August 3, 2011 • 18 mins
Historically advertised as a sanitary process, douching has become increasingly controversial. In this episode, Caroline and Cristen take a closer look at the facts surrounding douching -- and why it isn't as near as healthy as some might believe.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff Mom Never told you?
From House top Works dot Com. Hello, and welcome to
the podcast. I'm Christen and I'm Caroline. Caroline. I would
(00:22):
like to do a little podcast theater to kick things off, please,
I'd like to do a re enactment of a commercial, okay,
for a certain product, and I'm going to play the daughter.
Would you like to play the role of the mom.
Of course, we don't have to do the whole thing,
but it goes a little something like this, And for
(00:43):
our listeners, just imagine this wearing some cablenet sweaters, perhaps
walking down a beach. Yes, wind blowing gently in our hair,
and in hand the sunset, Yes, the sun is setting,
and I'm your teenage daughter. I'm just gonna take your
hand and ask you a question that I never asked
my mom. M there goes mom. Hm, yes, honey, do
(01:07):
you douche? I sure do, especially when I like to
be fresh. Great mom. And that, my friends and listening,
is a re enactment of the greatest commercial ever produced
in the nineteen eighties for a douching product cauld Mass
(01:28):
and gil it's amazing. Uh. And I thought that we
should kick things off with that commercial because douching it's
a little ridiculous like that commercial. Yes, and lately a
little controversial, a little controversial. Yes, the reason why we
wanted to talk about douching. Um, and yes, you can
(01:49):
start your douching drinking game right now every time. Kind
of like the poop podcast that Molly and I did
way back when we're I think a listener went back
and counted and we did say poop. I believe seventy
two times. We're gonna totally talk. We're gonna talk. We're
gonna talk with this douching podcast. Douche, Doe, douche. There's
three right there. Um, at at least a pint. Sorry,
(02:13):
you're wasted already. Um. So we're talking about douching because
there was a very controversial ad campaign, part of which
was just pulled by Summer's Eve feminine hygiene product line
because they had these these well, I don't care, like,
can you describe it hand puppets? Yeah, there were some
(02:35):
hand puppets. They were hands folded in the shape of
a lady parts. Yes, and they they were talking lady parts. Yeah,
they were. They were talking basically talking vaginas, advising women
to uh clean me up. That's one accent they didn't use. Yes,
there were some racial stereotypes involved. There is a if
(02:55):
you'd like to see a parody Stephen Colbert Show did
a whale to the d Yes. Yeah, that was the
title of the advertising campaign was Hail to the V
because it was all about and there was a statement
from the head of marketing for Summer's Eve and she
she spun it as a as a thing of confidence.
We need to celebrate our confidence in our V and
(03:18):
also in the meantime calling it up. Yeah, I'm not
really sure. I haven't quite linked in my mind female
empowerment with cleansing products for my vagina. But now I no, no,
I can't link this. And apparently you're not alone, because,
like I said, they did pull at least part of
(03:38):
the Hail to the V campaign. But I will say, well,
douching does seem kind of kind of ridiculous. Maybe can
I say that? Yeah, my mom and I never had
a douching conversation. Um, but maybe I'm in the minority. Well,
actually I'm not in the minority. But a lot of
people do douche. UM An estimated of American women fifteen
(04:05):
to forty four years old douche regularly. And see, this
is crazy to me because I don't know. I mean, okay, now,
this is not something I would sit around and talk
about with my friends if I did this. But I mean,
I don't know anyone who does that, who does who douches?
I don't know anyone who does the douche? Who does
the douche? Yeah, I don't I don't either that I
know of. Maybe we're just not talking about douching enough.
(04:28):
And there was an additional study from the University of
Cincinnati because I wanted to back up these stats, And
this is data from hundred women reported douching. And then
if you break it down by race, um, Black women
had the highest percentage of the women Black women they
(04:49):
pulled douched, and then Hispanic women sevent and then Caucasian nineteen.
