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T owards the finish of final year, I published an essay about my vulva – in a volume, and so in the Guardian. At 25, I'd spent years considering labiaplasty and having sex activity with the lights off, considering of things ignorant boys had said, as well as some of my friends. I felt a deep sense of shame well-nigh my body, which over fourth dimension became crippling.

Information technology's this shame that photographer Laura Dodsworth is aiming to overcome with her latest project, Womanhood. In a book and accompanying motion-picture show for Channel 4, she tells the stories of 100 women and gender non-conforming people through portraits of their vulvas. Information technology's the third instalment in a series: in Blank Reality and Manhood, Dodsworth photographed and talked to people near their breasts and their penises, respectively (both stories featured in Weekend magazine). The photographer has described the series as an "unexpected triptych"; she didn't know the project would take this direction at the kickoff (and, when it was showtime suggested to her, she didn't desire information technology to). Simply the more than she thought about photographing women's vulvas, the more necessary she felt information technology was.

"I'd been because this idea, merely kept pushing information technology away," she tells me. "And then there were 3 things I read in a couple of months. Ane was about female genital mutilation. When I read about women effectually the world having FGM, I felt ill." She read a news story about girls as immature equally 9 asking UK doctors for labiaplasty. Then at that place was a description in a wellness leaflet of the vagina equally a "forepart pigsty" – language she felt was inaccurate and harmful. Finally, Dodsworth wanted to move on from the penis project, which had seen her hailed as a champion for men: "How am I, a card-conveying feminist, a champion for penises, just not women and vulvas?"

Photographs: Laura Dodsworth

Vulvas are rarely seen outside porn and childbirth, which Dodsworth puts down partly to their position on the body. "Cocks are correct there at the front end. They are visible, whereas vulvas aren't. If you're a straight woman, you don't see many." And, equally she writes in her volume, they're not easy to look at: "Let'southward be honest, it'due south tricky to witness our vulvas for ourselves, legs awkwardly astride pocket mirrors, bums shuffled up close to full-length mirrors, or taking a selfie with the unflattering lens of a smartphone."

It'southward besides a function of the torso we know relatively little about – historically, in that location has been a lack of scientific understanding; about the clitoris, most orgasms, sexual pleasure. Meanwhile there is a pervasive squeamishness most vulvas, which may be one factor behind the fact that, in England, cervical smear test rates are at their everyman for two decades. This gap in cognition may too exist responsible for the growing numbers of people who undergo labiaplasty: according to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, in that location was a 40% increment in procedures in the US between 2015 and 2016.

Dodsworth's vulva shoots were a very different feel from Manhood. For many women, beingness photographed was the first time they had looked at this part of their body in close particular. "I feel like men were revealing themselves to a woman, in a sympathetic space," Dodsworth says. "This time, women were revealing themselves to themselves. Some women were shaking, asking me if they were normal."

Laura Dodsworth, whose own vulva appears among her portraits. Photograph: Paula Beetlestone/Channel 4

Dodsworth had worried that information technology would exist bad-mannered to exist in such an intimate situation with her subjects. She writes that she needed to overcome her "'good girl' socialisation and internal self-censorship". In fact, she found the experience liberating – posing for her own portrait, too. "I couldn't ask people to do annihilation I wouldn't practise myself," she tells me. "So I'yard in it. And I remember when I took my photograph and I put it up on my Mac screen, I just thought, 'Wow, there is a lot going on there.' I remember looking at my episiotomy scar and information technology looked tiny. In my head, when I touch information technology, it feels huge – because I was holding on to huge memories of a traumatic nascency."

The stories told in Womanhood are vast (even if in that location are few people of colour included, which Dodsworth puts down, in role, to cultural taboos, as participants self-selected). The pages are filled with people of all ages and sexual orientations, speaking honestly about key life experiences. "The vulva is oftentimes seen just as a site of sexual practice," she says. "But we talked about and then many areas that aren't 'sexy' – periods, menopause, infertility, miscarriage, ballgame, pregnancy, birth, cancer." In this sense, she saw herself as a "kind of midwife, helping women to birth their own stories".

