Period

I am one of these women who suffer a lot because of their periods ( menstruation).

I had it when i was 11. Nobody told me what to do and how to take care, i have older siblings and a mother but i guess we were this far early on. The only thing i knew was how to use the pad . I remember the pain since i was that young.

What i hate most is the changes my body was going through . I was starting to grow up and i hated that. Lots of people in my society sees young girls with periods as trouble, cuz now she can get pregnant.

I was mocked , yelled at and looked at with disgrace because my body started to grow , to this day i hate my body. All of this was caused by my periods that's how i used to think.

At school things were not easier with stupid teachers who would punish you by letting you stand up for a long time while my whole body was aching with pain. How can you tell your teacher that you have your periods ( i was 11 and thought i was the only one had it) .

Till this day i have a hate relationship with my period. It is not a regular one and I have to take lots and lots of pills to ease the pain just for a bit the week before and the days after, visit doctors , couldn't movie from the bed for three days. Yet, nothing will ease it and it will take its course before vanishes.

And the food craving !!! oh god, that's why i seems to not be able to lose those five kilos, lol

The pain attacks every single part of my body . Let's not forget the mood changing , i become a monster.

I know i hate it and wait for the day it will stop (which is unfortunately in about 14 years to come), i see no need for it and can not seem to accept it. Goodbye Menstruation , Hello Menopause

Recently I have been thinking of changing my attitude towards many things ,love and embrace them instead of hating them including my periods .

And I was lucky when i found some lovely poems and topics last week, in Mona's blog about menstruation. Thanks Mona for allowing me to share :)

I loved what i read and started to feel differently , but i know it will take sometimes before i can love it the way these women show in their writings but i am on the way :)

The mind and soul can really changed by reading , i am sure about that now :)

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Menstruation Haiku

Bleeding vagina–

another month not pregnant.

Time to celebrate.

-Vi

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Menstruation

By Anonymous

As I write this, I am currently going through that time of the month. There is a dull pain in my abdomen, lower back and thighs, but I am able to think, articulate, reason and live, perfectly well!

When I first hit puberty, there was no fanfare or ceremony about sighting my first blood. I was shown how to manage my period hygenically by my mother and aunts, but that is about all. Life simply went on for me – school, friends, university, marriage and work. Once a month I am ensured extremely tender care from my husband who will rub my back and help me cope with the pain of an oncoming period. It represents for us, as a couple, our life-producing union.

I recoil in horror at the social anguish faced by my sisters in other parts of the world as a result of their menstruation. How the very blood that nutures life within a womb has become a mark of shame, as a reason to oppress, marginilize and subjugate is ridiculous.

Menstruation is a time for me bask in my womanhood – my feminine power of producing life. It is not a shameful or dirty thing – but a beautiful affirmation of the potential and a symbol of the cycle of life.

Dare anyone say to me that I cannot be who I am because I menstruate.

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The Morning I Became a Woman

By Roxanne, Brooklyn, NY

Women gathered around my bed first time she came to me

I was young, eleven

Did not quite understand the diversity of emotions before me:

Tenderness, happiness…sympathy

“You’re a woman now,” my grandmother said

I was just embarrassed at the sudden attention

It felt like….nothing

Nothing that I imagined

But that statement cloaked me

Cloaked me, heavy

Like an unwanted armor on an apprehensive soldier

I was later told the main strategy for safety:

“You can’t talk to boys now, they will ruin yu” an aunt said

I took that to heart…

I was not until the second month I felt pain, felt something

That I knew that it was for real

And as the months and years passed

I came to understand the faces that looked down on me

The morning I became a woman

Copyright © RNLH 2010

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Holiday

By Geneva Kachman (from her 2000 collection “The Traveling Menstrual Show”

“That song is the biggest joke. I never take a vacation.” — Madonna, Truth or Dare, 1991

Original words and music by Lisa Stevens and Curtis Hudson

hol-i-day!

men-stru-ate!

hol-i-day!

men-stru-ate!

if we had New Menses Eve,

wore some bright red party hats

as well as maxipads,

it would be, it would be so nice.

St. Val’s Day, we’re gonna see

a heart shot with Cupid’s arrow is

really just a uterus

with fallopian tubes.

now it’s Menstrual Monday,

a week before Mother’s Day –

Menstrumobiles are hung with care,

and Menstrububbles fill the air.

