His and Her Health

I am 30 years old and I'm still - technically - a virgin. I say technically because I've never had intercourse but I don't feel like a virgin in the usual sense of the word - and I hate calling myself one because of that feeling. I've had many sexual relationships over the years including two long term relationships with men I really loved and cared about; but I've never been able to have intercourse due to primary vulvar vestibulis syndrome. I couldn't tolerate penile penetration at all - even a tampon was extremely painful, though only when I put it in and took it out.

I had a vestibulectomy with vaginal advancement on October 20th of this year - about 7 1/2 weeks ago.

I started using the dilators 3 days ago. For the first time in my whole entire life I was able to insert something fully into my vagina and pull it in and out! I did this for 10 minutes. Last night I even had an orgasm while doing it - felt really good. It's still really sore near the urethra, but my doctor assured me that the area that still hurts is the area that usually heals the slowest. Anyway - it's nothing like before and I'm sure in time sex will be very pleasurable.

I'm not surprised by how emotional I feel these last few days - I am, however, overwhelmed. It's an equal mix of happy, hopeful, sad and angry. It's hard to focus on other things.

I'm writing because I just wanted to know if anyone reading this is like me in that they've never been able to have sex at all because of VVS. I found it really hard to make the decision to have the surgery in the first place because, even though my doctor assured me I wasn't crazy and even after all these years with no change, I still had this thought lingering in the back of my head that went something like: "A lot of girls have pain when they first start having sex. It's normal. Maybe there's just something wrong with me - like I'm not strong enough to deal with it or I'm too uptight or something." I remember this one guy I dated for a while used to say "You just gotta take one for the team." That relationship didn't last very long at all (thank god) but his words have stayed with me all this time.

Now that I'm using the dilators and having success, I feel like I can let these thoughts go, but it would really help to hear from anyone who was in the same situation as me before they had the surgery - or from anyone who has any thoughts or feeling about my situation at all. I'd greatly appreciate hearing from you. Thanks.

THis is a late post as I go through the boards, but I can relate to what you've said. I'm not a virgin, but sex has always been painful and losing my virginity was a slow process as I was not diagnosed at the time. I'm not sure if I have primary vestibulitis or not, because I have a lot of other symptoms indicative of other types of vestibulitis, but I have had similar experiences. I am able to have an orgasm and enjoy sex, but at the same time feel intense pain! I often think about how great it would be, if just the pain sensations just went away.

FOr the first year I thought maybe it was just normal pain. I had heard women say it took awhile to adjust. Or I thought maybe it was because after my first few sexually active months I stopped having sex for several months, but then started again. I thought maybe the delay slowed down my process to becoming "used to it".

I did go to 2 different gynecologists with my symptoms that year. Once I was diagnosed with a yeast infection, and there was a little improvement, but much remained the same. THe next time they couldn't find anything wrong at all.

I really think there need to be better education of not just practitioners, and women with this condition, but also teens. In health class if we had learned a little something about this I would have known what to watch out for and not stopped until I saw a specialist. Instead all I heard was urban legends about how painful losing your virginity is and how long it takes for a woman to enjoy sex.

Many times I would stop while my husband's penis was just past my vestibule/hymen area so it took me a long time to realize that the pain was only in the vestibule and to be able to accurately convey my symptoms to my doctors. Before that I would google painful intercourse and nothing but STD and yeast infection stuff would come up. THen, I didn't have internet at home for a few years, only at work or in a library, and obviously I didn't feel comfortable researching the subject in those places, so I relied on my doctors to properly diagnose me.

Unfortunately it took me 5 years to get a diagnosis. And it was mainly because I did the research online, found out what could be causing my symptoms and then found a doctor from the NVA that knows their arse from a hole in the ground. It's funny now to know that's not even a full diagnosis, that I have to go through the process of elimination to figure out whether it's primary or not. It's also hard thinking of primary vestibulitis as a birth defect. It only further increases the feeling I have that something is wrong with me. Sometimes I wonder how on earth evolution and natural selection managed to let primary VVS genes slip through the cracks since this is clearly something that might limit frequency at attempts to reproduce!

Now I just htink of this as a lesson that when something is wrong you have to trust your instincts and push until you find the right doctor. I feel like I lost 5 years of my life and my marriage...my wedding night, my honeymoon... and that I should have been more aggressive in seeing a specialist. I didn't even realize they had vulvar pain specialists for many years, I thought people didn't get more specialized beyond gynecology and obstetrics.

Anyway, I definitely know how you feel!