The vulva stories Dodsworth has collected fabricated me express joy and cry, moved by the openness with which each person talks about sexual liberation, grief, loss, abuse and everything in between. But I first opened the book while on a train, and found myself skimming past the photographs then that commuters looking over my shoulder would not encounter.

The very fact that vulvas experience so controversial to look at underlines the power of the project. Would my attitude to my body be unlike if I'd read this book every bit an adolescent? There is a spread of shapes, sizes and pubic pilus that you don't see in pornography, or in any mainstream context. Information technology goes some way towards showing there's no "normal" or "abnormal", merely a never-ending list of variables.

Photographs: Laura Dodsworth

I enquire Dodsworth if it feels right to telephone call a project well-nigh vulvas Womanhood, since information technology implies that sex equals gender. She tells me that none of her projects is a manifesto, or a dictionary definition of what it means to be a human or a woman. "It's a chorus of voices. Even so, body parts play a very definitive part of what it is to exist a man or a woman."

She says the project has had a profound impact on her ain life. "People started to encounter me a little differently," she writes in the book. "Unexpected offers, eyes opened – my own explorations took me on new sexual and emotional adventures. I am approaching perimenopause, merely at the tipping point when society might deem me past my best, yet I experience freer, happier, more sexually strong, more than in my prime number, than ever before."

Dodsworth's book and film get in at a time when the vulva appears to be having a cultural moment. Next month sees the publication of Lynn Enright's book Vagina: A Re-education, and live events that aim to repossess the trunk are increasingly popular – from body-positive life-drawing classes to "pussy-gazing workshops". Meanwhile, campaigns such as Encarmine Good Catamenia target menses poverty while encouraging young people to shake off any shame nearly menstruum.

Are nosotros about to see a shift in what people call back looks "normal"? Dodsworth thinks so. "Things rise up in the commonage consciousness at the same time. It'southward partly in the wake of #MeToo. I think it is so long overdue that nosotros repossess our bodies and our stories. Right at present seems to be the time."

Interview past Liv Lilliputian, editor-in-chief of gal-dem. Womanhood: The Bare Reality is published by Pinter & Martin on 21 February; 100 Vaginas will air on Channel iv on 19 Feb.

'Women are taught to fear their bodies': 51, five children

'Black female bodies have been politicised and fetishised.' Photographs: Laura Dodsworth

I'k a doula; I back up women through pregnancy, childbirth and postnatally. I've spent a lot of time looking at vulvas and watching them open up as babies come up out. I recollect society tries to affright women by talking about our vaginas and our vulvas as though terrible traumas happen to them. I'm not just talking about abuse, but also birth – we talk well-nigh information technology with such frightening linguistic communication. If you scare a adult female about the style her vulva won't open up, then how will she trust information technology to open? It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I find birth incredible, fifty-fifty subsequently all these years. Every time is an awe-inspiring moment, watching a woman'southward inner goddess come out, however she births, whatever the situation. I discovered my vulva afterward I got into birth work. I recollect my vagina is magical and powerful now.

I'1000 affair-of-fact most myself and my body. I don't purchase into other people'southward ideas every bit to how I should view my trunk. I'k 51, I'm a blackness adult female and I alive in a world that denigrates everything about my own personal dazzler, except for when it's trendy to like information technology. If a white adult female were to wear and do the things that I do, it would be edgy and urban and heady; but with me, information technology's synonymous with fetishism and eroticism. I don't similar it. Black female person bodies have been politicised, eroticised and fetishised. It'due south difficult for usa to ain and love our bodies, because our bodies haven't belonged to us for the longest fourth dimension.

There are two pleasance spots. My mind is a fertile field. I beloved erotica, but I find it gets boring because there aren't many black women in it. There'south a song with the line, "Oh I love your dark-brown pare, I don't know where mine ends, I don't know where yours begins." I had a white boyfriend who really liked the differences in our skin tones; he liked seeing my brownish skin against his white skin. That brought me no peace or joy. It made me really want a black lover. Of course, you know what will happen at present – I'm going to meet the most amazing, incredible white guy so have to apologise for this story.

