Middle of Everywhere - Mary Bray Pipher [81]
The health educator said, "If you are sexually active, it might mean you are pregnant. Otherwise, it could be stress, or maybe too much exercise."
Patti yawned in an exaggeratedly indifferent way and asked, "How do you know if you are pregnant?"
The health educator told her about pregnancy kits then moved on to feminine hygiene. She asked if any girls in the room used tampons and all the girls said no. Even Patti, Velida, and Tharaya thought that if you used a tampon you would lose your virginity. The health educator said that wasn't true, but she didn't persuade anyone. Homera put her hands over her ears so that she could not even hear the lecture.
As the girls passed around the tampon, they handled it like it was hot or infectious. Patti seemed curious about the tampon as a cultural artifact. She asked when it was invented and what was its purpose. But she said, "I will never buy these."
Tharaya asked why she felt so tired when she had her period. The health educator suggested that she get a blood test for iron deficiency.
The health educator pulled out a rubber model of a breast and explained breast exams. She explained the mammogram procedures by saying it was just like making a hamburger patty out of the breast. Patti held the breast models to her chest and the girls laughed. Nadia and Homera wouldn't touch the breast model. Tharaya said it felt like Jell-O. Velida passed it on as if it were a plate of spaghetti and she was full.
When the health educator put up a model of male anatomy, Homera asked to leave. The health educator said, "Okay, go to the library," and Homera rushed gratefully out.
Nadia looked at the picture, but only her desire to understand a medical lecture kept her in the room. How could she be a doctor if she couldn't sit through this? But when the health educator used the word ejaculation, Nadia covered her ears.
On the other hand, Patti, Tharaya, and Velida were attentive. Patti asked about condoms. The health educator stressed that abstinence was the safest and best form of birth control and she urged the students to wait for sex until they were older. However, she answered Patti's question and stressed that condoms did not always work and could only be used once. She told of two couples who had sex in a car. The boy in the front seat passed his condom to the boy in the backseat who turned it inside out and reused it. The girl in the backseat got pregnant but with the front-seat boy's baby.
By now all of the girls looked a little stunned. This class had covered too much too fast. The bell rang. These girls needed more discussions. Could they teach their mothers to do breast exams? What was a Pap smear? A pelvic exam?
Many of the mothers had never had a physical exam or any health care because they wouldn't see a male doctor and there were no female doctors in their areas. Many women from Africa had medical problems as a result of female genital mutilation. I wished we could have a campaign that explained the health problems associated with this terrible practice.
One fifteen-year-old girl from Tajikistan had been taken from school for an arranged marriage. The girl's father was dead and her mother had been afraid her daughter would lose her virginity in America. So she lied about her daughter's age and signed papers giving permission for an arranged marriage to an older man. The girl went from learning grammar and fractions to being a pregnant wife in a matter of a few weeks.
An Albanian girl became pregnant while in a refugee camp. Her pregnancy was discovered here when she had her routine physical. She was six-months pregnant and swore she had never had sex. It was unclear if she even knew what sex was and that it had a connection to the pregnancy. Her mother was dead and no one had ever talked to her about the facts of life. Because of malnutrition and trauma, she'd never had regular periods. I asked her if she had been raped and she stared at me confused. It was a stupid question. The term "consensual sex" had no meaning to a young