Regine’s answer to “Dear Ms. Abel I am reading your book I married a lizard man and wanted to let you know that your ex…” > Likes and Comments

The thing that was truly problematic for me was when you had the woman discuss how a man can know she is pure. She told him she had a piece of flesh to show that she had never been penetrated before. 60% of women will not have any hymenal tissue by adulthood. Are those women impure? So if I can give leeway on her personal experience in a fictional depiction, that explanation of why something is there and what it’s for is untrue and harmful. It’s not there for the man to know a woman is inexperienced in fact there is no way of knowing or determining virginity definitively in all women. So she could have said there may be blood and pain, to prepare her alien husband, her saying there will be and describing the hymen that way was problematic.
Also he says he sees the hymen two inches inside. The hymen isn’t inside the vagina it on the lower outside edge. So the rest perhaps is ok for fiction, even though personally I am not comfortable with the fetishization of the hymen and his wearing the blood, that’s your creative license to do with how you will in your book. I hope I explained my issues with it well enough and thank you for the discussion.

Hi Kristina,

Thank you for the clarification. I see the point you are making. It is valid. I have no problem modifying her statement to reflect that not all women will still have a their hymen by the time they reach adulthood, even without penetration. I can see how the way it's currently worded could mislead into thinking it's the rule for everyone.

Ugh, the inches was actually a brain fart on my part. I know that it's right at the opening. I meant to write centimeters since it's usually located within 1-2 centimeters. I will definitely correct that.

So the intention isn't to fetishize the hymen in any way. She's highly uncomfortable with it. But he's an alien and has different ways of interpreting things.

Thank you very much for taking the time to explain what troubled you about the scene.

Thanks for listening. It’s just so prevalent to depict virginity as a bloody painful experience in romance and it’s honestly not that way for so many. I was afraid for my first time because if this and had no pain whatsoever, then I worried that I was abnormal, when in reality I a, part of a majority. . Speaking to many friend who also experienced no pain I researched that the pain and blood was often used by society to warn women away from sex. It was great that she did enjoy sex afterwards and you were able to have her overcome some of her own purity culture issues from her home planet. No romance ever seems to depict the painless, no blood way so if you ever want to write one like that 😃. Have a great day.

Regine, these comments are ridiculous... This is Fiction, if readers what something different I think they should read NON-Fiction... Just Keep Writing what you Write, PLEASE!

El himen es muy diferente en cada mujer, y tu Regine lo hiciste muy bien y como dices es un libro de ficción. Personalmente solo sangre un poco mi primera vez...🤷‍♀️