Mirth Control: Contraception Is A Laughing Matter

By Cindy Pierce

Photo: Tim Calabro

Cindy Pierce performs "Finding the Doorbell" at The Lebanon Opera House in May 2005.

Everything you wanted to say about sex, but were afraid to even think it, is how we might describe story-teller Cindy Pierce’s hilarious one-woman show “Finding the Doorbell,” performed at the Flynn Theater in Burlington this fall. Even if our own elusive “spot” she calls the doorbell never quite gets rung, Pierce nails our collective funny bone as she shares her wit and wisdom of the facts of life, orgasmic and not-so-orgasmic. We invited Ms. Pierce to share one of her sexual misadventures, as she negotiates the turf of sex for pleasure, not procreation.

I have yet to find a form of birth control that is not a hassle.

True, there are the above-the-belt options, clean and clinical – the pill, the shots, the patch and the Norplant. But personally, I don’t like to mess with my body chemistry. I have enough quirks and tweaks without adding anything to the mix. Therefore, I am limited to the below-the-belt options.

This is where it gets down and dirty – and hands-on. The most common choice is the condom – the Ford truck of contraception. You can get Lamborghini and Ferrari versions, with different colors, flavors, ribs, twizzlers and ticklers. Flesh tone brown is the most convenient and accessible. But there is always the risk of breaking a condom, and using a backup method feels more like a project to me than a step toward pleasure.

The intrauterine device (IUD) is an out-of-sight, out-of-mind kind of deal which comes in interesting forms: the copper swirl, the question mark, the thing that looks like it is made to scramble eggs, and the one they insert into your uterus, then pull a string once it’s inside, so that tiny arms open up to create the barrier.

I almost fell off my chair when my midwife demonstrated the pull-the-string rig. I blurted, “It looks like Jesus on the cross.” She said, “As a Jewish girl and a midwife for years, I have never heard anyone put it that way.” I opted then and there for Jesus, the traffic cop of unwanted sperm.

I had tried the diaphragm – the old trampoline. It is tough to get all fired up and then have to stop to set up. First you clean the little stained rubber bowl with special mild soap, dry it and load it with gel. As you carefully squeeze the diaphragm and bend over to insert it, your muscles strain to the point of pulling. You wish you had done an hour of pre-insertion yoga, but it is too late. Or, as you carefully squeeze the slimy gel-covered thing, it suddenly zings out of your hand and flies across the room. What is most impressive is how far it can zing, powered by that gnarly little spring that will eventually fit nicely around your cervix, after you blow the dog hair off and give it another go. Either way, you squeeze it even more carefully this time to be sure it gets inside you before it opens up. As it opens, it reefs onto the walls of your vagina on its way Up There. You wince and strain until it slurps into place around the cervix. You’re not done until you ream your fingers around Up There to be sure it’s in right. If your partner has managed to maintain an erection through all that, you get to have sex. The day-after removal routine involves more reefing, leaking fluids, and smells that tend to waft upward as you go through the day.

Can the hands-on factor top that? Enter the female condom. One of my dear friends teaches sex education in Cleveland and makes it her business to learn about new birth control devices. When she sent us a box of female condoms to try out, we were game to give them a whirl even if it was just for grins. As I pulled out the condom, we were stunned. It was absolutely massive. It looked like a windsock at La Guardia Airport, for helping to land 747s. It had two rings – an outer ring and an inner floating ring that would act like a diaphragm once in place.

I was trying to imagine how the huge condom would fit in my vagina. I mustered every ounce of optimism, assuming it would fit once it was in, because vaginas are renowned for their mysterious folds, crevices, cul-de-sacs, and expansive properties. I imagined that it would tuck into uncharted territory and fit snug as a bug once in place. The cram fest was quite familiar to me from my days as a diaphragm graduate, so I started to work on it. Once the rig was in place, I stood up.

I looked down to see the outer ring hanging halfway down to my knees.

“Bruce, you didn’t tell me I had a short vagina. No one told me.”

He said, “You don’t have a short vagina…At least I don’t think you have a short vagina…”

I recovered and regained focus enough to begin my steamy saunter to the bed. Fwap, fwap, fwap, I felt the thing swinging against my inner thighs.

We both realized that this would not be one of the sessions where the stars aligned, the skies opened up and transported us to some other dimension. This would be a science experiment.

We take for granted that when we use any of the other devices that lubrication comes from the woman. With the female condom hanging to my knees, artificial lubrication was required. Fortunately, they send along a tube of the stuff along with the device. We put in a squirt and gave it a go. The lube ran out quickly. Another squirt and kept going until it got squeaky. Bruce decided he should just hold the lube tube for the sake of continuity. Squirt, squirt, squirt. Keep it going.

I started to laugh. “I feel like the Tin Man with you and your oil can.”

He was not amused. “Stay focused! Stay focused!”

With great effort and concentration, we got to some semblance of closure. He confessed that he felt like the boy in the plastic bubble.

Then it was time to remove the condom. I grabbed onto the outer ring and hauled the thing out with a splurch. As I slung it into the bathroom trash, I noticed the condom itself was not much smaller than the liner of the trash can. I decided I could line trash cans all over the house with leftover condoms. Then no one could penetrate my garbage.

Jane called. “So have you tried it yet?”

“Yes, but I am working through some short-vagina issues. Jane, you are five-ten. I am five-three…”

“Oh,” she said. “I forgot to tell you that it hangs out like the Liberty Bell.”

That tidbit of knowledge would have been helpful during the insertion phase.

I had never heard of women with vaginal size complexes, but I could see myself going in that direction. If the female condom catches on, it could mean trouble ahead for my gender. Too many women are already spending a lot of time and energy bemoaning their bodies. Now there could be vagina size to worry about.

The concept of condoms designed for women is empowering, and it reflects creativity. Ideally, both partners should share responsibility of contraception, but the amount of uncommunicative sex going on makes it unrealistic to expect such values to sweep the nation. Possessing a uterus inspires many women, including me, to be heavily invested in contraception because bearing the physical and emotional strain of an unwanted pregnancy would be difficult.

The conception of a baby is a miracle. Preventing the conception of a baby is a miraculous hassle. It is not surprising that the female condom isn’t dominating the birth control section at drugstores. Ironically, it could be the best form of birth control around, because no man will want to have sex with a woman who’s wearing one, unless mounting a hefty garbage bag turns him on.

Cindy Pierce is co-proprietor of Pierce’s Country Inn in Etna, New Hampshire; mother to three young children; and one of New England’s funniest storytellers. See Vermont Woman September 2005 for our lively interview with Ms. Pierce.