Beyond Eden-Kele Moon: It Was All About The Sex

I was curious about erotic literature, especially after the horrendous 50 Shades of Grey and the rather insipid S.E.C.R.E.T. Much of sex really is about things other than the act, secrets, emotions, grief, nostalgia, family and promises. I’m coming to believe that good erotica is a story that recognizes this. And this book was a happy find that way.

Beyond Eden by Kele Moon
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I liked the story. Unlike other erotic literature I’ve read, the plot didn’t feel like just words bunged in between sex scenes. The threesome relationship and the fetishes came through well too, without disgusting or scarring. The sex scenes were fresh, the emotions adding a richness to the complicated dynamics between Paul, Danny & Eve.

Danny is an interesting character, the real draw in the story. His character is beautifully nuanced as the troubled in-love bad boy, as a reluctant stand-in for the snake in the original Eden story. The character of Eve could have been brought out much better, however. The two men and even the catalytic dom-from-the-past were well-etched characters but Eve, such an important character to the story, felt just like a random body, conveniently fitting into the sexual/emotional dynamics between everyone else.

I noticed only about a quarter way into the book that that the two bodies in bed on the cover were both male. And then I couldn’t help noticing that the woman’s body with a strategically held apple, while beautiful was a Photoshop botch-up on the right leg. Minor but maybe not for a book that is about the appreciation of the body’s beauty.

I got this book off NetGalley, for a review.

View all my reviews

Scared Of Nobody

A colleague said to me,

You don’t seem to be scared of me.

I replied,

I’m not scared of anybody.

And I spent the rest of the day pondering that.

You never quite realize how much you live under fear until you break free of it. Afraid of your bosses, afraid of the government, afraid of your loved ones, afraid of losing face, afraid of being taken advantage of.

Scared child (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It’s true. I used to be scared of a lot of people. Even if I never admitted it, fear sat like a solid line above my head. It’s not that I’ve learnt courage. It’s that the fear has seeped out or evaporated. Like every experience riddled a tiny hole inside me, through which fear leaked & eventually ran out.

If you’re a woman, you’ve grown up steeped in so much of fear, fear, fear – fear of confrontation, fear of opposition, fear of disapproval, fear of abandonment, fear of a bad reputation, fear of judgement, fear of men, fear of women – this lack of fear is quite exhilarating.

I think the biggest fear most women have, is of something irreversible happening. Loss-of-virginity, marriage to the wrong man, childbirth (or not, since you’ll never be that age again and the bio clock is ticking) all fall under this. The fear looms huge like a monster, keeping you from making a decision. And back to the biological clock thing, there’s the fear that not making a decision will turn out to be just as bad a decision and just as irreversible.

There’s a conversation in Gone with the wind where an older lady observes that Scarlett has lost her fear. She also says that it is not a good thing for a woman to lose her fear. Women’s fears are the foundation of our social order. What when they are lost?

I’m just coming to realize that brashness is a result of this loss of fear. I thought about my last serious relationship. If I had feared hurting him just a little more and cared a little less about things like truth and fairness, things may have been different. Head over heart and all that. Still, that’s bygones.

The upside of fearlessness is really all that. Tremendous power and the energy that comes with it. Fatigue, boredom and ennui are indications of powerlessness. I experienced a rush of power and I think that’s fueled by (and adds to) being able to say just what I want, when I want, to who I want.

When the heady high dies down, however a hollowness returns. Hello fear, old companion, you’re back. It feels different though. This is fear of the world changing, of nothing seeming the way I thought it would be. But losing fear is an irreversible process, one that embeds itself in you. Once you’ve broken through, you know you’ll always be able to, again.

Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose, right? And that includes fear.

XXFactored Mar2013: We want gender-neutrality but we also want sex!

I initiated a social media clean-up last year that continued over several weeks. Pages were unliked, dead blogs were unsubscribed from, uninteresting and spammy twitter accounts were unfollowed, Boards rather than people were looked at to follow on Pinterest. The result is that my timelines move slower and I’m getting a better chance to look at things that are really interesting and relevant. Also, it has considerably reduced my social media fatigue (yes, there is such a thing!) so I’m more inclined to look at newer content.

