Tampons and Virginity

Virgins can use a tampon.  I’ve had a lot of people in India tell me that it is physically impossible for a virgin to use a tampon.  I’m not sure why they say this.  I used tampons when I was a virgin, as do millions of other Western girls.  So the people who say that virgins cannot use tampons either do not understand female anatomy or else they have a different definition of virginity.  

Using a tampon will not cause you to lose your virginity. Indian women are frequently concerned with maintaining an intact hymen so that they will bleed the first time they have sex in order to prove that they are virgins.  This is an issue that really makes me angry, but it is another topic.  For now, let me just say that not every virgin has an intact hymen in the first place, and that hymens break and tear for all sorts of reasons aside from sex.  Likewise, some people still have a hymen or part of it after sex.  Finally, not everyone bleeds the first time they have sex.  If you are a virgin and you do have a hymen, you have a little hole in your hymen. How else do you think the period blood comes out?  The hymen is stretchable.  You can almost always insert a tampon through the hole(s) in the hymen. It should not be uncomfortable if you are doing it correctly and if you are relaxed.  If you are worried about it, your body might be tense and you might want to use a little lubricant to make it slide in more easily.  A girl with an anatomical anomality in the shape of her hymen may have trouble inserting a tampon, but no one else should.

Hymens have nothing to do with virginity.  Anyway, the larger issue is that intact hymens have nothing whatsoever to do with virginity.  A virgin is someone who has not had sex.  Unfortunately, many women around the world are shunned, abused or even killed when they do not bleed the first time they have sex because it is assumed that they are not virgins if they do not have an intact hymen.  No women should perpetuate this injustice.  Girls should be allowed to participate in sports, straddle bicycles and wear tampons without any concern for their hymens whatsoever. 

More:

http://www.soc.ucsb.edu/sexinfo/article/hymen

http://health.discovery.com/centers/sex/sexpedia/hymen.html