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Dear Aunt Vadge,
I have a tear where the clitoral hood joins the labia. It looks different from the other side of the fold and hangs down a little from the skin fold. It’s fairly tiny, but it’s sore and burns after intercourse.
I thought it had healed after a week of no sex, but I looked again and it’s still not healed after three weeks. I’m underweight, 45, and a raw vegan. What should I do? Should I stop having sex until it’s fully healed?
Will I need stitches — do doctors stitch this area, or let it heal, since it’s small?
Thank you,
Unhealed
Age 45, California
Dear Unhealed,
A small split at the join of the clitoral hood and labia that’s still open, sore and burning after three weeks of no sex is past the point where it should have healed on its own — so a fissure that won’t close deserves a proper look, and the first and most important step is to see your doctor or, better, a vulval clinic for an examination.
At 45, a non-healing fissure there should be checked specifically for a vulval skin condition such as lichen sclerosus or lichen planus, which thin and weaken the skin so it splits and heals slowly, and which are easily missed but very treatable once diagnosed.
To your direct questions: a split this small is almost never stitched — it’s far too tiny and in tissue that’s left to heal naturally — so this isn’t about stitches, it’s about finding why it isn’t healing. And yes, keep avoiding intercourse until it’s healed, because friction just reopens it.
The other piece you’ve flagged yourself is important.
Being underweight and on a strict raw-vegan diet can really leave you short of the building blocks your body needs to repair skin — particularly enough protein, zinc, iron, vitamin B12 and the fats we need to make hormones — and poor wound healing is one of the classic signs of running low on these.
Heading into your late 40s, with hormonal shifts already starting to thin the tissue, that nutritional margin matters even more.
So alongside getting the area examined, it’s well worth looking honestly at whether your diet is meeting your needs; a doctor or dietitian can check for deficiencies with a simple blood test and help you fill the gaps, and you’ll likely heal better and feel better generally for it.
In short: get the fissure properly examined (it shouldn’t still be open), and address the nutrition, because both are probably part of why it isn’t healing.
Warmest regards,
Aunt Vadge
This is general information based on current research and our clinical experience, not a substitute for personalised medical advice.
