This is NOT politics.

[tblue]

17. Ok. I had that probe twice before.

For me, it was a cancer screening, but the procedure and prep for it are the same. It's not quick and it's not easy.

First you have to make an appt at a specialist who has the right equipment if your gyno does not. Then, one hour and 15 minutes before your appt, you have to drink 32 ounces of water and finish it one hour before your appt. You are not allowed to pee until well into the exam. So you're driving, parking, checking in, and sitting in the waiting room, while trying so hard not to wet yourself. The first time I had this screening, I had to hold it an extra 30+ minutes while waiting for my name to be called.

Eventually you're put in the exam room and told to take off your clothes and put on a drape. Then the technician pours cold jelly on your belly and rubs that probe thing (like the one you pictured) all over you, stopping to take pictures about every 30 seconds. My gosh. You just hope you can hold it.

Then s/he puts that thing inside your thang and moves it left, right, up, down, repeat, again stopping to take pictures. So far you've been there a good 15 minutes, but the "urge" makes it feel like forever.

Finally, mercifully, the technician lets you go to the bathroom. Then back you go up on the exam table and s/he probes you all over again. The exam doesn't hurt, but it's no picnic either. You don't feel relieved until you're out of there.

For a cancer test, it's not horrible, even if it's physically distressing. You hate the test but at least nobody forced you to have it. You (might) choose do it because your health could depend on it. (The operative word here is "choose.&quot

But to go through all that for no medical purpose is, IMHO, just crazy. It's a huge waste of time and resources. We're talking at least a couple hours away from work, and these tests are not cheap! And to do it only because of some LAW that some politicians in Washington cooked up would feel to me like an absolute violation. It's an invasion of your body. (It is your body, right?) It's also an assault on your autonomy and your privacy and your emotional wellbeing.

So your gyno, to avoid breaking the law, would have to tell the government what you're doing with your pregnant body. How else could the government force you to endure that test?

Why don't those pols just come out and say getting knocked up makes you government property? You're no longer an adult--you're a pregnancy! Not that they give a damn about your baby or how it makes it to term. They just want you to pay, I suspect, for the shame you deserve for being a sexually active woman.

Well I say NO! NO NO NO NO NO! The whole thing is just freaking wrong! I've been there, done that, so I know it is a horrible thing to do to a woman if it's against her will.