Safe sex and the single girl

By Namratha Krishnamurthy Oja, as is customary for a woman in love, is late for our weekly dinner. Her eyes ablaze, she’s wearing a scowl that would do a vengeful goddess proud. “What’s the problem?” I ask. “How’s the new boyfriend?” “More importantly,” Sneha interjects, reaching across me for a slice of garlic bread, “How’s the sex?” “Sex, everywhere and anytime,” Oja mutters. “And that’s the problem.” Sneha, garlic bread in mid-bite, stops, astonished. “How can that be the problem?” Oja rolls her eyes expressively. “We’re always running out of condoms — he keeps forgetting to buy them. And now that we’re seeing each other, he doesn’t want to always use a condom.” “Well there are other options, like the pill.” Oja shudders. “I’ve tried it before. It messes with my hormones. Total drop in libido,” to which Sneha giggles, “That certainly defeats the purpose.” “What about a diaphragm?" I suggest. “Where do you get them?” Oja throws up her hands in exasperation, “I’ve looked in a dozen places.” “An IUD?” [caption id=“attachment_36770” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“Responsible sexual behaviour requires taking the right precautions, be it condoms, contraception or pap smears. AFP”]  [/caption] “My aunt had a copper-T, “Sneha says between bites,” Was hellishly painful to get out when she wanted to conceive.” “I guess that means you’ll just have to buy condoms since he keeps forgetting,” Sneha tells Oja. Oja groans at the thought of doing the ‘walk of shame’ at the corner store. “Well, you know the rule,” Sneha retorts. “Never, EVER, go to your neighbourhood shop or chemist.” When I mention that a website, condomking.in, allows one to order female condoms online, Sneha turns up her nose in disdain: “That’s like making love to a plastic bag. And it looks hard to insert.” “Buying condoms at a pharmacy is bad enough,” Oja shakes her head. “Just imagine this landing up in my mail, and my mom finding it.” Sneha and I exchange glances, both remembering an incident that happened a year ago at a friend’s wedding. ******* We started that evening as the reigning divas of the mehndi ceremony; beloved best friends of the bride, surrounded by a fussing and clucking bevy of the bride’s aunts. As one pats my cheek, her hand covered in wet, Sneha exclaims, “Darling, you’ve got a smudge.” She reaches for a packet of tissues in her handbag, collides with a passing waiter and a footloose toddler, and  trips. Her handbag spirals into the air and then, inevitably, downwards, scattering its contents across the table. A packet of tissues,  comb, business cards, lipstick, loose change and… a rectangular blue packet. No it couldn’t be… was it? I shoot Sneha a look. She flinches. The product label all too visible to every horror-stricken eye: Durex Jeans. The aunts, wideeyed, draw back in consternation at this unexpected discovery of a snake in their midst. The mother draws her fallen toddler away, face averted. The waiter casts us a speculative glance. The mehndi woman looks outraged. The two men lounging nearby — Preeti’s cousins — loudly snigger for all to hear. “Condoms,” I hiss at Sneha, as the aunts rapidly flee our presence. “Really?” She shrugs, a touch defensive. “It’s a wedding, you never know what could happen,” and gesturing to the walls of the wedding resort, explains, “It’s so isolated here, no shops around. I brought these, just in case. Better to be safe than sorry.” Continue reading on next page Her logic and caution are faultless. But we eat our lunch, alone. “They’ll forget it by evening,” Sneha says, consolingly. “After all, how hypocritical can they be? Preeti and Ashok have been living together in the US for the past two years.” They don’t, however, forget. At the wedding ceremony, the women cast us indignant glances and treat us like lepers, while Preeti’s wizened uncles leer at Sneha’s bosom, and one tries to snake a hand up my sari. We feel angry and stricken, furious at the invisible scarlet letter pinned to our sari blouse. An important part of the women’s liberation movement is reproductive freedom: the freedom to decide when we want to have sex, when we want to be safe, and when we want to get pregnant. Experts tell us over and again that responsible sexual behaviour requires taking the right precautions: contraception, or in emergencies, the morning after pill to prevent pregnancy; condoms to guard against AIDS and other STDs; annual pap smears to guard against cancer. But in India, being responsible entails running the risk of embarrassment, or worse, all-out humiliation. The most accessible form of contraception in India against STDs is condoms, but this often leaves agency and choice in the hands of men — who may neglect or disdain this responsibility. I’ve heard friends talk about the shame and the guilt they’ve been made to experience when buying over-the-counter emergency contraceptives. Even getting treated for a UTI or just getting a pap smear can be a harrowing experience. Take, for example, my visit to a gynaecologist a few years ago. The waiting room was filled with couples, mothers with toddlers, and pregnant women, who stared at me the moment I walked in. The chatter abruptly ceased, and the air was thick with the inevitable speculation: She’s alone, probably unmarried, so why is she here? The silence stretched, unbearable. The minutes ticked slowly by. Then it was finally my turn, and I explained to the doctor that as a student in the United States, I’d been required to go in for a mandatory annual pap smear. It had now been two years since my last checkup. “Are you married?” The gynecologist asked, then. No. “If you’re unmarried, there’s no need for a pap smear,” she declared. But I demurred, pointing out that  Jade Goody had recently died at the age of 27 of cervical cancer. “Oh her,” she shrugged, dismissive but clearly well-informed on the pop-culture front. “She must have had a flourishing HPV virus. Multiple sexual partners too, I would think.” She then eyed me over the edge of her spectacles, pinning me with a school-mistress glare. “Are you, at present, sexually active?” I shook my head, and was hastily waved out of her office. But later I wondered: What if I was sexually active? What if I had multiple sex partners? Would I have summoned up the courage to endure that doctor’s contempt, or — more likely— decided to accept the high risk of remaining untested? And how about those who need to be tested for STDs or AIDs? Sex can be matter of life and death. Yet when we try to make responsible choices in our sex life, to protect our health and that of our our partner’s, we’re labelled, condemned and stigmatised. There’s no such thing as safe sex for a single Indian woman. And that’s not just unfair but unsafe for both men and women alike. Responsible sexual behaviour requires taking the right precautions, be it condoms, contraception or pap smears. But in India, being responsible entails running the risk of embarrassment or, worse, all-out humiliation for an unmarried woman.