Thanksgiving Day, we’ll spill

cranberry sauce onto white

tablecloths, to symbolize

our menstrutivity*

it would be, it would be so nice!

red sacks inside us

like we’re female Santa Clauses.

stick those tampons in.

it’s time to menstruate.

let cramps subside

and we will find

a way to bleed together

and make things better.

we need a holiday.

if we took a hol-i-day,

took some time to men-stru-ate

just a few days in each month,

it would be, it would be so nice.

hol-i-day!

men-stru-a-tion!

bleed to-geth-er in

ev-e-ry na-tion.

*menstrutivity (men’stroo tiv’eti) 1. Spontaneous outpouring of creative and/or collaborative energy. 2. To give and/or receive more than was bargained for. 3. An embarrassment of riches.

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On the Rag Railroad

By Geneva Kachman

“She’ll be comin’ roun’ the mountain when she…”

no ticket, station

or even timetable

just a penny on the track

that starts to vibrate

every 20 days or so

and you know it’s on the way

the countryside you’ll see

will be all mountainous

sunset or sunrise, blood red

you won’t remember

what high noon or midnight

looked like

on the rag railroad

all open windows

and bloody noses

from the high altitudes

got on board when I was 14

and I won’t get off ’til I’m 50

the destination is India

and the Cobra yoga pose

’til the small of the back

becomes the center of

the universe

although sometimes stranded

in a blizzard

of Advil or Midol

snowbound with cramps

in a narrow mountain pass

in the middle of nowhere

for hours on end

never knowing who your

sister passengers are going to be:

Chinese instructor

in a velveteen blazer

confiding before class

she’d just gotten hers

your classmate Leisel

who always had hickeys

(and never bothered to hide them)

asking to borrow

a tampon

near the bank machine

on the rag railroad

no baggage except

a silk-wrapped tarot deck

(to break the ice) is allowed

got on board when I was 14 (15, 17, 10)

and I won’t get off ’til I’m 50 (27, 43, 52)

* * *

Dylan says she breaks

just like a little girl

what does he know

on this mountainside

lion’s open jaws

are hot, wet, red and healthy

and she pounces

just like the animal

she is

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Menstruation

By Anonymous

There’s a joke that goes something like this:

how do you trust something that bleeds once a month

and doesn’t die?

Funny that menstruation is now

our weakness

when earlier

it was our power,

what connected us

in a life-cycle with the moon.

The men knew so little then…

But they know even less now.

If you can’t trust life, what can you trust?

They dismiss as weaknesses

our sign of giving.

They think we can only

take

semen,

that we only receive their power silently.

And when we don’t bleed

we’re even less worthy of receiving

love, respect.

Somehow,

menstruation is always

their problem, not ours.

I salute the strength of women

who bleed once month

and don’t die.

I salute the strength of women

who have stopped bleeding

and still live a full life,

as they should.

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Women’s Injury

By Imane Nofal

Imagine that you have an injury that bleeds every month for a certain period! Imagine that this injury hurts you for several consecutive hours, and sometimes it adds more pain to your bones and whole body. Imagine that while having such pain, you have to study, work at home, go to work, and fulfill every other job in your ordinary life. In short, that is how the period works: an injury that bleeds every month to which sympathy is dragged and heroic adjectives should be assigned.

Symbolically, the period was defined once by a physician as the tears of the womb. Each month the womb waits for a baby to hold, however the ovum doesn’t find the sperm, and so the womb engage itself in tears. Such tears appear in the form of blood to denote that woman is a giver even if there is no one to give.

Virtually, the woman is the utmost giver and donor. She is the only person who can give from each cell in her body without any reward. However, ironically enough she is then accused of being deficient!

Has deficiency now been linked to bodily problems (if we have the right to call the period a problem, rather than nature)?! Well, then anyone having any bodily disease should be categorized as deficient! And if woman is not to be assigned certain positions, then, same is applicable to any human with a chronic disease!

What I know about the period is that it leads to some hormonal changes and, therefore, women at this stage need some more compassion not criticism. They need simply a hug!

Not because I am a Muslim that I will mention the most wonderful man in treating women as Prophet Mohammed peace be upon him. But the necessity leads me to think of how people try to diminish women’s abilities and rather ignore her psychological needs due to body nature, meanwhile, Prophet Mohammed tends to glorify and care for her. It was said that he used to drink from the same spot Al Saida Aesha used to drink when she had the period. He did not also mind her giving him his cloak in these same days.

