How and when did you learn what pelvic and breast exams were?

How did you find out about breast and pelvic exams? Was it a class? Did your mother tell you? Did a doctor explain it to you? How? Also, how old were you and what was your reaction? Were you shocked? Curious? What? And this goes for the guys too. How did you guys find out and what was your reaction? Did it freak you out when you realized that your own mother was getting this done? And all your friend's mothers?

Did your mother tell you? (Yes both my mommy and older sister told me ALL about each and every step)Did a doctor explain it to you?(Any yes the doctor and nurse expained to me with my mommy in the room what was going to happen at each step.My first gyno was with my mother's gyno,and she was very very gentle and patient with me.As the speculum was being put into me,I did squirm and let out a gasp.Then the doctor told me to just relax,and breath deeply,and it would be over soon. Also, how old were you and what was your reaction?( I was only 16 with my first one,and very very nervous,but also excited.)

Very nice reply bggrh0321 couple questions for you did your mom stay in the exam room with you while you had your first exam done or was it just you and the doctor? Did the doctor also do a breast exam as well as part of the exam? Had you ever had a breast exam done before by your pediatrician or family doctor??? How did you feel about having to undress for your first exam? Was the scale in the exam room or in the hallway before you got into the exam room? I hope to hear more about your first exam thank you for sharing what you have shared so far looking forward to hearing more about your first exam 😃

I found out by sneaking and reading my mom's medical encyclopedias. I think I was like 10 at the time, and I remember being very curious about it, and feeling very weird about it. I think that's what first got me interested in medical procedures.

I think the first time I had any inkling that girls were examined in this fashion was when i was 12 in the summer of 1965.

My sister shared with us at the dinner table(despite my mom's protests) about her time being examined "On her chest, between her legs and up her butt" that morning.

This was designed to embarrass my dad who wanted nothing to do with the discussion. She also announced that mom had douched her when they got home and that she would be getting one monthly after her period.

I thought dad was going to choke on his dinner. I really didn't comprehend the scope of her comments in that moment. I got a better idea when I was 18 and a senior in high school. My girlfriend at the time had her first full meeting with the gynecologist. She gave me a much more graphic and detailed description. It was the first time i ever heard the word "speculum".

I found out what a Pap smear was when I was 12 me and my mom had a back to back doctors appointment to have blood work done and I remember the doctor asking her when was the last time she had a pap smear and a pelvic exam and she told him "last year" and I asked her (infront of the doctor) what a Pap smear was and she said she would explain to me later, on the way home she told me what it was but not in full detail, all she said was its when the doctor sticks a long cotton swab in you and collects cells from your vagina and they run tests on themWhen I was 15 or 16 my mom was going to take me to a gynecologist to put me on birth control because my periods were very irregular and I had really really bad acne and my mom said the doctor was going to do an exam on me and I asked what all they were going to do and my stepdad chimed in and went into FULL BLOWN detail of what the doctor was going to do to me and my mom had this really shocked looked on her face and I gave my stepdad a weird look and said "you're really weird", back then I thought it was strange my stepdad knew about female exams LOL

I don't remember exactly the age but it was early teens or tweens.

I had a friend with scoliosis and and I looked it up in a set of medical books my parents had. Somewhere along the hunt I came across illustrations of a best exam and well...boobs! The text I read described a breast exam as part of a gynecology visit. At that age, women heir parts and function were mysterious and exciting (OK, so that hasn't really changed) and I re-red that section several times over the next few months. I eventually got up the nerve to look up "gynecology" at the library (back in the day of card catalogs) and wow, even my tiny, two room, rural library had a copy of Our Bodies Ourselves. It had pictures.

