Lets Talk

What better day than “hump day” to talk menstruation? But since I didn’t give Rusty the requested 72 hours warning, I’ll start off with a little humor.

This is part of an episode of “Everybody Loves Raymond” that I thought was one of the funniest half hours of television I’ve ever seen. If memory serves me, Ray had audio-tapped Debra during a time he thought she was being particularly unreasonable due to PMS in order to convince her that she needed to take some pills to make his life a little easier. Not surprisingly, Debra was not pleased. Here’s what happened next:

I guess we can all agree that we’ve made some progress in being able to talk about this if network tv can air this on a family comedy show. Things were much worse when I was growing up.

At 13, when I started menstruating, my body didn’t produce all the hormones to regulate my periods. The result was that I bled profusely and continually. During this time, certain things became daily struggles for me. Like trying to figure out how to exit a room at school because the back of my dress was stained. Or being fearful of spending the night at a friends because I worried I’d soil the sheets during the night.

Eventually I ended up in the hospital. I got blood transfusions, a D&C, and was started on the pill. For me this was not a traumatic physical event. But it certainly was a trauma emotionally. The reason is that NO ONE would talk to me about it…not even my Mom. I felt total shame for something my body was doing.

As a result of this experience, I vowed as an adult that I would talk about menstruation and periods and bleeding whenever and with whomever I wanted to. This is normal bodily functioning for half of the world’s population. So why do we need to pretend like its a secret?

Here’s a piece of artwork by Kat Grandy titled “Go With The Flow” and her description:

I have been writing all my life. I always figure things out better if I put them down on paper. I remember what it was like to be a young girl who always thought that having a period was a very secret thing. My mom was very matter of fact about the whole thing so I took it in stride until I saw how things were at school.

I remember the first time. I was at my aunt’s in another town, and I had a white skirt on and the red dots were everywhere. We were at the restaurant when someone told me. I remember being so mortified as if they could see me naked. That feeling stayed with me a long time.

I have been painting with watercolor these last few years and I let the paint take me where it wants to – I was painting this woman wild and free and since I love the color red these days I thought that maybe it would be good to show that red is a good thing – it pumps throughout our body and makes us a warm-blooded animal and so the blood that leaves our body does not have to be considered a bad thing either. It is real, bright, rich and a necessary part of our womaness. Hence – Go With the Flow.

What are your thoughts, stories, experiences or questions about menstruation? Here are a few things I wonder about:

1. Whenever two or more women live together, they always get on the same cycle. I’ve always wondered how that happens. It seems like our bodies communicate and/or affect each other. But there might be a more simplistic explanation for it.

2. In addition to the events I’ve described above, as an adult I’ve had two gynecological surgeries – one for fibroid tumors and the other for endometriosis. On both occasions, I delayed seeking medical help until very late in the process. I think this is because, when you bleed and have pain once a month, its hard to know when your symptoms have crossed the line into a problem area.

3. I’ve read that in some tribal cultures, women menstruated together (see #1 above) and would gather together for those days and bleed into the ground. This was considered a sacred time for women and it was understood that they were wise in a deep and meaningful way during the ritual. I’ve often wondered if some of the causes of PMS might be that we don’t honor these cycles in that kind of way. And what kind of wisdom is the world missing out on when we don’t listen to ourselves during this important time?

4. And, speaking of cycles, I’ve also assumed that our 5 day work week was designed by men. I wonder what kind of cycle we might have developed for work and rest if women had been in charge.