The Idea-smithy’s Facebook Page looks at pretty much everything that isn’t here so pop culture, fiction, poetry, general slice-of-life moments all fall under that purview. There is so much coming in there that I’m considering making Ideamarked (The Idea-smithy version of XXFactored posts) a weekly rather than monthly feature.

There have been posts coming up that I am not quite sure whether to put on XXFactor or The Idea-smithy. They often have to do with womanhood, sexulaity and relationships but are also about pop culture, fiction or other such things. In a few cases, I’ve posted to both places. But I’m starting to question whether it makes sense to keep these two blogs separate. I’m the same person writing for both and I’m not even anonymous anymore. On the other hand, each one has taken on a certain voice of its own. Also, these are two communities with some overlap but possibly differences, too. So I ask my community here at XX Factor: Should I merge the two or should they stay separate?

And while you’re thinking, here’s the March picks on XX Factor:

• The ‘Harem’ series of pictures depicts Islamic calligraphy tattoos and clothes that blend in with the background to represent Arabic women trapped between their culture and their depictions in Western Art.:
  ‘Harem: Captivating Images of Islamic Women‘(by Paul Caridad on The Visual News)
• ‘5 Tips for handling Office Romance‘:
  I used to believe in ‘not dipping your nib in the office ink’ but with increasing work hours & pressues, I think it’s time to embrace a new social paradigm. And here are some sensible tips. (via YourTango)
• Lying as an essential relationship survival mechanism? I find it personally appalling but then, my all-honesty policy hasn’t worked for my relationships. What do you think?:
  ‘Deceptive Affection may actually keep relationships going‘ (via PsychCentral)
• ‘Why Gay Men & Straight Women have strong bonds‘:
  That’s what I thought too but it’s nice to have it confirmed in expertspeak. Yay to my gay BFFs! (via YourTango)
• High heels signify a class distinction, did you know? But of course, so much of fashion & image-consciousness is about creating a superior ‘us’ over an inferior ‘them’:
  ‘High Heels and Distinction among Women‘ (via The Society Pages)
• A hilarious infographic on modern day sex myths & reality:
  ‘4 Things Nobody Admits about Modern Human Sexuality‘ (via Cracked)
• ‘Things I’ve Learned From Writing Under a Gender-Neutral Name‘:
  As someone who built a presence on a gender-neutral name, this article called to me immediately. It brings out some very painful truths about gender stereotyping. I especially loved the last paragraph. Think. (via Thought Catalog)
• This article made me want to cry and sigh alternately. Some valid points, some “Are you EFFING kidding me??!” but mostly so much of Whats-the-damn-point. Good read.:
  ‘5 Ways Modern Men are trained to hate women‘ (via Cracked)
• ‘Remote-Control your Man/Woman‘:
  Terribly sexist. Also, quite funny. At least they have one for each of the genders. (via Morph8)
• An ‘strong intelligent’ woman’s tentative steps into make-up and what it means:
  ‘Brave New World of Make-up‘ (via Neha Vishwanathan)
• ‘She spreads her own wings‘: Fly! (via Coco J Ginger)
• The iconic ‘Can women fake orgasms?’ restaurant scene from When Harry Met Sally. 1.27 is the famous turning point. Enjoy! (via Youtube)

Sex Stuff

Some home truths about sex.

It is open to a wide variety of interpretations. That completely depends on you and your partner. And each of you may have a different take on it, in which case, God help you. It could or could not be a lot of things.

Commitment. A bribe. A transfer of respect. A power game. Love.

Then there are things that have got nothing (or should not be allowed to have anything) to do with it. Whatsoever.

Good looks. Religion. Rebellion. Alcohol & drugs.