So I don't know, but that's still, in me, is
still a very large percentage. I think so too, especially
for something that I don't know. I'm gonna go out
on a limb here and say I think it's pretty unnecessary. Well,
(05:11):
we'll get to the health aspect of douching a little
while later. But the thing I've almost fascinating about doushing
was its history. I yes, because back in the nineteen
twenties and thirties women douched as their primary form of
birth control. But they didn't put that in the ads,
(05:31):
of course, not no, no, no no. They had to
use euphemisms. Basically in the ads. They couldn't come out
and say like, here, lower your fertility and prevent pregnancy
by washing yourself with harsh chemicals, such as I'm looking
at this ad for Lisol. Yes, this is a vintage
Lisol ad, right, And this one shows a woman who
(05:53):
is locked out of her husband's bedroom door. She's desperately
trying to get in, and the quote above the picture
set please Dave, please don't let me be locked out
from you. And so there's there's a bunch of copy
underneath this picture, and it starts out saying, a man
marries a woman because he loves her. So instead of
blaming him, if Mary love begins to cool, she should
(06:16):
question herself. And by self, do you mean her feminine her? Yes,
her feminine hygiene scare tactic. The ad goes on to say,
one most effective way to safeguard her dainty feminine allure
is by practicing. And this is an italics complete feminine hygiene.
(06:38):
And by complete they mean they mean get up in
there and clean yourself with Lysol Lysol? Who knew? I know?
I mean, I have some under my bathroom, sank. I
had no idea. I had no idea. It's like a
two for one purchase. Oh lord, all purpose Lisa who
knew knew? Um? So, yeah, it is kind of interesting
to see how this there's scare tactic advertising evolves and
(07:01):
it starts with Lisol, but then there's also Licel's competitor, Zonite,
which I had never even heard of before. But zona
is a similar kind of cleaning product that caught onto
this seminin hygiene hook and slowly evolved to become, you know,
a competitive alternative douching product. But they were also you
(07:23):
could do the homemade douches with just vinegar and water
and I don't know, lemon juice, no listeners, no. But
then once birth control comes onto the scene in the
sixth season, and then it's fully open to everybody who
wants it. In the early seventies, they become a little
(07:43):
more direct, like you have more direct douching products coming out,
and that shifts from this sort of hint hint birth
control to you need to get your vagina under control
and keep yourself mean. But the thing is, ladies and
gents out there, Uh, the vagina is and this is
(08:06):
a term that has come up a few times in
our douching research, a self cleaning oven. Please tell me
more about that. Yes, the vagina is a quote the
original self cleaning oven because it produces mucus that does
the work that we think douching does. It cleans out
(08:26):
any menstrual blood or semen or what have you, or
whatever you happen to put up like like douching products, right, Um,
and the mucus does that job for us. And yes,
there will be some odor. Okay, folks, let's just accept
the fact that genitals have a little bit of odor. Yeah, man,
(08:47):
do you douche your penises? No? No, you don't know
what that looks like. No, no, no, let's not go there.
But it's important not to douche because you are then
teen giring with the balance of healthy vaginal flora. Right.
According to Women's Health dot Gov, douching can actually alter
(09:07):
the pH and the balance of naturally occurring bacteria, which
just like the self cleaning oven reference. I have come
across the words vaginal flora way too many times. I
think of a terrarium. I know it's and I imagine
a bouquet bouquet. Yes, I imagine walking through a meadow
(09:28):
florest floria like a meadow with your mom right before
you ask exactly yeah, And actually, so if you upset
the pH balance and the the flora, the egos, if
you upset the balance of good and bad bacteria down there,
that that that does the work, that does the cleaning work.
You can actually make yourself susceptible to more infections, right,
(09:51):
certain things like just basic vaginal irritation or bacterial vaginosis
or s D I S or hey, how about some
pelvic inflammatory disease. And just in case you think, ladies,
I mean I really I really would like to douche,
here's some more facts. The American College of Obstetricians and
Gynecologists recommends that women don't douche. Now. Every now and
(10:14):
then doctors might recommend some acidophilists down there, but that
is that's it's not a common thing. That's not like
an every day Douching is not an every day the
thing that we need to If you get up in
there to clean it, it should be because your doctor
told you to, and you're doing it with a product
that your doctor told you to use. And I think
(10:36):
this is also a good time to point out that
along with douching, the U S Department of Health and
Human Services also says that women should avoid using scented tampons, pads, powders,
and sprays. All of this deodorizing is number one, a
product of advertising and scare tactics meant to sell first
(10:57):
Lisol and zonite and then a lot of feminine hygiene products.