If Allah glorifies woman, and she is being posed in the rank of prophets like the mother of Jesus; Mariam, should we human despise her because she has the period! Does not the fact that Quran and Bible mention women and ignore millions of men give us a hint that a woman with a period can beat dozens of periodless men!

A woman is a powerful creature who has unlimited potentialities, but in her injury time, she needs a hug not a slap on the face! So do not double a woman’s injury.

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Period – a Found poem

By Iqra Azhar

I’m having cramps.

Resist cravings, fats and sugars in your diet. It will help

ease the symptoms of PMS.

Calling in sick

can’t come to work

my face is breaking out

Why are you being such a bitch? It’s my time

of the month. Little evidence to support this. Originally,

“all in their head.” Women have contributed to

the social construction of the

pre-menstrual syndrome. Leave me alone.

Do you take any oral contraceptives, the pill?

Over the counter prescription, pain killer,

please check with your physician.

Chocolate: melts in your mouth

a girl’s best friend

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My Bloody Period

By Iman Ashour

Location:

Vancouver, B.C

Date:

2002

Incident:

I got my period during a trip with my dad, stepmother and sister where we were staying in a fancy hotel downtown B.C. I was just recently diagnosed with endometriosis – medical condition that renders women susceptible to heavy and intensely painful periods. Dad was aware of this…

So, I got my period and I had forgotten my painkillers back in Saudi. I was on the floor all curled up in the fetal position and crying from the immense pain when my step mother walked into my room upon my young sister asking her and father to come see me as I was crying.

She was all dressed up as her and father were planning to go out. She told me that they will leave me in the hotel room because I was acting up in an attempt to spoil this trip for everyone…

So, off they all left, father, his wife and my younger sister. They left me with no money, no drugs, and contact info in case I needed help. They were gone for the day.

As the hours passes I kept bleeding, losing volume and gaining pain. At one point the housekeeping lady knocked my door and came in because she heard my cries. She called 911 and I was hospitalized. I was given I.V fluids and morphine then was given a pain killer prescription and discharged back to my hotel.

The hotel took care of all the medical and transportation bills, they just billed everything to the room.

When my dad got back he realized, after the hotel manager contacted him, that I was indeed ill and not just trying to ruin his trip with his new wife…

PS: My dad is a surgeon and his new wife, a nurse.

Thank you for reading and happy international womens rights day to us!

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By Anonymous

Periods. I wish it would be just a dot or handful of dots in my life. It is anything but a dot as a young woman raised by Egyptian parents. I remember when I was 11 and without going into details, yes I got my first period. I remember my mother talking to other moms “spreading the news.” The message I got from my father was, “she is ready for marriage.” When I analyze this way of thinking, having a period means that now she can have a leadership position (in marriage) or did it really mean “that’s it, fun is over, we need to put a leash on her by assigning her a partner for life?” A race into finding a husband for me was set off when I got my first period. At age 12, my father attempted to arrange marriage for me to a man who was 35.

Until I got married, my periods were extremely painful, it would knock me down in its first 4 hours physically but after that, I was fine. Thanks to birth control pills that I started to take after marriage, the pain disappeared and I went on with life. Internally, I saw periods as a sign of shame as my dad hated to pay for the absorbents. He told me it was a waste of his hard earned money. He would say that back in the day, women used cloths and I should consider that. I felt worthless and on a monthly basis, it was a reminder that I hated depending on him to pay for my absorbents. My mom would have to lie when she asked for money, she gave excuses that money needed was for something else further deepening my feelings of inadequacy and wishing I was a man so I wouldn’t have to deal with periods.

As a teenager growing up in Egypt, when my body would bring to me my knees because of the physical pain of my period, my father would not allow me to lay down. I would not dare rest. I could not sit still in my father’s home. I had to always do something: cooking, cleaning, studying, cleaning and cleaning even while sick. My father would say I am not an old woman, there is nothing that should bring me down. I would not dare say it was because of my period.

Once I was married, my period entered a different context. Periods were seen as a natural process and it meant I was not pregnant. However, another way of oppression started during marriage. My former husband could not wait for 7 days…I hate having sex during my period, it is just plain gross for me and painful. My deeper surprise came after my first child was born, I had a cesarian surgery. My former husband started looking for Quranic and Hadith verses to justify his needs that I do not have to wait for 40 days. How about because I was not ready? Where was this devout Muslim husband’s patience and humanity? So I realized that again, I was living again another period of oppression.