It hurts. A lot. Physically, sometimes. Emotionally too. But most of all, in what a surprise it is. There’s much that you never understood, no matter how many books you’ve read, how many conversations you’ve been a part of. There’s much that will surprise you, no matter how much you’ve already had before. And anybody, anytime has the potential to surprise you. That surprise is not always a good thing, even if the sex is. You never realize just how much of your belief system is founded on certain assumptions of sex and sexuality, until they’re broken.

Everybody has a problem with sex. This is because everyone has problems. And it boils down to this. It’s a fundamental need, for one. But it is also the most fundamental way in which we relate to each other. It’s practically the building block of civilization. We spend our lives trying to figure out how to deal with life and to journey through the madness that is each other. How could those problems not turn up in our sex?

Sex (Photo credit: danielito311)

These problems do not mean that sex will not be pleasurable. But there’s much that gets released other than key fluids during the most intimate act two human beings can share (apart from childbirth). Fears, repressed notions, hidden states of being – yes they’re all in there imprisoned inside you. And guess what, with sex, you’ve gone and peeped into the dungeons. You may even let one or two escape by mistake. And that’s problematic.

These problems don’t go away by having more sex. Or by having sex with a different person. Or sex in a different way. Or with having sex at all (if you haven’t before). Or for that matter, abstaining from sex. You’re going to have to figure out the best way to deal with those problems and not let your sex life become a problem as well.

Stuff happens when you have sex. Something shifts within. Some things get released and other things take their place. You feel better for awhile. Scientists tell us that’s endorphins. You may go through the gamut of guilt, shame, fear, wonder, awe, affection, confusion. If you don’t feel anything at all, then you’ve got the MOTHER of all problems. Please see a doctor and sort it out. This problem may be the worst STD of all.

If you’ve ever had the misfortune of a bad experience relating to sex (peer pressure, abuse, rape), then that experience is going to stay with you. It would be comforting to hear that everything will get sorted out and you’ll never remember it again. That’s a lie. The truth of violation or violence or both will never be erased. It will be there with you, right in your bed with the blankets and sheets and the other person. But, as with every other fear, you can learn to live with it and not be stopped by it. Yes, this is possible but don’t make the mistake of expecting that life will deliver that justice to you on a platter. It won’t. As unjust as the past may have been, it will still, unfortunately, be up to you to get past it and build a better world for you to live in.

Never let somebody else’s judgement, morality or ideas cloud your ideas of sex. It’s just not worth it. Taking on someone else’s notions is like throwing a little carbon monoxide into an already foggy, smoky place. Also remember that as a member of this society, certain things are defined as legal, ethical and decent. Be aware of those boundaries and for your own sake, respect them. But inside your mind, run free because if you don’t, you’ll inevitably lapse outside and that’ll be a lot worse.

It’s not really that different from life. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s not worth the price. You pretty much won’t know for sure till it’s all over so try to relax and enjoy it.

Sometimes Does Yes Means No?

Our population figures tell us that Indians are having at least as much sex as the rest of the world. Not all extramarital pregnancies are the result of rape. And from a purely scientific point of view, if there are so many conceptions, the number of sexual intercourse occasions has to be at least the same, if not higher. Let’s just face the fact that India has sex and needs to deal with all the issues and questions that come up with it.

I’ve generally steered away from getting too close into the bedroom in my writing and so sue me, I’m Indian, it’s ingrained in me to never publicly acknowledge sex. But we are in the utterly ridiculous state of gangrapes, burgeoning population rates, teenage pregnancies and child abuse so I think it’s time I stopped being coy. I’m talking about this.

I recently read a post on TheFrisky by a guy who was left confused by an almost-hookup with a girl who didn’t say no but didn’t exactly seem amenable either.

Flashing as flirty a smile as I could muster, I asked,

“Is everything okay? Are you cool with this?”

Her response wasn’t quite what I expected:

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just do what you need to do.”

This particular statement wasn’t spoken with annoyance or frustration or impatience. It also wasn’t spoken with any enthusiasm whatsoever. It was the most matter-of-fact, emotionless comment I had ever heard from someone I was in the midst of undress with.