Everyone likes to feel fresh and clean, gals and guys.
But take a shower and let the vaginal mukis do
its job. Put that on a T shirt or I
am a delight on dates you can imagine. Um, I
(11:22):
am waiting for someone now to ask me if I do,
because I have a lot to tell them. Um, but
we cannot. We would be remiss in this conversation about douching,
Caroline if we didn't talk about the way that I
first heard about douching, which was not a conversation with
my mom, which was actually in high school. Maybe I'm
a late bloomer with this whole douching business. And it
(11:44):
might be because I was homeschooled, But I didn't hear
douching until it was used as an insult. Yeah, I
I really don't think I was aware of what a
douche was other than in the context of someone who
I don't like, specifically do bag? Yeah, and would you
like to know when it came into first usage? Tell
(12:07):
me really adopted? Uh? Oxford English Dictionary says in nineteen
sixty seven. Nineteen sixty seven, douche bag was an insult
for an unattractive co ed. I'm kind of have to
talk to my parents about this. They were in college.
I wonder if they threw that around. Yeah, did they
ever talk about douche bags? Also? For fun? You see
Berkeley linguists James Matisoft attributes to the popularity of douche
(12:30):
bag among our generation Caroline to none other than John Stewart.
How's that because douche bag is something that you could
say on air and it doesn't have to be bleeped out.
And you know that John Stewart's got a salty tongue.
So John Stewart, thank you for so much, including douche
bag and common vernacular. So there you have it. Douching
(12:55):
not necessary and bad for vaginas. It's unhealthy, you know,
I mean, and again I get the point, like feminine hygiene. Odor,
you know, sure it can get a little. We can
have insecurities about things that go on down south. But
let's all except two things. One every vagina is different
and two genital seven odor they do. And and frankly,
(13:18):
I would just like to to tell our our loyal
listeners that if if you have a smell going on
that is so bad that you feel the need to
put air freshener in your vagina, you should probably go
to the doctor because it's probably a sign of an
actual infection. Exactly. Um. This is also going back to
that Women's Health dot gov. Douching will only cover up
odor and make other problems worse. So call your doctor,
(13:41):
don't go. Don't go douching, call your doctor. If you
have vaginal discharge it smells bad, don't go douching. Waterfalls, burning,
redness and swelling around the vagina, pain when urinating, Yeah yeah, yeah,
And there's there is the possibility. This is this is
again going back to women's health dot of that if
you have an infection and you try to cover it
(14:04):
up with douching, that you could actually wash the infection
up into the rest of your system, up into your uterus,
your fallopian tubes, and your ovaries. And one last thing
that we haven't talked about. We need to set the
record straight on whether or not douching can be used
as a form of birth control, like an actual form
like some women will have unprotected sex and then douche
(14:27):
afterwards thinking they're flushing the semen out and they're then safe. Nope.
Now doesn't prevent pregnant, absolutely not. There is actually um
some evidence that it might hinder your chances of having
a healthy pregnancy because you're tinkering again with the vaginal
floor and Megan, Megan, fallopian tubes and whatnot. Don't get
(14:50):
up in there. That's for doctors U and dam bongs
and menstrual cups. Let's not forget about menstrul cups. So
I think there's really not much else to say about douching.
There's really is there anything positive to say about douching? Caroline,
Can we end this on a happy note for douching.
I think we we certainly can. The silver lining out
(15:11):
of all of this, Kristen, is that we have gotten
some great entertainment advertising. Is that what your ab incredible? Yeah?
If you ever, if you got some time to kill,
just watch some like eighties ads for douching commercials, or
just look at vintage douching ads. Look up some old
mice al ads. I mean, wow, yeah, quite a quite
(15:33):
a history of advertising there, yea, and I think yeah.
