Humpday: Vegetables, Vaginas, And Why DIY Sex Toys Are Just A Baaaad Idea

In the spirit of everyone rushing to their local supermarket or corner shop to stock up on their festive vegetables for the big dinner next Monday, I was reminded of a tale of ecstatic laughter and overwhelming dumbfounded-ness from when I was at university a few years ago…

I lived with three other cisgender female flatmates in my last year, two of whom were Swedish. This has nothing to do with the fact they were Swedish, but one of the girls had particular traits that she knows are accustomed to Swedish cultural behaviours. Her bluntness and outspoken nature with sex was definitely one of them (and man, I loved it). I’m going to call her Trudy.

We were having our early Christmas meal as a flat before we all went back home for the holiday. Inevitably with four females in a room and a lot of wine, we began speaking about past sexual experiences. I'm going to stop right there and insert a TMI alert here. Because it really is, to some, heck even maybe to most, too much information.

Now Trudy was speaking about her childhood and how when she was in her teens she started to explore her sexuality and her body. Cool, ride on we said in unison. Until she revealed that the first time she tried the aforementioned exploring, a carrot was involved. But not just any carrot, a baby carrot. That accidentally went too far up and got stuck. 

She couldn't go to her parents, merely out of how mortifying the whole situation was. At this point, understandably, Trudy was in a fluster, and managed to take matters into her own hands with the help of a (hopefully spare) toothbrush.

Apart from the obvious laughter that erupted among our party and questions to her thought process as a sexual-curious teen, it got me thinking about other items that could be used as sex toys, and if it is genuinely thought amongst teens to use them to explore themselves. Turns out, after a quick Google search, that it's way more common than you'd think, even amongst adults.

The best story I found of veg-toys-gone-wrong was of a 55 year-old man in South Africa who had an 18-inch cassava vegetable removed from his anus in an hour-long operation after he tried to use it during private time. His poor, broken arsehole, no amount frozen peas could help with that pain.

Funny or not, please, please please, if exploration comes knocking and you don't want to go solo, stick to toys produced specifically for that purpose. I'd hate to hear of anyone going on that embarrassing trip to A&E and explaining what had happened to a doctor. As much as it'd be a story to tell the grandkids (or actually maybe don't), I don’t think it's worth the potential mental scarring on your side. Besides, vegetables belong on your dinner plate; I certainly wouldn’t want to shudder every time I sat down for a roast.