Regardless of the periods of oppression in my life, periods were no more than a physical nuisance. As a sister, mother, daughter, professional, rain or shine, period or no period, I give my best in any situation I find myself in. I have never done drugs or committed a crime, doesn’t that prove that I have good judgment enough if I want to be a judge someday, to go for it because I know I am capable? On my period I do not miss work, I go to my college courses, I tend to my chldren’s needs as a single mother today, I travel across the oceans on my period, my bills are never late, my kitchen is always clean and my life is in order. Period to me is just a period that I do not let stop my life and my dreams.

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By Nakia Jackson

For the most part, my period been more reliable than public transit, and much less disruptive than some might think. It’s a sign my body is in good health, and since becoming a mother, a sign that at least part of my body is looking toward future possibilities, an expression of a longing to bring forth other new lives. It’s a quick trip to the drug store, for pads or tampons, and perhaps a bottle of pale pink nail polish. It’s a chance to henna my hair, sleep in, and marvel over the fuss that is made about a few days of bleeding. It’s no big friggin’ deal.

Perhaps because I come from a family that made no ceremony over this milestone, I don’t make much fuss over it, myself. It’s been a slight inconvenience, with few exceptions, for the past nineteen years. I don’t become extra weepy or irritable, scarf down chocolates or pretzels at a greater rate than normal, bloat to twice my size, or become debilitated with cramps. I’m sure that at least some women have difficulty with their periods- someone’s got to keep the makers of Midol in the black. But claiming that all or even most women are brought low every month by biology makes little sense. There are women who barely notice their periods, and there are women whose lives are greatly limited by irregular, copious bleeding, severe cramping, and other nightmarish symptoms. The vast majority fall somewhere in between.

Women have, and have always had, too much to do to spend much time curled in the fetal position. Who the heck would have done all the gathering our prehistoric ancestors need if the women spent a week a month moaning in the back of the cave? Most of us aren’t hunter-gatherers anymore, but we are students, doctors, accountants, mothers, postal workers, lawyers, artists, scholars, and most importantly, humans. We aren’t defective for not being exactly like men- in fact, that is our greatest strength. The uterus contains some pretty powerful muscles, capable of protecting life and making a fetus a child. No wonder some men are intimidated when those muscles flex.

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By Anonymous

Just this morning, my daughter who is 11, was crying in discomfort from her period. She wanted to skip school and just rest at home; but, if I let her skip school this time, then each month she will do the same thing.

As much as I wanted her to stay home, and comfort her, I had to somehow bolster her spirits and boost her mental energy to overcome her anxiety and discomfort.

I held her, and hugged her, and rocked her (although she is now bigger than me) and shed some tears with her too, and tried to make her feel a little better. My heart ached for her, but I urged her to go to school “Honey you have to go to school. We all have to go through this, but it can’t stop you from living your life you have to be strong in your mind, and focus on your studies, and know that this too, shall pass in a couple days,” and so, she summoned the strength, and got ready to go.

My baby girl, she grew up so suddenly. She got her period a few months ago and was absolutely devastated, as she felt that this was the end of her childhood, and that she would never be able to do the things she did before. She felt weak, sad, defeated. ”why why why”, she asked, “why do we have to get this awful curse?”

I had to explain to her, its simply nature’s way of demonstrating the circle of life. It’s not a curse. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. This is what ties us women together, this is our commonality, we are the bearers of life, and that is a gift. Women – doesn’t matter about their station in life – whether CEO or janitor, Senator or bus driver, we all get it and deal with and life just goes on, bear the discomfort for a few days but you must not let it get you down!!

Yes, we are weak physically for a few days, it wreaks havoc on our emotions, but, life does not stop because we get our period! Yes, I hate it too, but I know that we all go through it and get through it, month after month….and, if it wasn’t for my period, I wouldn’t have two beautiful kids. it’s a beautiful thing, actually. Women are amazing, powerful creatures, and we are stronger than men in a different way, because of our period.

Be strong, my little girl. But still, my heart cried for her – she’s just too young to get it. But, such is life – my little girl is now a little woman.

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Jamelah Zidan, 3rd year Sarah Lawrence student

That blood red and thick

is fertility, mother earth claiming me

telling this woman

“multiply, and

remember me.”

Heard a joke,

if women ruled the world,

there would be no war

just intense negotiations once a month

Ha ha

You mean because women birth and bleed

die and live for children, men…

You mean because we, given by God

The duty to bear the future,

Are pained by the present,

That we can not lead.

Fool,

It is a prophet who said that

“Heaven is beneath the mother’s feet”

And all roads should lead there.