It’s Not About My Vagina
By: Christine Therriault-Mer
Tags: Gender, LGBTQ, Feminism, Transgender, Identity

It’s Not About My Vagina

It’s about a 12-year old girl.

When I was a little girl all I ever wanted to wear was dresses. My parents didn’t always encourage this, but apparently I never really gave them the option. If my mother held up 2 different outfits and one of them was a dress I always picked the dress. According to them, I started doing this when I was a toddler.

I’ve always liked pretty. Don’t get me wrong — I liked to play in the dirt too, but I’ve always been fem. Masculine just never suited me. One of my earliest memories is of me playing in our front yard — maybe I was 7 or 8 years old. I was creating a fairy garden: building tiny houses out of dirt and mud, decorating them with leaves and dandelions, and drawing pathways between them with a stick. A boy, younger than me, and his mother walked past me on the sidewalk and I heard the boy say to his mother, “Look at that boy playing in the dirt.”

I remember wanting to yell at the boy and his mother, to correct his hurtful mistake:

“I AM NOT A BOY! I’M A GIRL!”

I refused to let my mom cut my hair short again.

My closet is full of dresses; I wear them almost exclusively. I hate the moment, each year, when I realize the temperature requires me to pull out jeans from a drawer and put them on. And while my hair is currently cut short (I’ve even sported a shaved head), it’s rare that I leave the house without makeup — because doing so expresses who I am.

Me with my shaved head.

My female-ness has never been about my vagina. Don’t get me wrong — I like having one and just like my eye color or my short stature it’s part of who I am, but it’s not what made me a girl who built fairy gardens in the dirt or a woman who still prefers dresses and the color pink.

I knew I was a girl, not because I had “girl-parts,” but because I knew I was a girl. I know that I am a woman, not because I have the “right equipment,” but because it’s who I have become. It’s not about my vagina — it’s about me as a whole person and all the things that have made me a whole person.

And I’ll tell you something — something important, so pay close attention.

My vagina is none of your business. My having a vagina or not having one is none of your business. If I had a penis instead of a vagina, that’s none of your business.

We refer to our genitalia as our “private parts” for a reason — because they are OUR PRIVATE PARTS.

And yet, society continues to be hell-bent on determining who we are based on something that society specifically says is meant to be kept under wraps. We are categorized solely by the one part of our bodies that we are supposed to be able to keep private. That kid didn’t think I was a boy because I had a penis; I don’t have one and if I had had one I wouldn’t have had it hanging out for passerbys to see. He saw another child, with short hair, playing in the dirt, and thought I must be a boy.

I didn’t then refuse to let my mother cut my hair because I have a vagina; I wanted my hair to grow long so people would see me as feminine — the way I saw myself. I didn’t choose to have a vagina, but I also didn’t choose my gender. The fact that my private parts and my gender “matched up” has made some things easier than others, but I didn’t choose for that to happen either.

That memory of being mistaken for a boy is uncomfortably painful.

I know it’s because I want others to see me as who I really am — as who I know myself to be.

When we are young and learning who we are and what we aren’t, what we like and what we detest, what gives us comfort and what frightens us, what we are good at and what skills we lack, who we can trust and who will hurt us, what makes us laugh and what makes us cry, what books we want to read, which games we want to play, who we want as friends, who we can trust with our secrets, what we want to be for Halloween, and whether we prefer wearing dresses or overalls — it’s not about vaginas or penises — it’s about learning how to be who we really are.

No matter what we’ve been taught about gender roles or gender expectations, who we are is not determined by what we have between our legs.

Our body parts can impact our identity — the sum of who we are — but just as my brown eyes don’t make me who I am, I’m not my vagina either.

I wasn’t predestined to like the color pink or want to play with dolls because mother’s OBGYN delivered a baby with a vagina then checked the box next to female on my birth certificate. I wasn’t predestined not to like pink or not want a Barbie Dream House (there was never one under the Christmas Tree) if I had been born with a penis.

I’d like to pause for a moment and ask if all this talk about vaginas and penises feels… weird to anyone. Does it? I’m not asking about feelings of prudishness or sexy-sexy talk. I’m not trying to gauge if you’re comfortable using proper terminology for body parts or if you’re one of those people who prefers words like “flower” or “pee-pee.” I’m not interested in how you speak about your own vagina, pussy, twat, slit, or cunt. I’m not interested in how you refer to your own penis, dick, cock, schlong, or man-meat. I’m asking if talking, talking, incessantly talking about whether a person has one or the other doesn’t strike you as — wrong — just plain wrong. Now, if you think that these are necessary conversations, if you believe it’s important to know that I indeed have a vagina and not a penis, then PLEASE can you explain to me how my private parts are any of your business?

And then can you please explain to me how grown adults can justify talking about what is or isn’t between a 12 year old child’s legs and say things like this:

Kira Wertz has written a really remarkable article on the grown adults who thought it was beyond necessary to discuss a 12 year old’s genitalia.

And if you think calling a child a thing is so hysterically funny that you need 4 of these emojis 😂 then you’re sure to 🤣 when you read this:

This isn’t about my vagina; this is about a 12 year old girl.

And seriously, even if you can’t accept that she’s a girl because she has a penis and not a vagina — even though her private parts are none of your business — and you have to refer to her as a boy this is STILL ABOUT A CHILD — A HUMAN BEING — WHO IS NOT A THING!

This is not about my vagina; I am not who I am based one single body part which — wouldn’t you be horrified if I shared a picture of it the way I shared a picture of my bald head?

This is about the horrifying way we turn people into things when their private “things” don’t determine who or what they are.

This is not about my vagina, or your vagina, or your penis. This is about us being so intent on making it about vaginas and penises — so focused on looking up skirts or down pants — that we are turning into actual cunts and dicks.