memes

Few of us would have been told that it can change with age, that some of us aren't born with one, or that it might totally disappear by the time we enter sexual maturity anyway. Or that a wide variety of activity can stretch or tear it, from exercise to masturbation to, yes, penetrative sex.

Emphasis mine, this is what I was taught in school

But this doesn't mean there's any validity to the idea that you can ascertain sexual activity with a hymen examination. One small study of 36 pregnant teenagers published in 2004, for example, found that medical staff were only able to make "definitive findings of penetration" in two cases. Another 2004 study found that 52% of sexually active adolescent girls interviewed had "no identifiable changes to the hymenal tissue". A binary idea that either we are sexually active and have no visible hymen, or that we aren't sexually active and do have one, is simply not accurate.

So TIL, it's not actually a membrane and is not guaranteed to tear at some point. Really interesting read, and definitely an example of how women's health research is just riddled with misinformation