The Menstruation Stigma Has to End... Period.
(First posted June 8, 2019)
I have a story. It's simple and pretty short, but bare with me. I was sitting in the classroom one day when all of a sudden that well-known feeling struck. Shit, I just got my period. So, I reached into my backpack and slipped a tampon up my sleeve, asked my teacher to be excused, and made my way to the wretched bathroom stalls. I routinely did my business, washed my hands and went back to class. I told you this story would be short and simple. Needless to say, there was this motive to hide to fact that I was bleeding. I swiftly slipped my tampon into the sleeve of my sweatshirt because there is this theme established with menstruation that it must be concealed, we must hide it.
As a society, we shut out any conversation regarding menstruation and use euphemisms to further deflect the stigmatic disgust and shame that can occur while bleeding. Aunt Flow, you ever heard of her? Maybe you've heard "shark week", or "on the rag" to describe that "time of the month". I find these euphemisms quite entertaining. They're comical, no doubt, but there is depth and meaning behind such phrases. These references are tools to further avoid the discussion of menstruation. I made it a goal in my life to stop feeling ashamed of this natural process of womanhood that half of the population experiences or has experienced. With this goal in mind, I have another story to tell, still short and simple. I was in class, yet again, and low and behold, I was on my period. I put my backpack on my desk and took a tampon out, held it in my hand, and asked to go to the bathroom. I will admit, I was rather eager to defy societies expectation that I must hide my period at all costs that I essentially made it clear to the entire room that I was going to change my tampon. I didn't care, though. It felt so damn good to finally be open about what everybody endures, but what nobody wants to talk about. It was empowering to dismiss the stigma behind my period, and I was hit with a wave of pride in my body.
Women, we need to be proud of what our bodies are capable of. Womanhood is so unbelievably miraculous, our bodies have the ability to create a living being inside of us, and menstruation is a component of the process as a whole. I am so proud of what my body can do, and when I came back from the bathroom, I was happy that my peers knew I was bleeding. Crazy, right? In reality, menstruation is not a heinous or grotesque curse that society makes it out to be. I invite and challenge every single woman who reads this article to view their monthly cycles in a different light. Be proud of what your body can do and embrace every component of womanhood, it's so beautiful. I also invite and challenge men to stop cringing at the sight of female sanitary products, to quit perceiving menstruation as a daunting, disgusting mystery. I mean, seriously, every man that I have talked to about my period has quivered at the sound of my words.
In my goal to stop hiding my period, I told one of my friends, who is a man, that I had to go to the bathroom to change my tampon. He screamed "Gross!" and pretended to gag. This reaction was brought upon him solely by the thought that I am going to change my tampon. How am I supposed to feel if I am shamed for talking about my period? How is this supposed to make me feel about my body? I continued to mess around with my cowdarly friend and I waved an unused tampon around in his face. Dodging the wad of cotton and plastic, I was amused and intrigued by how truly stigmatized this simple product is, how stigmatized menstruation is. If I took a cotton ball and waved it in his face, it would mean nothing to him. However, because the product that I put in his face is associated with my period, it became disgusting. I understand that an element of digression is expected from us, but Kayla Leah Rich discusses this idea in her TedTalk, "The Cost of Menstrual Shame".
In the past, maybe you thought the silence around menstruation was just discretion. After all, we don't openly discuss everything that goes on in the bathroom, right? But there's a difference between silence, shame, and discretion.... Discretion looks like me not openly discussing my period at the dinner table. And shame looks like tampon manufacturers that make rustle-free packaging!
Rich goes on to explain that the silence women maintain regarding their menstrual cycles is not to maintain a level of discretion, it's to avoid shame. I find that society has a habit of belittling and generalizing women who are on their periods. Sometimes it feels as if my opinions or feelings are invalidated, that my anger towards a certain situation is just my hormones acting up. From my experience, I don't feel like I am taken seriously if whoever I am speaking to knows I am on my period. I found this very prevalent during the presidential election in 2016, where I heard arguments against Clinton made on the basis of her hormones. People worried that a woman in office would make impulsive and poor decisions, because, PMS, right? It is disgusting that society still attempts to use our periods against us, but I'm not surprised.
Rich also mentions certain products that continue to push women to conceal their natural functions. Rustle free packaging might be the most ridiculous product I have ever heard of. What do I need this for, to try and hide my period from the woman in the stall next to me? It is products such as these that encourage and enable women to feel ashamed of their bodies, and in front of who? A fellow woman? Somebody who experiences menstruation just as we all do and just as half of the population does? It is products like these that influence women to hide their period and this leaves me detrimentally disappointed in tampon companies who produce products like these. We need to start a conversation. We need to be open about our bodies. The shame has to stop, we are far too spectacular to be left in the dust by stigmatizing gender constructs.
By the way, I was on my period when I wrote this.