Part of being a modern woman is taking charge of your sexual health. Going to the gynecologist, performing breast-self exams, getting regularly tested for STIs – all of these things are the necessary steps that women must take in order to stay healthy. Unfortunately for me, no one had ever told me to pee after sex. In fact, after three years of not peeing after sex with my boyfriend Trevor, I developed a recurring UTI so powerful that my only choice was to pack up my things and establish residency in a cranberry bog in rural Massachusetts.
You might be asking yourself, “Don’t they have medicine to treat chronic UTIs?” And to that I will say, yes, they do make medicine, but it wasn’t working well or fast enough. My doctor told me that I needed to let the medicine run it’s course, but that’s just your typical Western medicine, always believing that pills will fix every problem with our bodies. Also, medicine isn’t natural! Know what is natural? Living in a stretch of wet, decomposing land filled with antioxidants that relieve the burning in my urethra. So take that, Dr. Pressman!
Some of you might be asking, “Why don’t you just drink the cranberry juice?” And to them I say, “Absolutely not. Too much sugar.”
I want to be clear that living in a bog is not as glamorous as you might think it is, and it certainly isn’t for everyone. Yes, cranberry juice is delicious, but I do not spend my days relaxing and drinking tasty cranberry juice cocktails. Yes, I get to wear stylish, rubber overalls every day (although the bog is more effective if I go without them) and watch sexy farmer-men churn the bog-water to harvest the berries. But trust me, the paperwork I had to fill out in order to become an official resident of this bog was no walk in the park!
Still, I think I made the right decision. Even though it’s been very difficult to leave behind my life, job, and everything I knew to live in the bog from the Ocean Spray commercials, it was something I had to do for me and my bacterial-laden nether region. Sure, I miss railing Trevor and not going to the bathroom after, but living in this fruit-filled, watery swamp is the best way for me to take care of my body and that is what being empowered is all about.