Awhile ago, I also heard about an incident between two people I know. There was alcohol consumed and some hooking-up done. Later though, the accounts varied. The girl says that she was taken advantage of. The guy says that she was perfectly conscious and never once stopped him or said no. The girl says a combination of inebriation and shock worked against her.

And a few years ago, I was in a steady relationship with someone who wanted to go much farther and faster than I was comfortable. It caused a lot of problems for us. From the outside, it’s easy to say, “He was a jerk. You should have left him then.” But what makes it so difficult is that these moments don’t occur all the time. In a relationship, there are good moments of shared intimacy, laughter, fun and even love. And bedroom conflicts tend to get categorized with all other things that couples argue about. In this case, I gave in a lot of the times just to keep the peace. Those were the times when my Okays were really Nos.

In a more recent relationship, I was shocked to hear my partner tell me, that he felt he couldn’t always say No to me. It was a conversation that changed our relationship. I never felt comfortable around him again, always worrying that I might be unknowingly transgressing into predatory behavior that men are usually accused of. It opened a whole new dimension to an already complex issue. What about those times when a guy wants to say No? Is this solely a female prerogative?

Interestingly, the same morning that I read TheFrisky article that got me thinking, also brought me this other study by PsychCentral that talks about how people routinely keep up small deceptions in relationships. Ordinarily, much of these gets written off as compromises that one makes in a relationship. When there’s tension and bad blood, you can bet it infects everything in the relationship. Routine adjustments that we make everyday suddenly seem like severe compromises. And since sex isn’t something you can separate from the rest of the relationship, the murky depths suddenly fall into focus. The already grey area of relationship interactions is further complicated by the extreme intimacy and thus awkwardness, shyness and silence that couples and individuals maintain over sex.

And finally, as Indians I think we’re already experiencing the consequences of being caught between the devil and the deep sea. On one side, a repressive social structure that doesn’t allow us to even think about these things. On the other, an increasingly bigger-better-faster-more global village where we’ve access to ideas, actions, social systems and behaviors that require us to be prepared with these notions.

I carried a fair bit of guilt for a long time simply over being physically intimate, a fact that I think the guy used against me when he told me that this was  road of no return. Even today, a lot of Indians believe in virginity, rape victim blame and condemning the sexually active as ‘promiscuous’.

All the above mentioned relationships ended and on sour notes, ranging from acrimonious break-ups to a loss of job in one case. It’s serious enough for us to need to talk about this. I don’t really have an answer. Realistically, how do we protect ourselves, first from unwelcome encounters and second from falling victim to misunderstood intentions?

A Beautiful Man

I think it would be fair to say that in my choices in the opposite sex, I’ve been a ‘brains’ person, a girl who liked geeks. In those personality quiz thingies, my answers have leant in the direction of Einstein & Socrates rather than Brad Pitt & Adonis. My men have all been talkers, thinkers even but not exactly lookers.

This month I tried something different – a good-looking, handsome hunkish, visual treat of a man. He fits all the acceptable norms of male attractiveness. Height – check, long legs – check, sharp facial profile – check, full head of luxuriant hair – check, long graceful fingers – check, nice butt – ooh, check, check, CHECK! Complete nayansukh as the ladies who tweet would have it. Bonus points for a traffic-stopping strut and a deep, warm laugh. And let’s be honest, my brain did the checklist on this long after he was out of sight and after much detailed *ahem* perusal. When he’s around, the most it manages is,

“Ooh, that is one nice looking man, that is!”

Well, it is true that he also is a good conversationalist and has an interesting opinion on everything from movies and food to quantum theory and religion. That certainly explains our great conversations. But when I ask myself what I like best about him, I have to admit that it’s that he’s so darn easy on the eyes.

RODIN’S “THE THINKER” (Photo credit: happy via)

For the first time in my life, I’m completely okay with it. He is so much *not* my usual type but I think I’ve had enough of heartbreak and drama from that type. Well, actually never mind the justification, who needs one to marvel at a piece of human beauty? It’s infinitely pleasurable and damn the accusations of shallowness. My eyes need as much nourishment as my brain, I’ve decided, and my brain gets more than adequate stimulation.