I hope in that location's practiced sex after the menopause. I retrieve there will be more liberty. We live in a time when women live much longer and menopause is coming up more in the conversation. If skillful sex activity comes my way, then I'm going to enjoy every moment of it, whether I'grand 51 or 91.

'My vulva reminds me of a pink cupcake': 28, no children

'The little mole looks similar a chocolate scrap.' Photographs: Laura Dodsworth

My vulva reminds me of a pinkish cupcake. The labia and clitoris expect similar layers of piped pink icing. The picayune mole to the left of my labia reminds me of a chocolate flake that's simply been popped on the top. When nosotros're having sexual practice, I savour the imagery of the penis being a pocketknife that is cutting into the layers of the rose velvet.

When I was 24, I noticed that I bled a lot between periods, and also after sex with my then boyfriend. I went to the md, and although I was too immature for a smear test, she did 1 anyway. She didn't even need to look for the results. I was sent to the hospital and ii weeks later on it was confirmed it was cancer.

It's actually hard to put those feelings into words. Information technology was almost like I was watching a film of my own life. I was in that location, and hearing what the consultant was saying, but not present at all, and I felt hot, sweaty, shaky. I was so glad that I went to the doctor with those symptoms, because I wasn't in pain: it was merely blood. I could take ignored information technology. I had a stage 1B grade iii, which is modest just nasty. Thankfully it was caught early. I had my neck removed, the surrounding tissue surface area and the height third of my vagina and, give thanks God, didn't need farther treatment, similar chemotherapy.

It took a long fourth dimension for me to like my body once more, because it did modify. Y'all can't really do much action for a while, and yous put on weight. I can withal go pregnant, but because there'southward no neck there'due south a loftier hazard of miscarriage or early birth. If I cull to have children, I'll have to accept a caesarean at well-nigh 36 weeks.

At that place's a lot of stigma around having a gynaecological disease. Somebody at my old job asked what kind of cancer I had, and when I said cervical, she said, "Oh, how do you get that?" You wouldn't ask the same if I'd said chest, bowel, or brain. There'south an supposition that you've washed something incorrect, that y'all've slept with a lot of people. It is a cancer that'southward associated with sex, as in most cases yous get it from the HPV virus, which is transmitted through sexual contact.

I feel a bit cleaved as a adult female, because nosotros're supposed to carry babies. And I'm besides cleaved in the pleasance way, because I take a shorter vagina now. I felt angry that the office of my trunk which defines a lot of women, and is central to women's identity, had done a number on me at such a young age. Information technology took a long time for me to forgive my torso. I don't know if I accept, to be honest.

'Your vulva goes south, besides': 77, ii children

'In the 70s, we'd do self-examinations in the church hall.' Photographs: Laura Dodsworth

I was incredibly nervous about having a photograph taken. I'grand onetime and my body has changed. My legs, my face, my hands, I tin see those changes, simply I don't meet the changes in my vagina all the fourth dimension. It didn't look as bad every bit I thought it would.

This little vulva is 77 years old now, and so it's gone through rather a lot. The ageing process is interesting, because people talk about your trunk going s and they hateful your breasts, face and stomach, but of grade your vulva goes south, likewise. I miss having tight curly pubic hair. I'm not quite sure why, merely it becomes wispier as y'all age.

When I finished the menopause I didn't terminate desiring sex activity, I didn't stop wanting orgasms. At that place is something magical about making love with someone else, but it's lovely to be secure in the knowledge that y'all tin pleasure yourself. I'k quite orgasm-oriented.

In the 1970s, I was part of the women's liberation motility. We had small groups all over the country. We talked about everything: childbirth, sex, men, kids. We said the personal is political, and nosotros tried to connect up our experiences in different means. 1 of the things nosotros did was to run into in church halls, and places similar that, and hold a whole day's workshop about women's health. We learned how to do a cocky-test. Nosotros'd take turns getting upwards on a table, with a mirror and torch, and apply a plastic speculum, not a cold, horrible metal one, and nosotros would look at our own cervix. The showtime time I saw my neck I idea, "Oh my God, this is me – this is inside me."

