Supple Cow

God. ghoastgirl1, this utterly infuriates me, and not just because you are a beautiful person and his statement was untrue. I hope all of the comments you receive in this thread (mine included) help you realize the scale of what happened to you - both how colossal it was (as in how wrong that idiot and his friends were) and how small it is.

I was lucky, I suppose, because I grew up with a set of best friends who did do kind of weird things like compare our lady parts. I remember being shocked at how different they all looked, but it never occurred to me that one mound should be prettier or better than another. At the same time, I had many similar experiences and your story reminds me of one event in particular. Maybe I was just lucky to have a cultural lense help me to see the situation for what it was.

I was kind of a tomboy as a kid and when I was 14, I decided I would wear a dress to school for once. That day, a boy who played in the band with me looked at my legs and said, "Hey you have pretty nice legs. You almost look like a white girl... that's probably what you were going for, right? Well, your legs are pale enough, but then you get to your dirty-looking feet and you can tell you're just a filipino girl." He was smiling derisively the whole time because he knew what he was saying would be hurtful and insulting. I wanted to (and excuse my language here) fucking punch him in the face, scratch his goddamn eyes out and shove the mangled eyeballs up his filthy, rotten ass. Instead, I just ignored him. And yet that didn't make it not hurt.

I obsessed over it for a long time, but in the end, there was nothing to be done about my feet and hands. My skin is just dark around my nails because of genetics. When I don't trim my cuticles in over a week, they start to look dirty (though I cringe to use the same word). Does that have anything to do with who I am? Nope. Can I change my genetic make-up? Oh no. The conclusion was clear once I thought about it enough - he was a dumbfuck and I had to let it roll off my back the best I could. Obviously, the situation can require a little more maintenance when it's your vagina instead of your feet.

Sage makes a great suggestion if you have the resources for it. I used to go to counseling because my university offered it for free and I had some issues (like everyone) that I could stand to talk about with a trusted professional. When my old roommate first suggested it to me, I balked at the thought and was insulted. 'Wow, I'm pretty obsessive about the way I think about this stuff, but I mean, I'm not crazy or anything. It's not like I need a shrink like that really crazy girl I know - what a nutcase! Hahahahahaahahah.... but not me. Nope, no thanks. I'm normal. No therapy for me. I know, my roommate must just be so crazy that she's projecting it onto me to make herself feel better!' You might be having a similar reaction now. (In fact, that's very likely.)

Again, after I thought about it for a while, I realized that counseling was just another tool, despite any stigmas attached to it. Nobody was going to do anything against my will and nothing terrible would come from just giving it a try. It just took me a little while to get over the idea that my "crazy" roommate might be trying to make herself feel better by dragging me into the mud and see that she had a genuinely good suggestion.

It may seem like I'm rambling, but I tell you all of this for the same reason. Lots of bad stuff can happen to us in life, and unfortunately there isn't a damn thing we can do to change most of it. The only thing we can change is what we do with the stuff we can change: namely, our outlook. You can choose to be a victim your whole life, or you can choose to take control. You are already taking control by posting here and asking for information and commiseration. You can take more control by seeing a counselor if you so choose. You can take more control than you think you can, and you can have more control over your life every day. You just have to get all the information you can, decide what's best for you (and this is the part that doesn't come easily to most because a lot of people interpret "you" to mean "all the people in your life and what they say about you"), and do it. Research, set a goal, and go get it - it's as simple as that. It's not always easy, but it sure is simple.

__________________
"I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed."
(Michael Jordan)