I knew about it from reading some women's magazines of my mom's but when I hit puberty I got a book from my mom and she shared more details with me. Honestly though, it's one of those things that regardless of what you have read or heard rumors about it isn't anything until you are sitting in the stirrups as the nurse / doctor walks you through it for the first time 😃

I think my first exposure to exams was from reading a book back in middle school. It didn't go into a lot of detail. In my freshman year of high school a close female friend of mine had to have multiple pelvic exams due to ovarian cysts. When she explained to me how a speculum was used I was pretty much in disbelief. I remember being amazed that a girls vagina was opened that far just as part of a routine checkup.

I was clueless until I had to go the first time at 15. My Mom told me some in an attempt to inform me about it before I went, but as I found out her description was pretty vague and she left out many key details. So experiencing the exam is how I mainly discovered what it was all about and entailed exactly.

I used to read about them in my Seventeen magazines... that was definitely how I got interested in gyn exams from a young age.

I learned about it at 15 or 16 when my girlfriend told me her mother was taking her to her gynecologist. I read a pamphlet or something about what the exam entailed and I was shocked as well as very aroused.

I had heard about them from my sister. When I went the first time the doctor explained every step as she did it. My sister was with me. I was 17.

I always liked medical exams ever since I was at least 4 years old, but I didn't know about pelvic exams or breast exams. When I was maybe 15 or so, I saw the words pap smear on a gynecologist card and then I googled it, except there wasn't a google back then. I probably asked Jeeves or something, but needless to say I soon learned all about it. There was a good website that I read called gyn101.com, I think. It's offline now, but it was educational at the time. Once I learned more phrases and terms associated with pelvic exams, I was able to find the speculum pages site and that's that.

Have been fascinated by the male doctor-female patient scenario from a very young age. Listening to my mother and her friends sitting around discussing exams and making comments like, "A woman always falls in love with her gynecologist," always intrigued me but at that young age I did not understand the implications of what they were saying. I did not know what actually took place in the doctor's office nor the intimacy of the female exam until I was about 11 years old.

We were helping neighbors move and they left several books. Two of the books were medical texts that had very vivid descriptions, with pictures and drawings, of what took place during a female exam and how the procedure was done. I managed to get the books home and hid them from my parents. At the time, adult material was not readily available - especially to an 11 year old - so this was a treasure trove.

For the next three or four years I studied those books intensely. Although the books had instructions for entire female exams and treatments for various female maladies, I dwelt almost exclusively on breast and pelvic exams and became thoroughly familiar with both. Now when the ladies made their comments and innuendos, they were no longer a mystery and provided many pleasurable images. I was just starting puberty and often masturbated to the image of a neighbor lady or a female classmate getting a full female examination.

Somehow my hiding place got flooded and the books got destroyed but the pleasure and knowledge they brought has stayed with me many years later. They did not start my gyn medfet but probably strengthened it - or made it fully bloom. Many of those pictures are still etched in my mind and I still enjoy them.

I was about 12, saw a Playboy video late one night on cable.

I am based in UK and we had a video at school which covered breast exams and self examination plus smear tests, though no serious details about those but we did get a leaflet. However, nothing about internal exams so found out about those when I went to Dr for the pill when I was 18 and at uni, which was a slight shock at time. Though this appointment is when my interest in med stuff came from though more from the exposure involved than the speculum part to take the smear, though the internal exam after that became something I thought about a lot and found aroused me quite a lot.

Lisa

I never thought to look at medical books when I went to the library. Neither my mother or aunt told me anything. I found out about pelvic and breast exams when I was being examined for the first time. My first pelvic exam was at age 15 and my first breast exam was at age 18.

When a nurse first had me undress from the waist down, she said the doctor would look at my vagina. She didn't say he'd also use his fingers to feel inside my vagina and insert a speculum. Even though it was a shock, I was more shocked that my aunt was there watching. At least she wasn't there for my first breast exam.

I didn't really learn what it was but i recall being around 6 or 7 so to young to stay at home guess mom wasn't happy for to sit alone in waiting area.

I am sure I would have been more interested in comic or book but I know the dr examined her breasts and what turned out to be a pelvic exam etc but with drape and where I was sitting couldn't see anything.