I wonder if I’m being disrespectful or condescending. After all, I would not like a man to think of me this way. On the other hand, I’m utterly frank in my open admiration of this man, not the kind of behaviour most women exhibit to most men. Is that not a sign of being treated differently, even specially? This association is too nascent and we’re too new to each other at the moment. But I could learn to savour this beauty; I am a lover of art after all. And then my interest which turned to admiration may turn to worshipful devotion too. Why should that be any less meaningful than the respect of the intellect? Both are things that human beings are born with, after all.

We are with other people because ultimately, they fulfil some need in us – companionship, boredom, respect, relatableness etc. If one can be entertained, charmed and even made happy by watching a movie, if one can be inspired by great art, why may it not be plausible that a perfectly satisfactory time may be spent with someone who pleases your eyes instead of your ears?

I’m still trying to decide whether my behaviour is decidedly regressive or aggressively feminist. Do tell.

XXFactored Jan2013: Dating, Sexuality & Relationships – The Same New

I’ve really spent 2012 so self-absorbed, haven’t I? In my defense, I got into the utlra hot-and-heavy of commitment, did the deep soul-searching that everyone does after getting engaged (don’t they?), hit rock bottom with a break-up, wrote plenty of mournful stuff, bored myself and got back with the ‘Really now, are you over *all* the drama finally?’ and here I am. So yes, I haven’t really spent much of the year looking at other people and their relationships and what they think of them. But a new year is here with new people, new problems and adventures of the heart. And I’m promising to bring back the social butterfly that I and this blog have always been. Let’s start with a round-up of interesting reads:

• “When a woman is the sum total of her headscarf and hymen – that is, what’s on her head and what is between her legs – then nakedness and sex become weapons of political resistance.” A thought-provoking article on the objectification of women’s bodies. ‘Nudity, Niqab and the Illusion of Free Choice‘ (via The Express Tribune Blogs)
• I’m most intrigued by no.4. We never seem to think of condescension & sarcasm as would-be abuser traits. These seem to be cool & attractive behaviour, drawing us in like flies to honey. ‘Are You Dating An Abuser?‘ (via Psychology Today)
• ‘The Subtext Of An Entire Relationship In 4 Minutes‘ (via TheFrisky)
• Some surprises here on what guys do on Facebook before dating the girl: ‘10 Ways Guys Use Facebook For Their Dating Lifes‘.  (via HowAboutWe)
• A great answer to ‘What Do Guys Wish Girls Knew?’ (via Quora)
• When do you google your date? The obvious answer was ‘before the first date’. But I’ve been meeting so many familiar strangers on account of social media that I find I only google after a couple of dates now. ‘Poll: When Do You Google A Date?‘ (via HowAboutWe)
• Ever notice how Satan’s head bears an uncanny resemblance to the female reproductive system? (via 10 Daily Things)
• Cosmopolitan’s hilarious and terribly wrong sex advice (via Uptown Magazine)
• What the dating guide has to say about Facebook: ‘When Is It Okay To Friend Someone You’re Casually Dating?‘ (via HowAboutWe)
• A study says bisexual women are likelier to be abused/raped. This article points out a few holes in that theory. (via Thought Catalog)
• 25 Things You Wish You Could Ask Someone On A First Date (via Thought Catalog)

It’s not a fling if it’s not something you can just throw away

You’ve got to be really broken, tiny, so miniscule you barely at exist, to be able to do that. And if it’s something that you let happen because it was comforting, healing even, it’s brought you back to life. You’re not incomplete, you’re healthy and breathing and alive again. And so you can’t stop yourself feeling. Gratitude and pleasure and joy and tickled and comforted and happy. Now, try throwing that away.

Whew, who knew that having fun could be so much effort?

Fifty Shades of Foolish Females

Fifty Shades of Grey (Photo credit: ellebnere)

I’m reading the Fifty Shades trilogy right now. It took me about 24 hours to get through Fifty Shades of Grey. It is that kind of book, that kind of story and maybe I just have that kind of time at the moment.