To to sum it up, just just go to your
doctor please. Yeah, if you're worried about some down there
that's called the duck, or your nurse practitioner. So is
that it's time for listener mail. If you would like
to write us about douching and guys, we definitely want
to hear from you about douching. Please write us mom
stuff at how stuff works dot com and let's read
(15:55):
a couple of litters. Kristen, we got an email from
Mike about our can Women be Aggressive in Dating podcast? Yes,
he says, Hi, gals, Hello, Hi Mike. I think us
men are scared to death of rejection, especially to coin
a phrase cold calling, it may not be necessary to
(16:17):
ask us out. Maybe just show some interest or strike
up a conversation. As far as asking a man out
the second time, I think that's unnecessary. If he understands
you had a good time, the ice has been broken,
he should have no problem taking it from there. Thank you, Mike.
I'll keep it in mind. And I've got some more
dude response from Billy. And this is also in response
(16:39):
to the dating podcast we just did, and while Billy
is no longer single, he was reflecting back on single
times and said that it was just difficult to find
and meet nice, funny, smart women. It would have been
great if the ability to initiate conversation would have been
more too way. However, as Peewee said, everyone I know
(17:00):
has a big butt, so let's talk about my big
but I'm pretty sure every guy out there has become
involved with someone that was, to put it politely, clingy
and not to discriminate. I know you girls have also
dated guys like this before true one approached by a woman.
That was the alarm bell that went off in my head.
Maybe if women approaching men had been more common, or
(17:23):
even a little more common, that wouldn't have been an issue. However,
at the time, it was rare and since some strange signals.
When I'm sure it was just a girl wanting to
talk to a guy. That's an interesting thing. So you
send off the sets off the clingy doatch that attachment?
Gender roles man gender roles. Well, we'll come back and
talked about gender roles in a couple more days. But
(17:44):
in the meantime, you can email us mom stuff at
how stuffworks dot com. We'd love to see you over
on Facebook as well, and follow us on Twitter. We're
at mom Stuff Podcasts. And then finally, during the week
you can look at some vintage douching ads on our blog.
It's was like put him on a T shirt for real.
It's stuff Mom never told you. From how Stuff Works
(18:05):
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Stuff from the Future. Join how Stuff Work staff as
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The How Stuff Works iPhone app has a ride. Download
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(18:28):
two thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff Mom Never told you?
From House top Works dot Com. Hello, and welcome to
the podcast. I'm Christen and I'm Caroline. Caroline. I would
(00:22):
like to do a little podcast theater to kick things off, please,
I'd like to do a re enactment of a commercial, okay,
for a certain product, and I'm going to play the daughter.
Would you like to play the role of the mom.
Of course, we don't have to do the whole thing,
but it goes a little something like this, And for
(00:43):
our listeners, just imagine this wearing some cablenet sweaters, perhaps
walking down a beach. Yes, wind blowing gently in our hair,
and in hand the sunset, Yes, the sun is setting,
and I'm your teenage daughter. I'm just gonna take your
hand and ask you a question that I never asked
my mom. M there goes mom. Hm, yes, honey, do
(01:07):
you douche? I sure do, especially when I like to
be fresh. Great mom. And that, my friends and listening,
is a re enactment of the greatest commercial ever produced
in the nineteen eighties for a douching product cauld Mass
(01:28):
and gil it's amazing. Uh. And I thought that we
should kick things off with that commercial because douching it's
a little ridiculous like that commercial. Yes, and lately a
little controversial, a little controversial. Yes, the reason why we
wanted to talk about douching. Um, and yes, you can
(01:49):
start your douching drinking game right now every time. Kind
of like the poop podcast that Molly and I did
way back when we're I think a listener went back
and counted and we did say poop. I believe seventy
two times. We're gonna totally talk. We're gonna talk. We're
gonna talk with this douching podcast. Douche, Doe, douche. There's
three right there. Um, at at least a pint. Sorry,
(02:13):
you're wasted already. Um. So we're talking about douching because
there was a very controversial ad campaign, part of which
was just pulled by Summer's Eve feminine hygiene product line
because they had these these well, I don't care, like,
can you describe it hand puppets? Yeah, there were some
(02:35):
hand puppets. They were hands folded in the shape of
a lady parts. Yes, and they they were talking lady parts. Yeah,
they were. They were talking basically talking vaginas, advising women
to uh clean me up. That's one accent they didn't use. Yes,
there were some racial stereotypes involved. There is a if
(02:55):
you'd like to see a parody Stephen Colbert Show did
a whale to the d Yes. Yeah, that was the
title of the advertising campaign was Hail to the V
because it was all about and there was a statement
from the head of marketing for Summer's Eve and she
she spun it as a as a thing of confidence.
