Two more menstruation stories plus an - uh - interesting photo!

Here are a couple of stories from younger women.  I think they're around 21 or so.  I notice that these two seemed to have an easier time sharing with their mothers than we older women did.  I hope that means we're making progress!

This is really cool.  I've heard so many different stories of first
periods from friends, it's an event that I think every woman
distinctly remembers!
My first wasn't as bad as the scene in the movie 'Carrie' but I think
it was still kind of horrible.
 
My family really likes to camp, so when I was twelve we went camping
in the summer.  I think it was in southern Illinois but I'm not sure.
We spent a wonderful couple of days hiking and reading and playing
bluegrass music, which I was embarrassed of, at that age.  Then one
day I started to feel sick.  It was really hot and I was dizzy and
achy.  I remember stumbling out of the tent and walking to the
outhouse with the sensation of blacking out - my mom and I get low
blood sugar so I figured that was why.  My parents didn't notice
because they were playing music with another couple.  I went inside
the stall and sat there for maybe ten minutes not sure if I would
throw up.  Sweating, dizzy, etc.  Then I noticed a weird brown
stickiness in my underpants.  My mom had told me many times about
periods.  I knew what to expect - red blood.  This was not that.  I
freaked out but thought maybe it's ok and she just didn't mention it
before.  So after another ten minutes and trying to deal with it with
toilet paper, I staggered out of the bathroom, over to my parents.
They were still playing bluegrass.  'Mom,' I said sickly, 'hey, can I
talk to you?'. She smiled and said brightly 'Sure!  This is our
daughter Sally.  Sally, these are some nice people who have been
playing music with us!  Why don't you get your fiddle?'. I gritted my
teeth.  'Can I talk to you alone?'. I finally pulled her away and told
her of my problem.  She was overjoyed, despite my pain.  My parents
were quite proud of the fact that I was now a woman.  However we
didn't have any supplies because my mom had just finished her cycle.
So I made do with toilet paper until we could drive the twenty miles
to the nearest drugstore.  Thus began a long struggle between the
monthlies and me.  Later that year, I had a period that lasted twenty
days and bled through two pads and a pair of pants onto a chair in the
school library, and for which I had to be put on the contraceptive
pill in seventh grade to make my cycles more regular, but that's
another story... Now we're cool though!  It's pretty regular and my
diva cup means I never have to think about it.

And a story from a second young woman:

I was fourteen so I had been hoping for my period for a while. My friends always said I was lucky when I told them I hadn't gotten it yet, but being in high school without having it felt weird, and I was ready to look older; I was often mistaken for an eleven or twelve year old.

I woke up one day at my dad's house and saw what I knew must be my period from what my mom had told me. I didn't feel like telling my dad or stepmom right then so I made do with toilet paper on the way to school and then bought a pad from a machine in the bathroom. I felt so self-conscious buying the pad, which seems really silly now. On the drive home from school with my mom I told her that I had gotten it. She was excited, which was nice, but I didn't really feel like talking about it more than to acknowledge it. Later we went out to lunch and she bought me a pair of earrings to commemorate my entrance into womanhood. I had been waiting for so long that I just remember feeling relieved, and I'd heard all of my friends talking about it as well as having received instruction from my mom and my school so I had a pretty good idea of how everything worked. It was a positive experience but really not a big deal - just the start of something I had known was coming for a long time.

And, sorry - I found this picture while I was looking for the previous two pictures and just couldn't keep from sharing it!   It's quite creative if a bit gross!

More stories about starting to menstruate

I've gotten some wonderful emails as follow ups to my question about how it was for you to start your period.  Thank you to all of you who responded.

I think I'm noticing a bit of a shift from my generation to younger women.  The four people who are around my age who responded seemed to have suffered from intense embarrassment and shyness.  Those 30 and younger who've responded didn't have any huge reaction to it - it was more normal and fine.

That speaks well, I think, to the increased comfort we're having with our bodies, and perhaps our own experiences are helping us do it better with our own daughters?  I like to think that's true.

I believe this is a rich topic, and I'd be delighted if any others of you felt moved to share your stories with me.  Thanks.

Below are a couple of more stories I received.  I'll post more tomorrow as well.  Thanks for reading, and thanks for sharing!

