Skip to main content

Digging Deep into all things Vagina with April Davis


Hey Tranquility Tribe! This week, we are digging deep into all things down there - yup, vaginas! There’s no one better to guide us through this topic than the vagina aficionado herself, April Davis. April is the mastermind behind The Vagina Blog, an incredible blog and social media presence dedicated to our lady bits. In our society, most of us with vaginas are unfortunately not educated about our own anatomy and are quite frankly scared of poking around down there. As a doula, birth photographer, and birth assistant to a midwife, April has been up close and personal with too many vaginas to count, and she’s excited to share all she’s learned with you!

Caring for your vagina
The vagina is a self-cleaning, independent woman, but what do you do if you’re experiencing some stank down there? April is always waking down the feminine hygiene aisle and taken aback by all the special soaps, perfumes, and deodorants for sale that your vagina really doesn’t need. If you start shoving those things up or around here, you will mess with the natural flora of your vagina - and you really don’t want to mess with that pH! Water is truly the best for keeping your lady bits clean, but if you do want to use a wash, April recommends Good Clean Love’s natural moisturizing wash or even just plain, old school pine tar soap, which April uses for whole body - including her vagina.
When it comes to lube, you should be mindful of the synthetic chemicals that are found in many  products, as the vaginal mucous membrane is super absorbent. Coconut oil works best for April, but she suggests doing your research and figuring out what’s best for you!

Of course, one of the biggest and overwhelming aspects of caring for our vaginas is managing our periods! There is so much out there these days and April goes very in-depth about all kinds of products on the blog, but she emphasizes that everyone is different and what works for her personally may not necessarily work best for others. From sea sponges to menstrual cups to cloth pads, there are so many things out there to try. April’s personal favorite is a menstrual disc, which sits up in the fornix rather than in the canal and is easy to both put in and put out. Hehe and April both love Thinx underwear - and April recommends them for postpartum bleeding too!

The vagina in pregnancy and childbirth
The vagina is the most stretchy part of our bodies, but it’s hard to believe that since we can’t really see it. Take the case of a freezing cold flaccid penis and compare that to a fully erect one. While we can’t get that same visual because the vagina is external, we should still keep in mind that our bodies were biologically made for handling the extreme stretch of childbirth!
The vagina heals itself very well, from minor cuts and scrapes to childbirth. While extreme tears require some extra help, when it comes to 1st and 2nd degree tears the vagina can heal quickly and significantly when you take the time to rest and stay down like you’re supposed to. Tears or not, it’s so important to take good care of your vagina after birth. One of April’s favorite postpartum products is Earth Mama Angel Baby’s perineal spray, which is super soothing on a sore vagina and also promotes healing. Ibuprofen and tumeric are great for inflammation along with ice packs on and off to keep swelling down.

After the initial six week postpartum period, kegels are great for bringing strength back into your vaginal muscles. But if things don’t quite feel like they’ve put themselves back together, you may be suffering from prolapse of one of your pelvic organs. Culturally, we tend to think our bodies are ruined after childbirth and that pain is just a part of post birth life - that’s not okay! Unfortunately, most OBs only check the cervix at the postpartum exam and don’t assess for prolapse, so you need to advocate for yourself in the office if you feel that something is off. 

Postpartum sex
April has had three kids and each postpartum experience was completely different. For her first pregnancy she didn’t even consider the idea of sex before her six weeks appointment and with her second she was back to having sex within two weeks of giving birth. The key to postpartum sex is patience for all parties involved! April is sympathetic to partners supporting women who just had babies and who are eager to get back into things. Remember that you can always do other things to be intimate that don’t necessarily have to be intercourse - after all, orgasms are fantastic for healing!
If you’re interested in keeping up with April and all her vaginal musings, you can find her on Instagram @thevaginablog and of course, at http://thevaginablog.com/. She has a book club to help people on their educational journey when it comes to their lady bits - this month, they’ve been talking about The Guide to Getting it On, which talks about from everything to Barbie’s impact on women’s sexuality to how to give good head. 

Don’t forget to join our private Facebook, The Tranquility Tribe Podcast, and follow us on Instagram at @tranquilitybyhehe!

"Welcome to the Tranquility Tribe"

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Do Inductions Really Rise Around the Holidays?

Do Inductions Really Rise Around the Holidays? As long as I can remember in my doula career, I have been told, both seriously and sarcastically, that inductions rise around the holidays because doctors want to control the births they will have to deliver on..let’s say Thanksgiving day or Christmas Day.  I have to be honest in that I never really paid much attention to it because our team typically takes off the end of the year! It has been an intentional decision in years past to not take births in the months of December and January. This provided us with the time to disconnect, visit family and friends, and wrap up one year + dive into the next with a solid foundation. As you well know, 2020 has changed so much of what we knew and, for us, this meant not having the space to disconnect without leaving birthing people vulnerable in a global crisis and not traveling for this holidays. With this, we decided to work straight through 2020 into the start of 2021. And in this moment, the enti

Failed Inductions: What You Need to Know

Failed Inductions: What You Need to Know When we talk about inductions, we often speak of them like they are 100% guaranteeing us a baby at the end. While this is true most of the time, you’d probably be surprised to learn that indcutins can fail and you may be sent home to wait it out a bit longer. Or, if the option isn’t presented to you, you can ask or take yourself home. It is important to ensure that you and your baby are safe to go home.There are thousands of women each year that experience a failed induction and it can be very hard emotionally.  What is a failed induction? A failed induction is the inability to reach active labor while being induced . There is a certain process we want to take when it comes to induction. I call this your ‘individual induction equation.’ It’s truly individual to you and you get to introduce various induction methods as you see fit which makes your equation unique to you. First we want to ripen the cervix--it needs to be soft. You have options of

Is your IUD poisoning you?

Could your copper IUD being causing your body to be overloaded and in need of a serious detox? (This is also a podcast episode on The Tranquility Tribe podcast, if you prefer, listen  here .) Hey Tranquility Tribe! This week, we’re getting educated about a little-known, big problem that affects thousands of women around the world: copper toxicity. HeHe has had a copper IUD for about a year and loves it, but when she started experiencing some funky symptoms, she came across the topic of copper toxicity and knew she needed to do a deeper dive. There’s no one better to educate us about this than someone who has experienced it themselves, so HeHe enlisted the help of Kirby Costa Campos, who has made it her life’s mission to educate herself and others about copper toxicity and help women face the reality that the copper IUD may be playing a big role in occurrences of this poisoning.  Kirby had been ill on and off for many years and