A Young Woman's Gyn Health Glossary
PMS and Ovulation continued...
Slang: Egg chute, egg shoot, egg bowl, or "O" (not Oprah's magazine)
Basics: Your ovary releases a mature egg about two weeks after your period starts. PMS symptoms can start around this time. It's also the most fertile time of the month -- when you're most likely to get pregnant.
The egg travels through the fallopian tube and toward the uterus. If the egg unites with a man's sperm, it can be fertilized, attach to the uterus, and grow into a baby. When the egg is not fertilized, it passes out through the vagina during your period.
Female Anatomy Lesson
Slang: Honey pot, hoo-ha, muffin, vajay-jay, vaj
Basics: Your vagina is a stretchy tube that connects the uterus to the outside world. To make a baby, a man inserts his penis here. For a traditional birth, the baby leaves the body through the vagina, and the vagina shrinks back to its normal size.
What we refer to as "the vagina" has a lot of parts with their own proper names.
Vulva: This word covers all the outside parts of a woman's genitals, including:
Mons Veneris, or "mountain of Venus”: This is the fleshy area just above the opening to the vagina. Underneath is the pubic bone. It's covered in pubic hair in adult women.
Labia Minora: These are the inner, small "lips" of the vagina.
Labia Majora: These are the outer, large lips of the vagina.
Clitoris: The part of this organ you see is a tiny hooded knob. It's above the spot where you pee, the urethra. When the clitoris is touched, you become sexually aroused. It can swell and become erect, which can lead to an orgasm.
Urethral opening: This small opening is just above the opening to the vagina. It's where pee leaves your body.
Hymen: This stretchy skin covers the opening of the vagina. In slang, it's called a ''cherry'' that can be ''popped'' or torn when a girl loses her virginity. The hymen, however, can also be broken by being active.
Perineum: The space between the vaginal opening and the anus.