Must have lit my curiosity as years after that I quized my sibling on it.

For breast exam I was aware how it is, I had seen in breast cancer awareness video on YouTube. The nipple pinching and the way of doing it. And I was aware that gynec checks it during the appointment. I mean that was my understanding for the exam.

Pelvic exam was new for me. Mom had fixed my appointment with the gynec for my period. She just said, doctor will check you down there. Just 1 line. That was my preparation for the exam before the appointment.

But as I have said somewhere else on Zity, I was not worried about the appointment at all. There was a much bigger personal thing going on in my mind.

I was 20 when I heard about self exam on YouTube. But I was 21 when I actually had my first exam. Dr said I should start regular exams now.

It was the same appointment when I had my first pelvic exam.

My mom took me with her to her yearly exam soon after I started menstruating. It took all the mystery and apprehension away when I had my first Gyno exam a couple of years later.

Dita

I think I was 5 years old. We visited the doctor with the family. Mother, father, my little sister, and me. On a certain moment my mother had to strip waist down lay on a special kind of table, spread her legs, and the doctor put in something of metal. Just in the view of the whole family.

This was from my child perspective, now I know what has been done. It was in the early 70's and my mother must been have 28. In that time this was normal in this way in the Netherlands I presume.

Later it became more prudish.

I didn’t know about breast exams until I had one. I was eleven and my breasts had just started to bud. I wasn’t given a gown at that age so I was just in my panties. When the doctor asked me to lay down, I thought he would examine my stomach like he always did, but that day he said something along the lines of, “now that your breasts are starting to grow, you’ll have them examined when you come in for a check up. I’m going to do a breast exam on you now. It might feel a little funny.”

And then he palpated around my breast buds and then palpated my nipples. I was equally fascinated and embarrassed as I watched him do it. I had never even touched my nipples before and I remember they got pointy and felt funny and tingly.

When I went home, I laid on my bed and did the same thing. I started doing it everyday after that and I would always strip down to my panties so it felt like I was at the doctor. It eventually lead to me pushing my panties down to my ankles and getting into the frog leg position. I would close my eyes and poke around down there like the doctor did.

I would have been around twelve. My mom was going to school to become a licensed nurse. She always had text books laying around. I remember looking through and reading the parts of books that interested me. Which at the time were the parts on gyn exams and other types of female examinations.

I think when I was in HS like 14 because my friend had one (it was her first one) and she told us all about it. The only thing I remember her telling us about it is that she had to be naked and spread her legs while the doctor examined her, but I’m not sure with a speculum or anything, just external with I believe she said he felt inside.

I can’t remember why she did have this but I think it had to do with something for birth control or something cuz she had sex and her parents found out. She didn’t want to go and she said it sucked.

@shyLela36 Many teenage girls are taken to the gyn while highly reluctant to because their parents suspect they're having sex…

The sad thing is that a pelvic exam is not medically needed for oral contraceptives (but some blood work may be).

This is an excellent topic. Thank you for all the replies.

I found really what went on from my sister. When younger we had checkups together but eventually had exams separately but still same sort of time and one just waited outside the exam room.

So i was confused when i had to go to school one morning and she didn't as i had a checkup booked. I am sure I protested a little about it being the brat that i was.

I was briefly palmed off with its a dr only for girls or something like that.

When we were back from school i asked her about it and she went into detail of what happened.

My mother wasn't helpful in educating me, other than saying not to get pregnant.

Once puberty began for me, my pediatric exams were intimate enough that I started looking things up and chatting with my close friends. I'm an only child but friends with older sisters told me what was to come as we got older.

Breast exams, I am not sure but I started getting simple ones around 13... Pelvic exam was talked about in a book on puberty my mom gave me and it was in teen magazines etc... Before my first my mom kind of told me... but it's really not "real" in your mind until you have one.