Amanda Bynes does a great shrill scream, and in the film “Easy A,” you can see her at her shriek-iest best when her character discovers that her boyfriend has a sexually transmitted infection.
_“Chlamydiaaaaa?!?!?”_ She bellows furiously about 58 minutes into the film, in a tone of terror that’s unable to accurately represent with mere question marks and exclamation marks (though maybe that screaming emoji could work).
It’s a great scene in a great movie, but I’d never given it much thought until one cold, rainy March morning when I was standing outside the Arts and Science building, a few days after I’d gone to the doctor for what I thought was a yeast infection. Now the nurse was calling me with the results from the STD test I’d flippantly decided to toss in while at the doctor’s. In that instant, I could clearly hear Amanda’s voice screeching in my head. It sounded a lot like my own voice.
_“Chlamydiaaaa?!?!?”_
The MU Student Health Center nurse on the other end sounded calm but sure. She paused, took a breath and then asked me when I could stop by to pick up the medication.
I wanted to puke. I felt like the most disgusting, trashy piece of vomit ever spewed upon the earth. How could I have chlamydia? I’d been sleeping with one guy. I’d made him use a condom every time. Hell, I’d _always_ used a condom, every time. I had been so _good_.
Shaking, I stalked down the sidewalk toward the Student Health Center, holding back tears. It was so unfair. I was the last person on earth who should have gotten an STI. I was the Rory Gilmore type, who had gotten good grades, who stayed away from dangerous Jess-esque guys in favor of the Deans of the world, who took her birth control pill religiously, and who’d even been vice president of her church youth group once.
The voice of Coach Carr, the unintended role model for sex education of our “Mean Girls”-obsessed generation, rang in my ear. _Don’t have sex…You will get chlamydia. And die._ I quietly, irrationally prepared to die.
Luckily, Coach Carr had it wrong, and I didn’t die. Instead, I picked up a little white paper bag from the Student Health Center that afternoon, swallowed the singular pill inside, went on studying for economics that night and then celebrated my birthday a few days later.
So having chlamydia, in hindsight, was laughably un-dramatic. It didn’t hurt (okay, yeah, things were itchy). The one-time pill I took was less expensive than a Plan B, and it wasn’t even a social-life-killing antibiotic.
The worst part was just facing myself in the mirror that night, wondering if maybe this all made me a five-star slutbag who didn’t deserve love or the pleasure of innocently watching “Easy A” ever again. According to the CDC, an estimated [2.86 million chlamydia infections occur annually, and 1 in 15 sexually active teenage girls have it](http://www.cdc.gov/std/chlamydia/STDFact-chlamydia-detailed.htm). I wish I’d known that. I also wish I hadn’t blamed my partner at first, even though he was older and supposed to be wiser and not too terrified, when I finally called him with the news, to be much comfort.
Obviously, having chlamydia will go straight to the list of “Things I Won’t Tell My Parents Until The Earth Disintegrates And Our Atoms Explode,” but luckily, having the most supportive friends — including the ones who cluelessly but good-heartedly asked if chicken soup would help — made me realize that having chlamydia didn’t make me any different of a person than having a cold did.
So, yes, having an STI was embarrassing. It made me acutely aware of all the free STD screenings on campus (because, just FYI, the Student Health Center is not exactly free lunch), and just generally way more cautious about penises. Which, you know, isn’t exactly a bad thing.
_Love,
Edna_
