re-blogging re:Cycling
In celebration of our fifth anniversary, we are republishing some of our favorite posts. This post by Chris Bobel originally appeared October 1, 2012.
Okay. Enough. I gotta say something.
Because I am committed to various efforts to reclaim the menstrual cycle as a vital sign and subvert the dominant narrative that menstruation is obsolete and/or a badge of shame, many people assume my periods are all drum circles, red jewelry and a week-long love affair with my Diva Cup.
More insidious still is the pervasive assumption that thinking differently about our cycles necessarily points to LOVING our cycles. As if there are ONLY two choices on the menstrual menu: I’ll have the Obsolete Shaming Nuisance or My Cycle is Womb-alicious. That doesn’t work for me as I suspect it does not work for others. There’s a whole lot of territory between refusing to see menstruation as meaningless OR as proof positive that my body is unruly, out of control, and a source of deep-seated shame AND embracing my menses as the Sine qua non of my gender identity or the gift that keeps on giving, about every 28 days.
I gotta ask: can’t I resist the shame and still find the monthly uterine shedding a royal pain in the vagina? Because, dear reader, that’s how I feel about MY menstruation. Most of the time, I really hate my period.
I am a heavy bleeder– a seven full days of gushing, clotting, and without fail, staining usually both my sheets and my underwear. My period is a week of carrying an extra pair of underwear with me in my backpack, sleeping on a towel (that always bunches up and makes me miserable as I try to find a comfortable sleeping position) and scrubbing stains out of my underwear.
I do not celebrate my flow during my menses. At the same time, I am grateful that my body is signaling All Operations Normal and Functioning. Yes. I AM appreciative of the reminder to practice self care, to slow down, to pause…. but I rarely do, if I am honest. Truth is, even in the context of all this gratitude for what my body is doing to keep me healthy, I groan when Aunt Flo comes a-calling.
But admitting that has not come easily because I am privy toan awful lot of menstrual talk (on this blog and in the wider world) and the two OPTIONS ONLY discourse is pervasive. You either hate it (shame on you for shaming on you) or you love it (Fool. Join the 21st century!). See?
My point is simple. Let’s not trade one dogma for another. Messages on either pole fail to listen to women and instead, PRESCRIBE how we should THINK about our embodied experiences. Some menstruators DO welcome their periods and find ways to celebrate them. Some menstruators spend Day 1 on the floor of the bathroom, clutching the rim of the toilet. Some menstruators are damn grateful to see bloody panties as a signal of Not Pregnant or Right on Schedule and then pretty quickly shift into dogged management mode. Some menstruators _________________ (your experience here).
The different menstrual world I want is a bigger one, one shaped by a more (not less) pluralistic menstrual discourse that makes the way for as many menstrual attitudes are they are menstrual experiences. This stuff is personal and individual and yet, because of FemCare ads, industry-sponsored menstrual education in schools and increasingly Big Pharma’s awkward melding of high tech body meddling so that women can menstruate like their Paleo ancestors, it is hard to hear our OWN voices over the din.
Here’s my voice: thanks for the free monthly wellness check but I wish it were not so much work. But I will be damned if I will whisper that I need to change my pad or be seduced by a slick ad campaign that enlists me as a paying research subject. I just need better pads (longer, anyone?) and maybe a terry cloth fitted sheet. And someone to do my laundry.
Hey Chris,
I hear you–periods can be highly problematic but that doesn’t mean they are not important and potentially acceptable.
But enough already with treating heavy, irregular, crampy or just plain awful menstruation as though it were bad weather and something to complain about to establish a common ground with other menstruators. No one asks us to rejoice in misery.
We can’t change the weather but we can plan for and dress for it. Likewise there are many natural, harmless and easy things we can do to better understand our menstruation and to make it something that is ordinary and acceptable.
I want to know why those simple, practical and empowering things to improve our understanding (like keeping track of our own experience with a diary https://cemcor.ubc.ca/files/uploads/Menstrual_Cycle_Diary.pdf, learning whether or not we are usually releasing an egg and have normal ovulation https://www.cemcor.ubc.ca/files/uploads/QBT_instructions.pdf are so rarely mentioned by feminists. Why don’t we all know how to take ibuprofen to virtually eliminate menstrual cramps https://www.cemcor.ubc.ca/resources/topics/cramps-and-painful-periods? Why doesn’t every woman know that 1-2 ibuprofen tablets (200-400 mg) with each meal will decrease heavy menstrual flow by almost half https://www.cemcor.ubc.ca/resources/topics/heavy-flow?
Women have all kinds of experiences, and we have often been victimized by our negative reproduction-related experiences. But the time has come to refuse to be miserable because of our cycles or efforts to control our fertility or to increase our likelihood of becoming a mother.
To achieve reproductive autonomy we have work to do in order to understand our own cycles; we have to stand up to those who make menstruation a burden; finally we must refuse to accept anything less than reproductive wellness.
And I hear you…and I hope others will, too! We are not powerless and we DO deserve relief. I did not mean to paint myself as a victim–and I see that I do come off that way. Thanks for the self supporting reminders. Listen up, everyone!
I mean no offence to the poster, but I guess I just don’t understand the negativity. I can’t relate to it.
Part of my frustration stems from the fact that I just don’t hear anything good about something I see as inherently so.
Admittedly, I apparently was one of the lucky few whose Mother was very happy when I started my period. It meant a form of power, the power of creating life with my own body.
All my life, I’ve been surprised by all the negativity! It used to shock me, some of the complaints from girls in highschool washrooms. What was such a hassle? To me, it was like saying “oh shit-gotta go have a shower again”..”yeah I hear ya, sister”..huh?
I used to get a kind of secret satisfaction every time I could feel a giant blob come out while some male teacher was talking to me. I sensed guys were freaked about it and I guess that added to my fun.
It seemed like a reflective time. It seemed like I was more aware of subtle emotional information from others and myself.
About the positive reaction from my Mom, I’ve often wondered if it was a coincidence that I had cramps maybe twice in my life instead of the painful experiences so many other women speak of. It’s not a question of denying other womens’ experiences, rather, to what extent does the power of suggestion manifest itself in women who have been force-fed such extremely negative ideas.
Would so many women have bad experiences if there was a strong association between menstruation and innate female power? I doubt it.
Talk about the power of association: I remember once going out to the woods with some women for a Wicca ceremony. A woman poured a vial of menstrual blood at the four corners of a red cedar wreath.
(See, this is the kind of thing that scares the poop out of the menfolk. Oh well. 🙂