To be honest, I wouldn’t have bought this book myself. It’s been making such a splash on the media and I never quite trust products that need such hardsell marketing. Someone said it’s like Twilight again and that was enough to put me off.What’s more the books are in first person narrative and present tense, two things that tend to put me off in fiction. But someone else bought these books and they’re standing on my bookcase right now. They’re there and everyone’s talking about them. How could I resist the lure of that?

So, now about Fifty Shades of Grey. It is a romance…sort of. It’s not girly or comforting or silly-funny the way chicklit is supposed to be. It’s not even fantasy-level unrealistic & beautiful, the stuff of romances. But it is about a relationship between a man and a woman so it falls short of the Thriller & Psychology aisles. I think men would like reading it too. It never gets soppy and it’s oozing so much sex that in the first 100 pages, I thought I was reading porn/erotica. Let’s just say that it uses sex to illustrate some very dark corners of the human mind.

I don’t want to give away any spoilers because I believe I am going to be recommending this series for readers. Let me just say that it is about an extremely disturbing character, a very fucked-up relationship. Mr.Darcy looks like a sulky boy as compared to Christian Grey, the (anti?) protagonist.

Maybe because I’ve just ended a rather toxic relationship, it feels like the right time to speak about this. Book 1 ends with the couple breaking up (and that is *not* a spoiler, see the blurb of Book 2!). I am becoming painfully aware of  things that I thought I knew but never really internalized. We live with fanciful notions of life and love and relationships and men. We want it so much, we need so desperately for it all to make sense in that way that we set ourselves up for disappointment over and over again.

Why do so many of us have a Mother Theresa complex? And does it occur to us that there isn’t a male equivalent of that? (Not that there haven’t been male do-gooders & martyrs but none of them have lent their names to any male-specific complexes, have they?). We are drawn to needy, incomplete, even toxic relationships and we stay there. I think something inside each of us is still repeating nonstop,

“You exist to serve. You exist to nurture. You exist to take care of. You have no needs or rights of your own.”

I’m very angry right now. I’m so pissed, I’m practically seething and crying lava-hot angry, angry tears. I’m angry because of the compassion and nurturing instincts that have only proven to be bad for me. I’m angry because it was never supposed to be this way. Do good and good shall happen to you is a myth fed to keep human beings subservient and who’s a better example of that than us – the weakened sex? To every foolish woman (including myself), I’d like to say,

“If he says he can’t give you something, maybe he means it. It’s not ‘I can’t’ where he means ‘I won’t’ and just needs to be coaxed out of it. In fact, if he needs coaxing, he’s not worth it. Really. Let his therapist or his mother deal with his issues. You are NOT here to sort his life out. You deserve a good one of your own.”

To come back to the book, my rant will make a lot more sense when you read the book and I hope you will. That is to say, I hope you’ll read it after you turn 20. I don’t believe in censorship but some things, like sex for example can be damaging if they occur too early in a person’s life. Fifty Shades is a bizarre story with some horribly disturbing characters. It’s also engaging and a powerful story, the kind that could influence thought and action. Which is why I have my fingers crossed that the next two books resolve the story in a way that’s powerful and not disempowering.

I take heart in the fact that the main female character, Anastasia Steele is a strong one. Not conventionally so, she’s shy, awkward and by her own admission, scruffy. But she has good instincts, is brave enough to take chances and doesn’t confuse self-preservation with selfishness when she decides to walk away from a situation that’s bad for her.

I think too many of us have gotten trapped in a Superwoman complex, acquiring male egos while trying to compete with them but with the nagging self-doubt that they don’t have. It’s harder for us to walk away, burdened as we are under guilt, pride and fairytale notions of ‘Forever’. The other end of it is our generations-old conditioning of caution. We don’t take enough of risks, we don’t play enough and once we’re in, we sign away our right to get out and save ourselves.

Anastasia Steele is breaking many of those norms in the first book and I hope she will in the two to come as well. I’ll report back when I’m done with the series. There are some interesting Twitter conversations happening over at #FiftyShades and #50Shades.

