We were sitting in the kitchen, Beth and I, drinking cups of tea and discussing our genitals, as you do. I guess you’d call it the Vagina Dialogues. Like me, Beth, was fascinated by sex. Every month we’d buy women’s magazines – ignoring the fashions, which we couldn’t afford anyway – and discuss, dissect and analyse the sex articles.

This particular afternoon we moved beyond theory and techniques onto biology, specifically boobs – she’d too much, I had too little – and our vaginas. Beth wanted to know what function, if any, the superfluous flap of flesh on the left of the vagina served, and why, unlike the labia majora and minora, it didn’t come as a matching set. If you are confused, so was I – I had no idea what she was taking about.
Beth and I were good friends but a bit old for “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours” so I grabbed a handheld mirror and had a look. My investigations in the bathroom proved fruitless. I sought it here, I sought it there, but this extra flesh proved elusive. Whatever it was, I didn’t have it.
You’d think with all of the sex articles we read, we wouldn’t have been so surprised that our vaginas were different, but we were. The shiny, manicured world of women’s magazines might have taught us where to look for the G-spot, but glossed over the fact that the surrounding terrain could vary, sometimes quite significantly, from woman to woman. Like faces, or snowflakes, no two vaginas are exactly the same. At least that used to be the case. These days I’m not so sure.
In the past few years, vaginal surgery has become increasingly popular. The most controversial of all procedures is hymenoplasty, which reconstructs the hymen so you can lose your virginity all over again. Thankfully this is not popular in Ireland, but the fact that the operation even exists is a damning indictment of society. In much of the world we have 21st century science but the same old religious mumbo jumbo, which equates virginity with a state of grace.
While hymenoplasty is nothing less than butchery pandering to chauvinist and religious nonsense, other vaginal procedures arose from real medical and sexual needs. Surgery to expose the clitoris may help women who have difficulty reaching orgasm, while vaginoplasty, which tightens the vagina, could be the last resort for a woman who finds that pelvic toning and Kegel exercises are not enough to repair the wear and tear of multiple births.
Although these surgeries promise to improve sexual pleasure, there is the risk of scar tissue or hypersensitivity, potentially making sex impossible or painful. However, for a woman who has issues with sexual functioning to begin with, the potential rewards may well outweigh the risks.
I certainly don’t blame anyone for wanting to improve their sex life, but what strikes me as worrying is that most vaginal surgeries have nothing to do with sexual pleasure – it’s all about the aesthetics. At the Harley Medical Group’s Irish clinic, labia reduction is the most popular vagina surgery performed. Surgery such as this, labia liposuction to reduce the pubis mound or labiaplasty, which reshapes the genitals, are all performed as cosmetic procedures.
A few months ago an acquaintance of mine, who we’ll call Lauren, decided to have her outer labia reduced. She thought her labia looked too big and she wouldn’t wear tight fitting pants for fear of the dreaded ‘camel toe’ effect. She told me she had been considering surgery for years. “I finally just thought, feck it, I’ll go and get it done.”
Lauren claimed that although everything was in good working order her self-consciousness about her vagina had affected her sex life. “I wouldn’t have sex with the lights on.” How about oral sex? “Oh, God, no… no, I couldn’t bear it, couldn’t relax.”
What I wanted to know was why did she felt this way in the first place? But Lauren would say no more than she “just did.”
The British Medical Journal (BMJ) interviewed women who had undergone labia reductions and found that these women often mentioned pornography as a reason. Many feminists agree. In Beauty And Misogyny: Harmful Cultural Practices in the West, Sheila Jeffrey argues that there is growing pressure on women to conform to models of femininity based on stereotypes of the sex industry, an idea picked up by Ariel Levy who argues that women have vaginal surgeries to conform to raunchy images in popular culture.
I like porn, but my viewing habits are almost all amateur because the look favoured by most professional porn stars – fake boobs, bright white teeth, tans, and waxed and polished pussies – is a bit, you know, ho hum, for me at least. But – and excuse me for getting all Carrie Bradshaw here – I couldn’t help but wonder, what if the commentators are right? Has the easy availability of porn resulted in a very narrow definition of what is sexy?
Years ago the only crotch most women saw was her own – and if she was prudish she could avoid that as well. These days we are drowning in a sea of snatches, so perhaps it is true that the standards set by porn stars, strippers and swimwear and lingerie models give both men and women unrealistic expectations of how ‘pretty’ a vagina should be.
For other women it’s the availability of surgery that motivates them, a kind of ‘build it and they will come’ (well, hopefully they will afterwards too!) The BMJ study also found that as increasing numbers of women have labia reductions, more women decide they need surgery too. The more cosmetically beautified labia out there, the more our idea about what is ‘normal’ shrinks.
Liz Dale of the Harley Medical Group agrees. According to their records, no Irish patients have cited porn as a deciding factor. Instead it is the fact that surgery is available and accessible that encourages them. “It’s the awareness that they can have something done,” she says.
We might not be running into cosmetic surgeons with porn magazine clippings saying “give me one of those” but as Liz Dale notes, for women like Lauren, it’s all about looking good. “It’s not about sexual satisfaction, it’s about how they look and their confidence. These women are generally either coming out of a marriage, or getting into a new relationship, and that’s when they decide to have the surgery.”
At €4,470 labia reduction isn’t cheap, but many Irish women could afford it if they wished. At Clane General Hospital, labiaplasty costs €4,500 with an initial €100 for your consultation.
The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists warns that vaginal surgery can result in numbness and loss of sensation. Irish cosmetic surgeons do not deny this but the risk varies depending on the procedure. Nicci Ward of Harley Medical states, “With a labial trimming this is a risk, but with a reduction of the labia keeping the natural contour this [risk] is reduced.”
Furthermore it is impossible to say what long-term problems or complications may arise out of vaginal surgery. When I asked, Ward acknowledged that there has not been enough research in the area and that the medical group is auditing their patients. In a real sense, women undergoing these procedures have paid for the privilege of being guinea pigs.
I tried to talk Lauren out of the surgery, but as she pointed out, it was her decision, she was the one who had to live with her vagina, not me. “It’s like when I read that Cameron Dias doesn’t believe in cosmetic surgery. Yeah, so what? She’s gorgeous; she doesn’t need it. If she had a big nose I bet she’d feel different.” Luckily for her the operation appears to have been a complete success.
I am not against cosmetic surgery per se, even on the most intimate parts of the body, but it really does depend on what is being done and why. After all, by letting a surgeon run riot over your vagina with a scalpel and scissor you risk no longer being able to feel sexy, in order to conform to some nominal standard of looking sexy.
I can’t help but think we’d be better off learning to love our bodies as they are – or finding a lover to do so for us. Between men wanting to be bigger and women wishing to be smaller or neater, that’s a whole lot of humanity fretting about their genitals, instead of doing as the good Lord or evolution intended – enjoying them. What a sad state of affairs!