One time we'd washed it, we felt elated. It was absolutely amazing to take control of our bodies. We saw the variations in labia and inside vaginas, the ways in which we were incredibly different, and nonetheless had something in mutual, besides.

I decided to become sterilised when I was in my 30s, after I'd had 2 kids. To my amazement, I was told I needed my husband's permission. I told them they had to be joking, only the doctors insisted. I knew enough most the law, and I told them I refused to go my husband's permission. I got my sterilisation.

There take been a lot of changes during my lifetime in regard to vaginas and how women experience almost them. Some good changes and some of them, unfortunately, going backwards. When I became a lesbian, the word cunt actually came into its own for me. Women use it in a very sexual, heady and comforting mode.

'The doctor said labiaplasty would definitely help me': thirty, one child

'Now there'south nada there, I experience happier.' Photographs: Laura Dodsworth

When I masturbated when I was younger I used to hate it when my clitoris got bigger – I idea it looked like a penis. I felt very cocky-conscious. I idea my labia were too big equally well. I fifty-fifty questioned if I had half male and half female parts.

I didn't talk to anyone nearly these fears. I had to be drunk to take sex activity; I was drunk my beginning time. I didn't fifty-fifty know that I'd washed information technology until the next morning, when he said I had to become the morn-after pill. From that time on, I always just let partners exercise what they wanted, merely I never permit everyone pleasure me.

I thought the area of the vagina should look like the ones that I'd seen in porn on the net, and they looked the exact polar opposite to mine. Porn made me experience bad in all sorts of ways: my weight, my boobs, my vagina.

I watched a documentary that talked nigh porn stars who were having operations to make their labia smaller. I realised it was something you lot could have done and I went to my GP and had a scrap of a breakup. I recollect information technology was a really low day. The consultant I saw said that labiaplasty would definitely help me, but information technology wouldn't be washed on the NHS. He referred me to a private doctor. That convinced me that I needed it. Earlier the process, they gave me some numbing cream. I was awake throughout. He injected anaesthetic into the labia and up into my lesser and then simply sliced abroad. I lay at that place thinking how much better my life would exist after. In reality, my labia were probably quite small pieces of skin, merely to me they felt similar big elephant'southward ears.

My recovery was horrific. I thought I'd have a week off piece of work and I ended upward needing two. It was so bloated, I couldn't walk.

Now, I feel a lot more than comfortable day to day, sitting down, crossing my legs in jeans, the type of underwear that I can wear. My labia used to be saggy, wrinkly, brownish, hanging bits of skin. At present there'south cipher there and I feel cleaner. I feel happier.

I still wish I could exist more than confident and powerful. I'g trying to terminate worrying about what other people think of me. I desire to detect out who the real me is, because I all the same don't know at xxx.

'It'due south definitely not going to look similar a porn star'southward': 31, no children

'We don't even talk about our fannies.' Photographs: Laura Dodsworth

I've never looked at a photo of my vulva – I've never even looked with a mirror. I'm a bit nervous that I might be grossed out. Maybe I'thousand worried about what my partner sees.

I really wanted to do this. All the same in that moment, when I considered looking at my photo, I thought, "Information technology's definitely non going to look like a porn star's fanny." I'thousand a feminist and an activist and yet my first idea is that I won't accept the kind of pristine fanny that everybody is used to. I've actively campaigned against FGM for the last 10 years, in various capacities. 1 of the things I do is talk most how women don't look at their fannies; nosotros don't fifty-fifty talk about our fannies. I've talked about some really, really personal things with close friends, but not that.

I was built-in into a Muslim Pakistani family unit. I am no longer a Muslim and I don't tell people that I am Pakistani, only I am. One turning betoken for me was the sexual violence stuff – your husband tin can accept sex with you if he wants to. If yous refuse, there are teachings that say the angels will curse y'all all dark. As a devout Muslim, when I was first reading that, it was quite a scary idea. Now I have no interaction with the community that I'm from; I can take part in this project because it is anonymous. There are ii things that my family unit don't know about me that would push them over the edge. One, that I've had sex, and two, that I eat pork.

