I haven’t been called for one for years and was dreading it. I’m 59, the first thing the nurse asked me was ‘are you on HRT?’ No, luckily never had any need to.
Painful doesn’t describe it - and all the way through she kept saying, ‘it’s because you’re not on HRT, even as she twisted the speculum trying to push it in further. At the end she said she didn’t know if she got anything so I might need to go back and get ‘opened up’. I actually had a little bleed afterwards 😦
Reader, I am not going back, ever.