This 30-something woman posted her story as a comment on this blog, but I wanted to make sure it got a wider audience, so here it is:

You know what's funny about my first period? How easy it was to tell my mom! It's interesting to realize this, because it highlights for me in a new way how separate the physiology piece was from the sexuality piece in my family. Talking about my developing uterus? Easy. Talking about the development of me as a sexual, sensual being? No way in hell.

My mom was a childbirth instructor in the '70s and a natural birth proponent. Pregnancy and birth were everyday topics in our home and eventually I witnessed the births of my three youngest siblings. I can remember being three or four and seeing my mom change her sanitary napkins, and she explained what they were to me. My preadolescence was spent desperately wishing for breasts and my period.

When my period actually came for the first time, at 13, almost 14 years old, it was just one or two brownish spots on my underwear at the end of a beach trip. I remember being in one public restroom stall with my mom in the next, and telling her through the wall that I thought maybe this was my period (I was surprised, I had expected it to be heavier the first time), and that I needed her to buy me some pads. She was pretty matter-of-fact about it. Not congratulatory, not embarassed.

A month or so later when my first "real" period started, heavy and crampy, I was equipped with thick pillowy pads. I waited for the bus on the first day of my high school career with this mattress between my legs, feeling crinkly and certain that everybody could hear it or smell it or see the way I walked. I didn't comment on those worries to my mom, who was at the bus stop with me. They seemed more personal, less physiological.

This woman is closer to my age (around 50, I believe).  Her story is closer to mine, emotionally.

I was 11. I had seen The Film with my 5th grade class. Toward the end of The Film, I raised my hand to ask, "Does this happen to everybody?" The Lady leading the discussion said, "Well, pretty much. Every once in awhile, there's a girl whose body needs extra help from the doctor to start her hormones working in a way that makes her periods start." I remember sitting back with great confidence and comfort, thinking, "That's the path I choose. Why bother until you need your womb for making children?"

That year was the last time I remember being completely comfortable in my body all the time. But my mom must have seen the signs of impending puberty because, when I left for Girl Scout camp, she packed a package of Modess pads and a sanitary belt. I loved Scout camp--hiking, swimming, singing camp songs, playing with my friends. One morning, I woke up to see blood in my sheets. My distinct thought was, "Dang! I must really be scratching my mosquito bites! I'd better stop it." At breakfast, I shared this comment with the table and then saw the expressions of my counselor and table mates and made the connection. I was horrified and embarrassed that I had misunderstood the event and felt more than a little betrayed by my body, with whom I'd made a deal a few months earlier.

I remember not being able to relieve the Oklahoma heat by swimming twice a day (since tampons were unheard of for use by 11-year-old virgins), sitting by the side of the lake or pool feeling very sorry for myself. I remember struggling to make the belt and pads work right, including getting the nasty little hooks tangled in my pubic hair. I remember feel dirty as the only showers we had were cold water ones and the only bathrooms wooden latrines. When it was time for my parents to pick me up, Mom asked about my experience, saying that the camp director had called her and she'd thought about coming to see me, but decided that would be making too big a deal out of it. I remember this hurting my feelings as, in my world, it WAS a very big deal.

That's my story. Hope it's useful.

Diva Cup

A friend of my daughter's just made me aware of a relatively new feminine care product I'm embarrassed to say I didn't know about.  Actually, I think my daughter might have mentioned it to me at some point, but I didn't absorb the information. 

It's a Diva Cup, a silicon cup made to fit inside the vagina and to collect menstrual blood.  It is used instead of pads, tampons, toilet paper or rags.  It can be worn for up to 12 hours, then it just needs to be washed out and re-inserted.  Imagine all the trash you could keep from putting into the landfill!  And the toilets you would no longer cause to get stopped up.  And the money you could save. 

Here is what they write on their website as questions to consider (which you won't need to worry about anymore if you get a Diva Cup):

Have you ever…(?)

• co-opted toilet paper from a public washroom as a temporary measure

• planned a vacation around your period

• avoided white pants for that one 'special' week of the month

• done a supplies hand-off with a girlfriend while the dates weren't looking

• cautiously tucked the telltale string into your bikini

• accidentally pulled a mystery object from your purse in front of a curious male audience

• scuttled to the washroom to survey the leak damage after a sudden 'surge'

• clogged your toilet with "flushable" feminine products

• left a party with a jacket tied around your waist...?

The cups cost around $40 from what I can tell.  It's easy to spend significantly more than that on tampons and pads each year.  I don't know how long a cup lasts - I couldn't find that information on the website, but it (the website) has tons of other great information.

