Designer vagina the latest in plastic surgery disasters


Jen Vuk
December 23, 2010

Apparently more and more Australian women are unhappy with the appearance of their genitalia. This is according to psychologist Frances D'Arcy-Tehan who also found that 75 per cent of the 800 women she surveyed were none too keen for anyone else, including their partners, to see their genitalia either.

Indeed, so uncomfortable have many of us become with our slightly dangly bits that almost half admitted they would consider going under the knife. Goodness. Isn't it enough that the Brazilian tore strips off our map of Tassie, now we're being told to get rid of the folds as well.

If I sound flippant, dear reader, forgive me. I'm still reeling from the news, as reported in The Age earlier this month. And here's why. In addition to the above findings, D'Arcy-Tehan listened to the women, aged 18 to 80, telling her again and again that the look and odour of their "pink bits" worried them no end.

Advertisement: Story continues below When they described their private parts, words such as ''unattractive'', ''inadequate'' and ''repulsive'' were common. And the women's yardstick for normal? Online porn sites. There's certainly distortion at work here, but it has less to do with the state of our hapless genitals and more to do with what's going on upstairs.

We can't pile all the blame into porn's corner, either. Women's magazines have long been obsessed with our vaginas, but in the past few years they've become positively transfixed by the "designer" variety. And, not surprisingly, it's in the US that the demand for genital cosmetic surgery procedures has gone through the roof.

But here in Australia we're fast closing in. Last month, a report by The Sunday Age revealed that in the past financial year almost 1400 women underwent surgery to reduce the size and appearance of their labia. To put that into context, in 2000-01, it was just over 450.

Medical reasons for surgery included sexual dysfunction, congenital defects and problems following childbirth. I can certainly empathise with the latter. There's nothing like pushing out a baby to destabilise a pelvic floor, but, surely, there can't be that many women presenting at plastic surgeries with gynaecological issues?

Just as I suspected, Dr Google has the answer. "It is not uncommon," one plastic surgery site enthuses, "for women to worry about the shape or size of their labia."

Not uncommon? Really? I would have thought it was more "not uncommon" to keep these things to oneself.

Unlike men, who spend a fair chunk of their lives worrying about their genitals (standing shoulder to shoulder at urinals will do that to a person), women have long enjoyed the luxury of discretion and the private cubicle. In fact, so mysterious are our nether regions, even to ourselves, that many of us are hard pressed to tell our labium majora from our labium minora. And don't even get me started on the questionable whereabouts of our G-spots.

And yet here we are looking to porn sites to enlighten us.

I've got another term for non-medical genital operations - gender manipulation. When plastic surgeries spin about "vaginal rejuvenation" and "aesthetic vaginal surgery", without making much mention of the dangers, they render an invasive procedure as benign as the old style cut and blow dry.

This isn't just false advertising, it's gross negligence and an insidious form of marketing designed to defuse and neutralise a non-refundable procedure that can cost upwards of $5000 and carries real risks of disfigurement and sexual impairment.

Despite the inherent promise to women of a "youthful appearance and function of the vulva and vaginal area", the surgery offers no guarantees of a more positive body image.

How do I know? Well, after trawling through more than enough sites spruiking before and after shots, let me say this. Beauty may well be in the eye of the beholder, but it sure isn't in the close-up - reconstructed vulva or not.

My advice? Next time you hazard a glance down there and are rocked by too much information, cancel that appointment for a XXX wax. In this war of insinuation, the best defence is staying under cover. Blanch at the thought if you must, just remember this: when you refuse sex with your loving partner because you don't have a designer vagina, it's not a medical or cosmetic issue, it's a wake-up call.

Jen Vuk is a Melbourne writer.