u/parkerino24311

hi ladies, I just recently introduced a bike into my life. after fixing it up and taking a spin, I realized I have no idea what the proper body positioning is to ride a bike. I am also 5'4 with a short torso, which exacerbates the problem. I apologize if this question has been asked, when I searched the sub I only saw information about bike shorts!

the user's manual for my bike described that your knee should only be slightly bent with the pedal in the down-most position. when I adjust the seat to achieve this, I have a hard time touching the ground and getting on/off the bike. I also don't understand what part of my butt to put my weight on, the most natural position for me is to have all my weight on my vulva which I know isn't right. but when I try to support myself in other ways, I put too much weight on my handlebars, which affects steering/reaction times.

can anyone provide information or even photos/drawings of how you're supposed to distribute your weight and angle your hips? how much should I be bent over to reach the handles while on the saddle? I am autistic, so the more blunt and specific, the better! I ride a 24"" schwinn ranger mountain bike.

hey everyone. I have biked a lot in my life, but mostly as a kid on campgrounds or on trails with my parents. now I am an adult. I just brought my schwinn to my apartment, and not sure where to start. I don't have a helmet or a bike lock, I don't understand the rules of the road, et cetera. I mostly intend to use the bike to supplement public transportation, as I dont drive at all. i have some questions:

how important is wearing a helmet? how cheap can I go without compromising safety?

how do I find out the bike laws where I live? my apartment is in a township, and the public transport is in a city nearby. is there an agency that would publish this stuff? can I get a ticket on my bike if I (not intentionally) break the law?

how do I know when it's appropriate to ride on the sidewalk versus the road? we have some bike lanes in the city, but not everywhere, and not always clearly marked. I know drivers hate bikers, but pedestrians seem to hate bikers too.

are there any books or magazines that address common bike mechanical problems, kind of a reference book to keep on hand?

basket recommendations, so I can transport my purse/laptop/backpack without killing my back?

I am pretty nervous since I'm autistic and a lot of rules are based on intuition that I don't have (like the sidewalk thing). I just want to get around the city a little faster without adding a ton of hassle to my life.

hi, I am posting because this incident has really upset me for years and I'm not even sure it was traumatic. mild TW for possible CSA.

when I was a kid at the doctor's, she needed to look under my underwear briefly at every annual visit. I was told this was to make sure everything was appropriately developing, and later to make sure I wasn't being abused. as an adult, it seems incredibly naive and/or uneducated to think she could assess any problem simply visually (endo, yeast infection are not diagnosed this way for example). i hated these checks and would feel off the rest of the day, especially if I had to go back to school afterwards or be in public. (a larger part of my trauma history has to do with feeling like "everyone can see down there" if one person saw, even an "appropriate" person like a doctor, and this made me sick to my stomach upset). when I was 13, on the way to the appointment I talked to my mom about really disliking this part of the exam and if we could skip it. she explained that doctor needs to make sure i'm not being hurt by anyone, but agrees I'm old enough to decide.

we get there, get to that part of the exam, and I told the doctor I didn't feel comfortable and wanted to skip it. she explained that she *needed* to do it, it's for my safety, et cetera. I look at my mom, she agrees with doctor (it's so weird with her, she's technically abusive but usually on my side with stuff like this). I had to submit to the humiliating exam. I was too young to understand I had other options like refusing or leaving.

the next year, I told the nurse I absolutely did not want to do that part of the exam. by that time I had gotten my period. she said they don't check there anymore once you have your period. that made the whole thing even worse, I had so much shame over starting my period "late" at 14 (at least 2 years older than any of my friends were when they got it), if it had just come "on time" my no would have been listened to. I also felt like, I'm still a young kid, you're not concerned about sexual abuse anymore just because I got my period? how does a period change what my doctor is able to visibly assess?

I have since had all kinds of trouble with doctors, I hate going but my mother is a worry wart who worked for a hospital so we saw a doctor for absolutely anything and everything. we had a huge fight last year because I dared to question gynecology (was due for a pap after an extremely traumatic gyn visit at 17). I am now 23, have gone through my first traumatizing and painful pap smear, and discovered this sub where I found out I don't fucking ever have to let a doctor do anything i'm not comfortable with.

my assumption is that the checks were actually supposed to prepare me to go to the gynecologist as an adult. however, they were degrading, exposing, always done with my mother in the room (she couldn't see anything due to positioning, but still). I have never told this story before so I'm hoping someone can validate my experience and/or tell me if these checks are a normal part of a pediatric physical. I would also love to know if there are resources for how often I "actually" need a pap done. I know some others in this sub refuse them altogether, but I feel I have enough risk factors that i need to get them done, but i'm not sure what is pro-gyno propaganda and not.

also, whether or not these visual checks were normal, I would love to know why doctors do them. often things don't bother me as much if I can understand why. again, I'm not sure what she could visibly see as far as illness, and while some abuse is of course visible, it isn't always. i can only imagine that kids who are being severely abused are traumatized further by this kind of exam. plus, I actually was molested while seeing this doctor, never told anyone, and she obviously couldn't tell by looking that that had happened, so it just compounded the trauma.