We need to celebrate our confidence in our V and
(03:18):
also in the meantime calling it up. Yeah, I'm not
really sure. I haven't quite linked in my mind female
empowerment with cleansing products for my vagina. But now I no, no,
I can't link this. And apparently you're not alone, because,
like I said, they did pull at least part of
(03:38):
the Hail to the V campaign. But I will say, well,
douching does seem kind of kind of ridiculous. Maybe can
I say that? Yeah, my mom and I never had
a douching conversation. Um, but maybe I'm in the minority. Well,
actually I'm not in the minority. But a lot of
people do douche. UM An estimated of American women fifteen
(04:05):
to forty four years old douche regularly. And see, this
is crazy to me because I don't know. I mean, okay, now,
this is not something I would sit around and talk
about with my friends if I did this. But I mean,
I don't know anyone who does that, who does who douches?
I don't know anyone who does the douche? Who does
the douche? Yeah, I don't I don't either that I
know of. Maybe we're just not talking about douching enough.
(04:28):
And there was an additional study from the University of
Cincinnati because I wanted to back up these stats, And
this is data from hundred women reported douching. And then
if you break it down by race, um, Black women
had the highest percentage of the women Black women they
(04:49):
pulled douched, and then Hispanic women sevent and then Caucasian nineteen.
So I don't know, but that's still, in me, is
still a very large percentage. I think so too, especially
for something that I don't know. I'm gonna go out
on a limb here and say I think it's pretty unnecessary. Well,
(05:11):
we'll get to the health aspect of douching a little
while later. But the thing I've almost fascinating about doushing
was its history. I yes, because back in the nineteen
twenties and thirties women douched as their primary form of
birth control. But they didn't put that in the ads,
(05:31):
of course, not no, no, no no. They had to
use euphemisms. Basically in the ads. They couldn't come out
and say like, here, lower your fertility and prevent pregnancy
by washing yourself with harsh chemicals, such as I'm looking
at this ad for Lisol. Yes, this is a vintage
Lisol ad, right, And this one shows a woman who
(05:53):
is locked out of her husband's bedroom door. She's desperately
trying to get in, and the quote above the picture
set please Dave, please don't let me be locked out
from you. And so there's there's a bunch of copy
underneath this picture, and it starts out saying, a man
marries a woman because he loves her. So instead of
blaming him, if Mary love begins to cool, she should
(06:16):
question herself. And by self, do you mean her feminine her? Yes,
her feminine hygiene scare tactic. The ad goes on to say,
one most effective way to safeguard her dainty feminine allure
is by practicing. And this is an italics complete feminine hygiene.
(06:38):
And by complete they mean they mean get up in
there and clean yourself with Lysol Lysol? Who knew? I know?
I mean, I have some under my bathroom, sank. I
had no idea. I had no idea. It's like a
two for one purchase. Oh lord, all purpose Lisa who
knew knew? Um? So, yeah, it is kind of interesting
to see how this there's scare tactic advertising evolves and
(07:01):
it starts with Lisol, but then there's also Licel's competitor, Zonite,
which I had never even heard of before. But zona
is a similar kind of cleaning product that caught onto
this seminin hygiene hook and slowly evolved to become, you know,
a competitive alternative douching product. But they were also you
(07:23):
could do the homemade douches with just vinegar and water
and I don't know, lemon juice, no listeners, no. But
then once birth control comes onto the scene in the
sixth season, and then it's fully open to everybody who
wants it. In the early seventies, they become a little
(07:43):
more direct, like you have more direct douching products coming out,
and that shifts from this sort of hint hint birth
control to you need to get your vagina under control
and keep yourself mean. But the thing is, ladies and
gents out there, Uh, the vagina is and this is
(08:06):
a term that has come up a few times in
our douching research, a self cleaning oven. Please tell me
more about that. Yes, the vagina is a quote the
original self cleaning oven because it produces mucus that does
the work that we think douching does. It cleans out
(08:26):
any menstrual blood or semen or what have you, or
whatever you happen to put up like like douching products, right, Um,
and the mucus does that job for us. And yes,
there will be some odor. Okay, folks, let's just accept
the fact that genitals have a little bit of odor. Yeah, man,
(08:47):
do you douche your penises? No? No, you don't know
what that looks like. No, no, no, let's not go there.
