the real people they are, with the bodies they have, rather than resemble fantasy or fiction. So, by all means, if before you get naked or sexual with someone, you get the impression from them that they aren't ready for real, actual people with the bodies people have outside sexual entertainment do, you should steer clear, for a whole bunch of reasons, including that that person is just probably going to truly suck as a sexual partner for anyone in a myriad of ways.

You also get to take time before being naked or sexual with people to find out about them and build the kind of trust and comfort you need to to feel comfortable being vulnerable in the way anyone, with any kind of genitals is, together.

I would also say, though, that I don't have the impression that young people now with the maturity anyone needs to be safely sexual with someone else expect people's bodies or sexualities to be like they are in porn, or even want that. It might also help to bear in mind that someone's harshest body critic is almost always themselves, not other people. In my experience in life and this field, most people who want to get naked with someone are so freaking excited to be naked with that person that the body they are paying attention to is that person's body, not what they may have seen on other bodies before. So, some of this may just boil down to pairing any trust you build, for as long as you need to, with a little faith.