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So this is definitely not going to be a question you get every day ... I’m a 22-year-old woman and recently started dating a girl who I had sex with 5 years ago. When we got together 5 years ago, I used my lip gloss to penetrate her. Things got out of hand (literally), and I lost hold of the lip gloss, and it got stuck in her vagina. We tried to take it out, but the sharp edges prevented it from coming out. So as I said we recently started dating again. She reminded me of our last encounter and said she hasn’t been able to remove the damn thing because she was embarrassed to go have it removed by a doctor. I didn’t believe her — after all, it had been 5 years — but we recently had sex and turns out, she wasn’t lying.
She and I both know she should not leave it in longer than she already has. What should I tell her to get her to have it taken out? What do you think she should do?
You’re right: This is not a question we don’t get every day, but it’s not unheard of either. People lose things in vaginas and anuses all the time — in the medical literature, they’re called “vaginal foreign bodies” or “anal foreign bodies,” which is a scientific way of saying “things that don’t belong in the vagina or anus.”
I am sorry the lip gloss got out of hand and got stuck in her vagina 5 years ago. I am surprised she let it stay in there that long, but sometimes this happens with sex mis-haps because people often feel embarrassed to tell doctors and nurses about their sexual behaviors. The important thing is that you and your girlfriend get her to a doctor. Since the lip gloss has been lodged in her vagina for five years now, it’s possible that it is at least partially embedded in her vaginal wall, and it may not be safe for you to try and remove without a doctor. I want to strongly encourage you to be a friend and a girlfriend to her and to go with her to a healthcare provider and support her during the process. She might feel embarrassed or ashamed, but she hasn’t done anything wrong, and neither did you. All you were doing was exploring each other’s bodies in a sexual way.
If you can believe it, I know of at least one other case in the medical literature in which a woman left a small vibrator in her vagina for 10 years! I am not encouraging you to let this go another five years to break her record, and I am not suggesting it is safe to leave in any longer. It’s really not safe to stay in there, as there can be serious tissue damage with time. I just mention this because, truly, healthcare providers do see these things from time to time, and they are trained for all situations.
You can go to an emergency room or, if your girlfriend has a doctor she is comfortable with, she can go to that doctor. I am guessing she has never had a gynecologic exam before or her ob/gyn would have noticed the lip gloss before, so if you have a gynecologist who you are comfortable with, she might need you to help her get connected to someone she can trust and who won’t make her feel bad about what’s happened. I have faith in you that you can help her through this, and I am glad you are there to take care of her.
Debby Herbenick, Ph.D., MPH is an associate professor at IU and a research fellow and sexual health educator at The Kinsey Institute. She’s the author of six books about sex; her newest is “The Coregasm Workout.” Follow Kinsey Confidential on Twitter @KinseyCon and visit us online at www.KinseyConfidential.org
