Article updated on 26/1/2022
Hymenoplasty is a surgical procedure used to reconstruct the opening of a women's vagina, known as the hymen.
It is sometimes called ‘virginity repair’, a treatment purporting to restore the appearance of virginity, but it has cropped up in other guises too. A couple of years ago, we reported on the insidious trend for something known as the 'husband stitch', wherein a male partner during childbirth reportedly requests that the consultant put in an extra stitch to a torn perineum, to 'tighten' the vagina, for the purpose of making sex more pleasurable (for the man). More details on this below.
But an amendment to the health and care bill means that from Monday, it will be illegal to perform procedures for the purpose of reconstructing the hymen, whether consent has been given or not, making both 'virginity repair' and the 'husband stitch' against the law.
The new legislation introduced by the government is designed to combat the growing number of girls and young women pressured into undergoing the 'virginity repair' procedure, which has been offered by myriad clinics, private hospitals and pharmacies.
The 'virginity' surgery was designed to make a woman bleed when she next has sexual intercourse - and it's caused uproar amongst campaigners, including doctors and midwives, after the government also pledged to make virginity testing illegal in July of last year.
A British Survivor, who was raped as a child, explained being coerced into the surgery by her parents, per The Guardian.
Under the pseudonym Hafsah, the 30-year-old woman told the news outlet: 'The risk of being ostracised by my community because I didn’t want to go ahead with the surgery under my parents’ orders put me in an extremely dark frame of mind.'
'I felt like I didn’t belong and I was abnormal.'
She added: 'If hymenoplasty had been illegal when I was a teenager it would have saved me a lot of emotional abuse.
'I’m sure it will be a great comfort to vulnerable girls in a similar position to know that the law is on their side. It could give them the strength to stand up for themselves.'
Speaking of virginity testing and hymenoplasty, and how violent both procedures are, Dr Edward Morris, president of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, insisted: 'We want to send a clear message to healthcare professionals that neither practice has any place in the medical world and should not be carried out under any circumstances.
'We will inform the General Medical Council if we are made aware of anyone carrying out these procedures, so they can take the appropriate action.'
He continued: 'Women deserve to have ownership over their own sexual and reproductive health.'
The Government pushed forward with its decision to ban hymenoplasty, which is said to cause trauma and be ineffective in around 50% cases, when it comes to making women bleed.
Gillian Keegan, the minister for care and mental health, has said: 'I am committed to safeguarding vulnerable women and girls in this country. That’s why we are making virginity testing illegal and why we have taken another significant step to also ban hymenoplasty in the health and care bill.'
She went on to say: 'We will continue to work across government and with local communities and organisations to tackle the taboos and damaging preconceptions associated with virginity and a woman’s worth.'
For more information on hymenoplasty and the government's review of the procedure, click here.
Article originally published on 30/1/2018
Though you may have never heard the phrase the 'husband stitch', we're pretty sure you know what it is, whether from a very inappropriate joke from your father, or maybe even your own midwife.
It's the slightly archaic/sexist/delete as appropriate practice of adding an extra stitch designed to tighten the vagina, when sewing up either a perennial tear or cut from childbirth. Just the time you want a bit of invasive vaginal surgery...
Want to know more? A newly published investigation by Carrie Murphy for Healthline is currently sweeping Twitter for its in-depth look at this ethically dubious phenomena.
Murphy speaks to women who have had the husband stitch, with terrible consequences. One woman experienced five years of 'excruciating' pain during sex before she learnt that her own vagina had been sewn up too tight.
The US-based report suggests that, although the subject matter lacks scientific studies, the practice is far more common than we think.
Alongside medical issues that can occur as result of a husband stitch, there are obvious ethical and political problems - namely that women, at their most vulnerable, are being treated as sexual objects under medical care.
Healthline reports that Stephanie Tillman, CNM, a certified nurse midwife at the University of Illinois at Chicago said of the misogynistic practice:
The fact that there is even a practice called the husband stitch is a perfect example of the intersection of the objectification of women's bodies and healthcare. As much as we try to remove the sexualization of women from appropriate obstetric care, of course the patriarchy is going to find its way in there.
We reached out to a British midwife, who was appalled by the practice and has not come across it (bar some nervous jokes from new fathers) in her job. She said that 'women's rights in childbirth take precedence over everything', adding that there are steps women can take to avoid perenial tearing, including; pereneal massage from 34 weeks, pool births, a warm compress during birth, and birth positioning (standing, kneeling or on all fours being preferable to being on your back) .
However, the mother's genes (the levels of collagen naturally present in her skin contribute towards elasticity) and the specific birth experience are unavoidable elements that can cause tearing or a needed cut called an episiotomy.
She also suggests that women's birth partners be clued up on the proper process of the stitching, including the use of analgesia (a pain killer), and that they write a detailed and well-informed birth plan to avoid decisions being made at vulnerable moments.
We reached out to the UK's Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists for comment and will update accordingly.
Daisy Murray is the Digital Fashion Editor at ELLE UK, spotlighting emerging designers, sustainable shopping, and celebrity style. Since joining in 2016 as an editorial intern, Daisy has run the gamut of fashion journalism - interviewing Molly Goddard backstage at London Fashion Week, investigating the power of androgynous dressing and celebrating the joys of vintage shopping.