I'one thousand in a very, very privileged position. It's taken me ten years to get myself into a safety situation where I can do and say whatever I desire. "Accolade" killings notwithstanding happen, even here in Britain. I marched at Pride and I was decorated with body pigment and had my tits out quite openly. At that place were objections, even though there were men in Borat-style mankinis, men in fetish animal costumes, men with their nipples out. None of that was a problem, but the odd female nipple hither and there – maybe information technology'due south why there are a lot fewer women at Pride than men. The threshold for nudity is supposed to be what yous would wear on the beach. Women'southward bodies should not exist seen as more offensive than men'southward.

'#MeToo made me speak out about a celebrity': 41, two children

'For ages subsequently, I had flashbacks.' Photographs: Laura Dodsworth

At fifteen I had an early sexual experience that I now run into as potentially harmful to my human relationship with sex. My swain was 18 and seemed very experienced, and I was afraid that if I didn't have sex with him, I would lose him. I kind of had an out-of-body feel – I remember looking down and seeing a very flat, nonetheless me.

When I was 19, I met a 34-year-old celebrity who came on to me. I was in awe that a celebrity would discover me attractive. Quite early into the evening I realised what an idiot he was and then, scarily, that his mate wasn't going to go away. Merely I went along with it because I'd put myself in a crazy, vulnerable position. I "consented", but the night was just degrading – taking it in turns between the three of us.

I left in the morning and then completely rewrote everything. I saw my friend and said I'd had a lovely dark. I connected to stay in contact with this celebrity, considering I got a petty fizz out of him still wanting me, until I saw him 1 more than time. This fourth dimension was really horrible.

We were in a room, merely with people coming and going. Nosotros only sat next to each other, catching upward. He put his hand at the back of my head and forced me to give him a blow task. It was cut short as someone else entered the room. I never mentioned that incident to anyone.

Later I had inklings from the media that this guy had gone on to have relationships with younger girls. I never felt I could come forrad with my story because I had told whatsoever friend that would listen that I had had great sex with him.

The #MeToo motion was hugely influential. I saw this guy's name come upward. I thought, "Peradventure my story could assist others." So I went to the law, maxim, "It'southward a very small piece of a jigsaw puzzle, but this is what happened."

I'one thousand finally going to counselling and hope to unpick how it's affected me. I wonder if at 15 the deal was done, with me going, "Right, this guy only wants experienced girls who know what they're doing. I shall be that daughter." I've always liked sex activity with the lights on, eyes open, considering for ages afterward those bad experiences I had flashbacks.

I admitted to my husband six months ago, subsequently telling him these stories, that I don't call back I've ever had an orgasm. He's been very understanding. I've got close several times. It feels like I reach the crest of a wave and and then it chop-chop goes away. I exercise get great pleasance through sex, and relish the intimacy. I'm notwithstanding struggling with pleasure, just right now my "foof" and I are friends, we're happy, and things are getting better.

'Sexual practice as a homo was confusing. Sex as a adult female makes sense': 38

'My vulva's not perfect, but it doesn't need to exist.' Photographs: Laura Dodsworth

When I was eight, I came to the realisation that I should take been built-in a girl. I grew upwards in quite a macho town and went to a Cosmic schoolhouse. There were very regimented, strict ideas near what it was to be a man and a woman. It was not a great environment for a male child to realise he should be a girl. I couldn't tell anybody.

Puberty was a problem. My penis wouldn't exit me solitary, information technology needed constant attention. It needed to be relieved, so yep, I kind of had to masturbate. It wouldn't allow me not. My teens were drug-fuelled. I don't really remember a not bad deal almost those years.

When I was 22, I contacted the doc to brand a referral to the gender clinic. There was a lot going on in my life at the time, so I went back when I was 28. I had the psych evaluations and a diagnosis. I went ahead with the operation when I was 31.

I was excited earlier the big day. I had a penile conversion. They take pare off the penis, and they use the nerves that run forth the shaft to make the clitoris. The whole thing gets sewn upwardly, inverted and they make a space, between the prostate and the anus, so it'southward in in that location. The testicles become, and they utilise the scrotum peel to make the labia.

