Luna pads and diva cups and tampons. Oh my!

December 27, 1998. I am 10 years old. My family is visiting family in New York City. I’m running around in my new flannel pajamas when, with a stomach cramp, I go to the bathroom to see I have just gotten my period for the first time. Merry frickin’ Christmas. I spend the next two days hiding this fact until I can invent some elaborate story or some witty joke to break the news to my mom. When I finally do, it’s painful. Painfully embarrassing. She hugs me and kind of tells everyone. I’m sure I’ll die. Miraculously, I don’t. What’s worse is that she is pregnant at the time so she doesn’t even have a pad to let me borrow. Awesome.

She and I make a trip to a pharmacy downstairs where we buy a gigantic bag of pads which is inconspicuously smuggled up in a black, shiny garbage bag. Before returning to the apartment I stop at my best friend’s house. Maybe I hope her girl radar will pick up my new predicament and she’ll sympathize or give me advice or something. Our older brothers, also best friends, inquire what’s in the bag. “Chips,” I answer. They frantically tear for the bag and much to their surprise they find my huge, gigantic, behemoth bag of pads! I finish writing my last will and pick out the sensible pine box. It’s just a matter of time now until I’m dead for real. I survive my second brush with death. And, so I made it through that period. Embarrassing as it was. Eleven years and about 129 more periods I’m still here to tell the tale.

What’s most surprising to me is how little I knew about menstruating. I consider my mother to be quite a progressive and open person and yet I still was not fully informed about what the hell was happening to me! I would have loved to say upon first seeing the blood, “Oh, I suppose I’ve started menstruating now. My uterus is shedding its lining since my egg was not fertilized. No big deal.” Instead, I said, “Ahhhh!” By the time I read Are you there God, it’s me Margaret, I’d already had my period for a year and wanted to punch Margaret and her friends for wanting something as awful as a period. I hated it. I really didn’t know the details about my period. The only things my mother explained were: I could now get pregnant (I kind of already knew this), I was to use pads, and shower frequently. There was no further explanation, no bonding, no nothing. I suppose I cannot be so hard on my mother. She’d definitely come a long way. When my mother had gotten her period, she’d thought she was dying. I knew better. Still, there is much to be desired when you don’t even learn why this is happening to you, what to expect as far as emotional and physical changes, alternative sanitary equipment, etc. Hispanic girls, good ones anyway, do NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT use tampons. Those are for crazy American girls because once a girl uses a tampon she’s no longer a senorita (an honorable young virgin). To this day my mother STILL does not know I’ve ever used a tampon. For the record, I often feel bad about using them but I’ve learned that I’m respectable regardless of what goes in or out of my vagina. But I suppose I’ll save that for next week’s blog.

The only way to change the social stigmas about men-stu -ray-SHUN is ed-you-kay-SHUN! Most men would rather die a horrible and painful death than get period blood on them. They don’t know that it’s not a cesspool of flesh-eating bacteria, it’s just blood. The evidence of a healthy and normal woman. Many fancy grrls even make art with their menstrual blood! (www.mum.org) There’s no need to hide your period, it’s not taboo it’s your period. If boys and girls alike had a thorough and scientific understanding of what a period is, they wouldn’t avoid it or be afraid it would just be a normal process of life. I highly recommend anyone and everyone to watch, “The Art of Menstruation.” Eleven years later and I’m still learning about my body and my period. Luna pads and diva cups and tampons. Oh my! There are so many environmentally friendly and cool alternatives to pads and tampons. I personally hope to get a diva cup soon but as of yet, I've been sticking to the evil I know.

The issue of having your period is so minuscule when compared to the emotional and body changes girls go through. I cannot stress enough the importance of education girls should receive about not only interpersonal relationships and self-esteem but physical changes as well. I’m shedding (no pun intended) the idea of being disgusted and having to hide my body. Girls have so much to understand! What’s the discharge down there? What’s that smell? Why are my boobs killing me?! Am I normal? The central idea here is that girls, and people in general, want a sense of normalcy and acceptance not uncertainty. It’s so important for us to educate girls so they know they’re normal and ok. When girls understand their bodies they will be leaps and bounds closer to accepting and loving themselves. It’s not the curse, Aunt Flow, or the red-headed monster. It’s your period! And it’s part of being a grrl.