Who Needs A Uterus, Anyway?
Our relationship has always been strained - it's time to say goodbye
This story contains mature content. Reader discretion is advised.
Listen to me read it:
~
Holy shit, it’s happening.
The Booting of the Ute.
In six sleeps I will have the thing that defined my existence for so long laparoscopically cut from my body and pulled out through my vagina, along with my cervix.
I feel surprisingly calm yet utterly chaotic, am coping ahead but am completely overwhelmed. I’ve had the last couple of months to process this upcoming procedure and while I’m certain it’s what I want, there’s still an element of grief that accompanies having a hysterectomy.
The surgery I never wanted to have because doctors made it seem like it was my only alternative to pregnancy and I didn’t want to “use it or lose it.” It felt like an important part of my womanhood that I was too stubborn to let go of.
Well, turns out I do want to.
Lose it.
Because when it became “useful” (AKA, a surprise pregnancy), I felt the deepest, most skin-crawling discomfort that I can only describe as dysphoria. I felt light-headed, weak, violated. I wanted to vomit, shit, pee and punch something all at the same time. I wanted to rip the fertilized cells from my womb because of the overwhelming feeling that it was wrong, it didn’t belong, it was invading my body like a parasite. I wished when I had my abortion they could pull the whole womb with it. I hate even calling it a womb. Is it still a womb if it’s never completed a full pregnancy? That word sounds weird now. Womb.
Ancient medical texts purported that not fulfilling the “duty” of motherhood would cause the uterus to be deprived of its primary purpose and therefore result in painful afflictions and the “Wandering Womb” we now understand to be endometriosis and other illnesses. I certainly didn’t feel like my body was fulfilling some innate, divine purpose by way of procreation, that’s for sure. I got drunk and wanted a creampie.
And that’s okay.
For a long time my sense of self, my identity was so heavily influenced by this organ that could fit in the palm of my hand. And trust me, if I could keep it and actually hold it in the palm of my hand, I would. But I can’t. I can however ask my surgical team to take a photo of it for me and sign some forms to say that I asked them to do it which I am ABSOLUTELY going to do.
I think on some level I always had “have a hysterectomy at 35” in my brain as an option if I still didn’t want kids. Sure, I had exes that I had The Kid Conversation with and when I was young I believed that’s what I wanted, but I never felt “ready.” I know people always say you never feel ready, but I had such a paralyzing fear of becoming and being pregnant (called tokophobia, I’ve learned) and a galvanizing desire for doing what I want when I want (called ADHD lol) that I would always put it off when partners would bring it up. Like I wanted to wait until I was settled in a career (LOL. That’s a funny joke) or had a house (even funnier!!) or was married (the funniest of all) or the next arbitrary milestone that our society has decided makes you “valuable.”
It took until my thirties to finally admit to myself and those around me that I don’t want to be a mother. I think suffering with endo for years made me accept that taking care of myself is a full-time job, I don’t want dependents that rely on me for survival. I know if I die my cat will be okay and probably eat my face before someone realizes I’m gone which I would accept as the Circle of Life.
My circle of life felt like a tug-of-war with my uterus. Horrendously painful, long periods defined my teenage years until I was put on birth control by a family doctor. Sure, it regulated my two weeks of bleeding that shot pain like lightning through my pelvis, but it also made me a deeply depressed, actively suicidal human who coped by giving blow jobs, smoking weed and writing poetry. Not much has changed. I write less poetry, I guess.
My endo diagnosis at 24 answered a lot of questions I had about my body and experience over the years. I had my first surgery, ablation (don’t do that!) that confirmed the presence of endo and everything changed because even though it stayed the same, I had a name for my pain.
I was off and on hormones for much of my twenties, pinging between the comfortable depressive pull of the pill and the noble suffering with endometriosis. When I went off hormones during my wellness phase (I’d party, get drunk and do cocaine and then go to work at a yoga studio where I’d give friends the recipe for my latest gluten-free, dairy-free vegan meal of the week) I spent six years off of them, in the throes of excruciating endo symptoms.
So I sought solace in the endometriosis community itself, which I didn’t even know existed until I moved to Toronto. Eventually, I had another surgery, excision (do this! If you choose to do surgery at all) that was deemed a success but didn’t do a lot to relieve my pain. Pelvic physiotherapy and cannabis have honestly done more.
When I began my own advocacy journey, I, like many people, would use a uterus as a symbol to represent the disease, which doesn’t actually make any sense whatsoever because by definition endometriosis occurs outside of the uterus. In 2020 a friendo and I started a podcast, “The Endo Buds: A podcast about enndometriosis, cannabis + everything in between” (RIP), and every version of the logo I created in Canva had a fucking uterus on it.
As far as womanhood goes, I’ve been exploring my gender in a nonbinary way and releasing myself from the confines of cisheteronormativity and I realize that I have no real emotional or physical connnection to the organ that supposedly “defines” a woman.
And really, if you’re going to go down that road, what “defines” a woman, anyway?! WHAT IS GENDER! GENDER IS A CONSTRUCT!!
The older I get, the less attached I feel to that identity that I clung to for so long in fear. Of what, I’m not sure.
Besides, I know plenty of women without uteruses (uteri?) and it certainly doesn’t impact their womanhood in any way, whatever that even means.
Both of my grandmothers had hysterectomies (after birthing multiple children) that they each told me vastly improved their quality of life. They didn’t have the access to information we do today to know if either of them also had endo, but it’s probably safe to assume that one or both of them did. Granted in the seventies a hysterectomy was often standard procedure once you’d allowed your uterus to fulfill its divine purpose. Cutting it out was easier than actually figuring out what was wrong if someone experienced pain or heavy bleeding.
~
I’ve been at peace with wanting to boot my uterus for some time now, long before I got that first call about a potential surgery date. Not because a doctor told me to, or a celebrity or a friendo or anyone else other than me.
Because I’ve lived and learned and made mistakes and suffered and experienced relief and joy and I don’t want my life to be the unwilling submissive to my dangerously Dominant uterus.
The end of any relationship brings grief with it, and my tremulous one with my uterus has plagued me for decades. I don’t know how I’ll feel after it’s gone, but I’m ready to find out.
Sometimes you need to know when to let go, when a relationship is over, and move forward into a new life that isn’t defined by a piece of your viscera that can be pulled out your vagina.
Who needs a fucking uterus, anyway?