But it's important not to douche because you are then
teen giring with the balance of healthy vaginal flora. Right.
According to Women's Health dot Gov, douching can actually alter
(09:07):
the pH and the balance of naturally occurring bacteria, which
just like the self cleaning oven reference. I have come
across the words vaginal flora way too many times. I
think of a terrarium. I know it's and I imagine
a bouquet bouquet. Yes, I imagine walking through a meadow
(09:28):
florest floria like a meadow with your mom right before
you ask exactly yeah, And actually, so if you upset
the pH balance and the the flora, the egos, if
you upset the balance of good and bad bacteria down there,
that that that does the work, that does the cleaning work.
You can actually make yourself susceptible to more infections, right,
(09:51):
certain things like just basic vaginal irritation or bacterial vaginosis
or s D I S or hey, how about some
pelvic inflammatory disease. And just in case you think, ladies,
I mean I really I really would like to douche,
here's some more facts. The American College of Obstetricians and
Gynecologists recommends that women don't douche. Now. Every now and
(10:14):
then doctors might recommend some acidophilists down there, but that
is that's it's not a common thing. That's not like
an every day Douching is not an every day the
thing that we need to If you get up in
there to clean it, it should be because your doctor
told you to, and you're doing it with a product
that your doctor told you to use. And I think
(10:36):
this is also a good time to point out that
along with douching, the U S Department of Health and
Human Services also says that women should avoid using scented tampons, pads, powders,
and sprays. All of this deodorizing is number one, a
product of advertising and scare tactics meant to sell first
(10:57):
Lisol and zonite and then a lot of feminine hygiene products.
Everyone likes to feel fresh and clean, gals and guys.
But take a shower and let the vaginal mukis do
its job. Put that on a T shirt or I
am a delight on dates you can imagine. Um, I
(11:22):
am waiting for someone now to ask me if I do,
because I have a lot to tell them. Um, but
we cannot. We would be remiss in this conversation about douching,
Caroline if we didn't talk about the way that I
first heard about douching, which was not a conversation with
my mom, which was actually in high school. Maybe I'm
a late bloomer with this whole douching business. And it
(11:44):
might be because I was homeschooled, But I didn't hear
douching until it was used as an insult. Yeah, I
I really don't think I was aware of what a
douche was other than in the context of someone who
I don't like, specifically do bag? Yeah, and would you
like to know when it came into first usage? Tell
(12:07):
me really adopted? Uh? Oxford English Dictionary says in nineteen
sixty seven. Nineteen sixty seven, douche bag was an insult
for an unattractive co ed. I'm kind of have to
talk to my parents about this. They were in college.
I wonder if they threw that around. Yeah, did they
ever talk about douche bags? Also? For fun? You see
Berkeley linguists James Matisoft attributes to the popularity of douche
(12:30):
bag among our generation Caroline to none other than John Stewart.
How's that because douche bag is something that you could
say on air and it doesn't have to be bleeped out.
And you know that John Stewart's got a salty tongue.