Here's the link in case you're interested in checking it out:  http://www.divacup.com/

Thanks to this young woman for giving me the information.  I plan to get one before my next period, even though I probably won't have my period for much longer.  It's a sound ecological decision.

Flow: the Cultural Story of Menstruation

I found what looks to be a great book at the library Friday.  It's called Flow: the Cultural Story of Menstruation by Elissa Stein and Susan Kim.  I haven't started reading it yet, but before I could, my husband already started reading to me from it!  He's finding it quite interesting.

Here's what he read to me already - I had NO idea about this!

Hysteria, that mysterious catchall of female ailments that existed in recorded history for thousands of years, is a diagnosis that dates back to ancient Egypt.  It's associated with out-of-control emotions, irrational fears, and unregulated, over-the-top behavior, but overwhelmingly, only in women.  and believe it or not, one of the most popular treatments for hysteria that literally spanned centuries was manual stimulation to orgasm by a medical doctor.

Okay, it wasn't actually called an orgasm back then, it was a "hysterical paroxysm."  And believe it or not, it wasn't even considered sexual; in a world ruled by a heterosexual, male-oriented notion of sex (i.e. vaginal intercourse in the missionary position), stimulating someone's clitoris was considered therapeutic and about as racy as bandaging a head wound.  That being said, we find the whole thing more than a tad kindy.  Just read the instructions Pieter van Forest wronte in 1653, which makes it all pretty clear to us: "A midwife should massage the genitalia with one finger inside, using oil of lilies, musk root, crocus or [something] similar  and in this way the afflicted woman can be aroused to a paroxysm."

Van Forest was far from the first to describe this method, and in such lingering detail, as an effective treatment for hysteria.  Centuries earlier, Hippocrates, that father of modern medicine, mentioned a simlar treatment in his writings.  And Galen himself, that old second-century perv, wrote: "Following the warmth of the remedies and arising from the touch of the genital organs required by the treatment, there followed twitchings accompanied at the same time by pain and pleasure, after which she emitted turbid and abundant sperm.  From that time on, she was free of all the evil she felt."

And yet, the medical profession emphatically did not suggest a woman try this at home by herself.[...]  No, it was a medical treatment to be provided by a professional - a doctor or a midwife - at a scheduled appointment, for cold, hard cash. [...]

Going to the doctor's for such a treatment was nothing like putting on an oversize gown that ties in front and scooting your bare butt down to the end ofthe table where the stirrups are.  Back then, a woman remained not only standing, but fully clothed; the doctor would have to bend down and reach up under all of her heavy draperies in order to locate the right spot, working completely by feel.  Not surprisingly, the treatment was incredibly taxing; it probably took the hapless doctor time to even find the clitoris, and after that up to a full hour to achieve the desired result.  Plus it was difficult; one doctor back in 1660 ruefully compared the technique to rubbing one's stomach with one hand while patting one's head with the other.  As a result, midwives were often employed to do the actual handiwork.

But by the late 19th century, the second stage of the Industrial Revolution [...] brought us the vibrator.  Dr. J.M. Granville, a British physician, developed a mechanical model in 1883, and overnight, doctors found they could treat hysteria patients in mere minutes instead of hours.

What a boon!  The vibrator quickly became a staple in doctors' offices, and as treatments sped up, revenue streams (ahem) shot through the roof....

Pretty fascinating history of hysteria and vibrators and treating women for such symptoms as (again I quote):

nervousness, insomnia, faintness, chills, fluid retention, heaviness in the abdomen, depression, headache, upset stomach, loss of appetite, shortness of breath, irritability, unexplained laughter or crying, anxiety, a choking sensation, muscle spasms, convulsions, fatigue, loss of appetite, cold hands, cold feet, loss of sexual interest, heaving of the chest, a sudden throwing back of the head and body, the tendency to cause trouble, and on, and on, and on, ad infinitum.

The book is now at the top of the stack of 5 or 6 books I'm currently reading and will get a much closer read beginning tomorrow!  I'll let you know what else I learn.

In the meantime, I find it fascinating how out of touch women - and men - have been with women's bodies and their raw sexuality and sensuality.  How did that happen?  How is it still happening?  Is it happening in your life?  Your daughter's?  How can women become so empowered and self-aware that such absurdities can never happen again?