Anatomy of a Vulva
As promised, I am prepared to give you more detail about the different parts of the vulva, below. It’s time to de-mystify a woman’s body! Here we go, from top to bottom (meaning from below the belly button to the opening of the vagina).
1. The mons pubis is the little mound of flesh on top of the pubic bone. It may or may not be covered with pubic hair, depending on whether the woman shaves or not.
2. The flesh of the mons pubis (pubic mound in Latin) splits in two to form the outer labia, the folds of skin and fatty tissue that run along the outer edges of the vulva. These outer labia (or labia minora) often hide the rest of the vulva, which is perhaps one of the reasons female anatomy seems so mysterious at times. Sometimes people call the labia “lips”; labia means lips in Latin. The outer lips come in a variety of sizes and colors, depending on the particular woman and her skin color in general.
3. If the outer lips are gently parted, the inner labia (or labia minora) are exposed. These form the clitoral hood (“hood” of skin that covers the clitoris) at the top and extend down to the opening of the vagina, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves! The inner lips on some women extend outside of the outer lips, and this is one reason for the differences in appearance of different vulvas.
4. As mentioned above, the clitoral hood is the hood of skin that is formed by the top of the inner labia, before they part. When looking straight down at the clitoral hood, the clitoris is actually not visible, much like how the engine of a car is not visible if the hood is down.
5. If the clitoral hood is pulled up and back, the clitoral bulb or glans will be exposed. This is the highly sensitive tip of the clitoris that protrudes outside the woman’s body. It can be compared to the head of a man’s penis, although there are many more nerve endings in one tiny clitoral bulb than in the comparatively large head of a penis. It was previously thought that the entire clitoris was visible from the outside of the body. This is not at all true. Now we know, through research that the clitoris has “legs” that extend down and are inside the body. In fact, the amount of erectile tissue in an erect clitoris is approximately equivalent to that of a penis, believe it or not! We’ll talk more about the clitoris in my next blog about how to pleasure a woman through touching her vulva and the region around it.
6. Below the clitoris is the urethral opening. This is where both urine and female ejaculate come out. Yes, some women definitely do ejaculate, it’s not a myth and it’s not urine!
7. Below the urethral opening is the vaginal opening , and that brings us to the end of our vulva tour. ‘Nough said.
I realized this may all sound very clinical and non-sexy, so how about finishing off with something a little juicier? All of these parts make up the wonderland of pleasure that is a woman’s vulva. Why wouldn’t everyone want to be intimately familiar with all of them?