So John Stewart, thank you for so much, including douche
bag and common vernacular. So there you have it. Douching
(12:55):
not necessary and bad for vaginas. It's unhealthy, you know,
I mean, and again I get the point, like feminine hygiene. Odor,
you know, sure it can get a little. We can
have insecurities about things that go on down south. But
let's all except two things. One every vagina is different
and two genital seven odor they do. And and frankly,
(13:18):
I would just like to to tell our our loyal
listeners that if if you have a smell going on
that is so bad that you feel the need to
put air freshener in your vagina, you should probably go
to the doctor because it's probably a sign of an
actual infection. Exactly. Um. This is also going back to
that Women's Health dot gov. Douching will only cover up
odor and make other problems worse. So call your doctor,
(13:41):
don't go. Don't go douching, call your doctor. If you
have vaginal discharge it smells bad, don't go douching. Waterfalls, burning,
redness and swelling around the vagina, pain when urinating, Yeah yeah, yeah,
And there's there is the possibility. This is this is
again going back to women's health dot of that if
you have an infection and you try to cover it
(14:04):
up with douching, that you could actually wash the infection
up into the rest of your system, up into your uterus,
your fallopian tubes, and your ovaries. And one last thing
that we haven't talked about. We need to set the
record straight on whether or not douching can be used
as a form of birth control, like an actual form
like some women will have unprotected sex and then douche
(14:27):
afterwards thinking they're flushing the semen out and they're then safe. Nope.
Now doesn't prevent pregnant, absolutely not. There is actually um
some evidence that it might hinder your chances of having
a healthy pregnancy because you're tinkering again with the vaginal
floor and Megan, Megan, fallopian tubes and whatnot. Don't get
(14:50):
up in there. That's for doctors U and dam bongs
and menstrual cups. Let's not forget about menstrul cups. So
I think there's really not much else to say about douching.
There's really is there anything positive to say about douching? Caroline,
Can we end this on a happy note for douching.
I think we we certainly can. The silver lining out
(15:11):
of all of this, Kristen, is that we have gotten
some great entertainment advertising. Is that what your ab incredible? Yeah?
If you ever, if you got some time to kill,
just watch some like eighties ads for douching commercials, or
just look at vintage douching ads. Look up some old
mice al ads. I mean, wow, yeah, quite a quite
(15:33):
a history of advertising there, yea, and I think yeah.
To to sum it up, just just go to your
doctor please. Yeah, if you're worried about some down there
that's called the duck, or your nurse practitioner. So is
that it's time for listener mail. If you would like
to write us about douching and guys, we definitely want
to hear from you about douching. Please write us mom
stuff at how stuff works dot com and let's read
(15:55):
a couple of litters. Kristen, we got an email from
Mike about our can Women be Aggressive in Dating podcast? Yes,
he says, Hi, gals, Hello, Hi Mike. I think us
men are scared to death of rejection, especially to coin
a phrase cold calling, it may not be necessary to
(16:17):
ask us out. Maybe just show some interest or strike
up a conversation. As far as asking a man out
the second time, I think that's unnecessary. If he understands
you had a good time, the ice has been broken,
he should have no problem taking it from there. Thank you, Mike.
I'll keep it in mind. And I've got some more
dude response from Billy. And this is also in response
(16:39):
to the dating podcast we just did, and while Billy
is no longer single, he was reflecting back on single
times and said that it was just difficult to find
and meet nice, funny, smart women. It would have been
great if the ability to initiate conversation would have been
more too way. However, as Peewee said, everyone I know
(17:00):
has a big butt, so let's talk about my big
but I'm pretty sure every guy out there has become
involved with someone that was, to put it politely, clingy
and not to discriminate. I know you girls have also
dated guys like this before true one approached by a woman.
That was the alarm bell that went off in my head.
Maybe if women approaching men had been more common, or
(17:23):
even a little more common, that wouldn't have been an issue. However,
at the time, it was rare and since some strange signals.
When I'm sure it was just a girl wanting to
talk to a guy. That's an interesting thing. So you
send off the sets off the clingy doatch that attachment?
Gender roles man gender roles. Well, we'll come back and
talked about gender roles in a couple more days. But
(17:44):
in the meantime, you can email us mom stuff at
how stuffworks dot com. We'd love to see you over
on Facebook as well, and follow us on Twitter. We're
at mom Stuff Podcasts. And then finally, during the week
you can look at some vintage douching ads on our blog.
It's was like put him on a T shirt for real.
It's stuff Mom never told you. From how Stuff Works
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