PCOS AND THE ALTERATION OF FEMININITY IN CRYSTAL MALDONADO’S THE FALL OF WHIT RIVERA

Abstract

Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS) is a condition whose physical manifestations can place women in tension with socially established expectations of feminine appearance. In Crystal Maldonado’s The Fall of Whit Rivera, PCOS is represented not simply as a medical condition but as a site where femininity is institutionally and socially regulated. Through Whit Rivera’s encounters with weight-centred medical care, peer surveillance, and the shame attached to hirsutism, the novel reveals how thinness and hairlessness operate as disciplinary norms against which her body is measured. Drawing on Susan Bordo’s Feminist Body Theory, particularly her understanding of the body as a cultural text, the docile body, and the internalization of insufficiency, this article examines how medical authority and social judgement transform bodily differences associated with PCOS into perceived failures of femininity. It also considers the significance of Maldonado’s first-person narration, imagery, repetition, capitalization, metaphor and the representation of adolescent consciousness in exposing the emotional effects of these forms of bodily regulation. An intersectional reading   further demonstrates that Whit’s experience is shaped by the interaction of gender, age, Latina identity, family and class rather than by PCOS in isolation. At the same time Whit’s narration creates space for resistance as she begins to distinguish bodily difference from personal inadequacy and to question the standards against which her body is judged. The article argues that The Fall of Whit Rivera exposes the cultural and institutional mechanisms through which femininity is regulated while creating the possibility of understanding womanhood beyond bodily conformity. 

Key Words: Polycystic Ovary Syndrome, Female Body, Fatness, Hirsutism.