The first fourth dimension I had sex afterward the surgery was surprisingly skillful. I enjoyed it. Sex as a man could be fun, but ultimately it was disruptive. Sex activity as a woman makes so much more sense. My vagina is only as sensitive as the penis before it. Masturbation likewise makes more than sense now. I feel relief after an orgasm, rather than confusion.

I think my vulva looks practiced. It's not perfect, but it doesn't need to be. I similar it. Every bit far as I'1000 concerned information technology'due south better than what was at that place before. They've done a sterling task.

Let'due south be up front about this: I don't have a vagina. I would draw mine as a neo-vagina. I'm not a real woman. I'd take loved to accept been one, merely that didn't happen for me and I have to brand do. I tin can't claim womanhood. I have a different body to women, I have dissimilar biology, dissimilar needs, I grew up differently. I don't think it should be something to feel embarrassed or shamed well-nigh. I'm a transwoman, and that'south fine by me.

I didn't have a girlhood, I wasn't socialised equally a girl. I have some similar experiences to other women. I deal with everyday, coincidental sexism now. The world can be a challenging identify for a woman, but I'chiliad certainly far more comfortable in it now, equally a transwoman, and tin can contribute more I could as a human.

'My 30s were centred on having kids, and losing them': 40, two children

'Having sex after you've had stitches is scary.' Photographs: Laura Dodsworth

When I was younger, I didn't call back a lot about what existence a adult female was. I was too busy enjoying myself. I spent a lot of fourth dimension trying not to get pregnant, then from the historic period of 30 it flipped. Then information technology was about staying pregnant, having a infant, then breastfeeding. All of that really made me sympathise what information technology was to exist a woman compared to being a homo. Because it's all on you. Your partner tin support yous, but other than the initial sex, all the rest of it is up to yous and your trunk.

My entire 30s were centred around having kids, breastfeeding them and losing them. In between my son and my daughter I had two miscarriages. The first knocked me on my arse, to be honest. Before information technology happened, something didn't experience right, and so when I was 12 weeks I started bleeding. I should have gone to A&E earlier than I did; I ended up having to have a blood transfusion. The foetus had to exist manually removed.

I felt like the hurting gave me closure. I had a few weeks off work, and then information technology was all about getting pregnant again. It took us a yr, which was rough emotionally. I had another miscarriage at 10 weeks and that ane was completely on my own at home. It wasn't equally encarmine. I felt like I knew what was what at present, and in one case I'd passed information technology, I could tell it was over.

After the 2d miscarriage, nosotros decided to just accept we were supposed to have one kid, and to not use contraception but otherwise stop trying. Of course, I got significant immediately.

Both of my births were vaginal and pretty good. I think I've been quite lucky. Information technology'south a lot, isn't it, a baby coming out of yous? It's amazing to call back how much the vagina stretches.

Having sex after you've had stitches is scary. It took me a good few months to feel like it again. I was scared the showtime time. The fright probably fabricated me tense up, and it was sore, but fine after the first time. I noticed later having my son that the labia are less even and I have one dangly down chip like a pare tag, which might accept been caused by the tear. Just it doesn't bother me.

My vagina might be looser, but I would say that sex is better since having children. I'grand a lot more than comfortable with my body. I know what it is capable of, so I don't care about how it's inverse. If I'm on a beach in a bikini I feel OK, because I've got the body of a woman who has had two kids. Perchance pre-children I felt I had no excuse to be a fleck wobbly. Information technology's a shame I wasted and so much fourth dimension feeling like my body wasn't as good every bit information technology could exist. I would tell my younger self to be kinder.

This is an edited extract from Womanhood: The Bare Reality by Laura Dodsworth (Pinter & Martin, £20). You lot tin can order a copy for £xv from the guardian bookshop here, or call 0330 333 6846.

If yous would like a annotate on this piece to be considered for inclusion on Weekend magazine'south messages page in impress, please electronic mail weekend@theguardian.com, including your proper noun and address (non for publication).

• This commodity was amended on xiii Feb 2019 to remove some personal information.

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