————————————————————————————————

Update: I’ve finished the second book Fifty Shades Darker and I revise my opinion. They are morbid, miscategorized, deviant and badly written. Do NOT waste your time on them. If you’d like a more detailed explanation for my strong turnabout, read my review.

18Again: From Virginity to Female Empowerment

*This is a sponsored post.

I attended the 18Again launch earlier this week. I had been informed that the product is a vaginal rejuvenation gel and that the brand stands for Women Empowerment. To be quite sure, that connection wasn’t absolutely clear to me then. A lot of thoughts have been swimming around in my head since which is why I’ve taken this time to put up this post. This week has also seen quite a bit of conversations (yes, backlash too) about 18Again and on the #WomenOnTop hashtag they began. Let me talk about what I’ve seen, heard & thought. But first, the commercial that’ll go on air shortly.

I was struck by the tagline of ‘Like a virgin’. Virginity is a notion that’s not friendly to women at all. It’s patriarchal, painful and represses women. It wasn’t until the speakers began talking that I realized it was meant to imply only the sensation of a virgin – a tight, healthy vagina.

The event brought up a few interesting conversations. I spoke to Mahabanoo Kotwal of The Vagina Monologues fame. In keeping with the play’s premise, she talked about how women don’t have a space to even think about this part of their bodies, let alone express fear or concerns about it.

Prof.Dr.R.M.Saraogi was one of the panelists at the launch discussion. He talked about vaginal health concerns that women face, some of which even the more educated & ‘evolved’ of us may not know about. For example I’ve never even heard of urinary incontinence and vaginal flatulence. These conditions exist, causing a great deal of embarrassment for their sufferers – older, menopausal women. But in addition to suffering the conditions themselves, these women also suffer silently and alone. Dr.Saraogi says that some of his patients talk about the strain on their marriages and that it’s often a challenge to identify whether the cause is psychological or physical. Since the woman is unable to articulate something she is embarrassed about, she may fail to get assistance that’s easily and readily available.

The celebrity guest, Celina Jaitly had a similar thought to add to this. Any modern working woman knows a big challenge we face today. It’s not the glass ceiling or bigger issues – it’s clean, sanitary toilets. Yeast infections abound on toilet seat rims and are the most common way women get infected. Any woman who has to use a public toilet in an office, a set or a mall is vulnerable to these. If we can have calcium supplements, vitamin tablets & nutrition-enhanced foods, shouldn’t we have our choice of vagina-specific health products too?

To come back to the virginity bit of the campaign – aren’t we keeping vaginas trapped by repressive notions of that word? Sexual pleasure is only one of the functions of the vagina. It is also part of a complex biological system that undergoes several changes over the course of a woman’s life. These changes impact the woman in more ways and in more places than just in her panties. Depression, hot flushes, giddiness, nausea, fluctuating libido, digestive disorders, urinary infections – the vagina could be the source of any of these. As empowered women, we need to be able to first acknowledge these issues, secondly be able to articulate our needs and finally receive support for them. Our vaginas definitely deserve it.

I’m neither recommending nor disparaging the product 18Again. But I’m saying I’m happy that I’m being given an option to at least think about it. I deserve good health and everything that goes towards making it so, including a choice of products.  If I were to consider using this product, I’d check with my gynecologist. Now how many women have one? If you don’t, please get one immediately – it’s the most fundamental step in empowering yourself: good health.

The 18Again gel promises vaginal health and protection from infections in addition to tightening. Personally, these are the features that I find even more interesting since there hasn’t been a product that addresses the need for good vaginal health. I can’t comment on the efficacy of the product but the fact that one exists forces us to recognize a need for it. And that I believe, is definitely empowering to women.

Here are some other views:

• The Indian Vagina
• Women On Top
• About The Words That We Still Whisper

I’d really like to hear your thoughts – men, women, all ye with an opinion. So leave a comment here or tweet it to me at @ideasmithy on #WomenOnTop.