Starting around middle school, many of us learn that periods are awkward. They require special behaviors and products, some of which we need to perform or purchase in public, and yet we’re supposed to keep them totally private. Also, there is blood everywhere. But never fear — we’re here to help you negotiate your time of month with grace and aplomb.
Periods are normal — and so is period anxiety.
I talked to Susan Kim, co-author of Flow: The Cultural Story of Menstruation, says lots of menstruating women are “scared of anyone noticing even a trace of the process: a tampon falling out of one’s handbag, a spot of blood on the toilet seat or on the shower floor, a used pad left in the garbage, even someone glimpsing our unused tampons in the bathroom or a male clerk checking us out when we have to buy a box of pads.” This isn’t surprising:
[L]ots of things have conspired over many centuries to make us mortified about the process. Since ancient times and around the world, menstruation has been treated as a filthy and shameful thing; it’s in the Bible (just check Leviticus), it’s part of Islam and orthodox Judaism, and even as recently as the 1950s, scientists from Harvard conducted studies to see whether or not menstrual blood was poisonous (it’s totally not, btw). On top of this bedrock of superstition and religious belief, you can add decades of advertising selling products by creating and then playing off fears of staining, leaking, bulging, and smelling. Who wouldn’t be stressed out?
So if you sometimes get stressed out about asking somebody for a tampon or telling a date it’s your period, you’re not alone. However, you don’t have to panic, either.
Be frank where appropriate.
Obviously you don’t have to go around yelling about your bleeding vadge to whoever will listen (more on this below). But if the situation warrants, your period can be a teachable moment. I talked to Rachel Kauder Nalebuff, author of My Little Red Book, who says,
I like to think of telling guys that I have PMS or am on my period as a chance to teach them what they missed in sixth grade while they were outside playing kickball and we were stuck inside watching a video about tampons with Pat the nurse. So much of the stigma surrounding menstruation is due to lack of knowledge. Talking about your period is a social good!
Adds Kim,
[T]he more you talk about menstruation in a straightforward and unembarrassed way, the less stressful it gets for you and, consequently, for anybody listening. Hey, most guys have females in their lives in a pretty intimate way already — wives, girlfriends, sisters — and chances are they’re not as clueless and squeamish as we might think. Many of them actually appreciate a little education about exactly how awful cramps can be (I remember when I told several male co-workers that it felt like I was getting stomped on my pelvis because the pain went all the way through to my back, and they were genuinely surprised), much in the same way I remember grilling a male friend in 7th grade about what it felt like to get accidentally hit in the nuts.
So if a male friend or close coworker asks why you need to make a quick stop at the drugstore on your way to dinner, or why you carried your purse to the bathroom, or why you turned down his invitation to the annual picnic of the Horseback Riding, Trampolining, and Abdominal Crunches Society, go ahead and tell him. Most guys — especially if they’re on the young side — are secretly curious about periods. Also, menstruating can be an awesome power. Says Nalebuff,
Not only do I think that it is important to be open and honest with men about your period – especially if it’s posing a problem — but frankly I also see it as a free pass when it comes to getting out of a bind. Guys often know so little about menstruation that they assume the absolute worst. Maybe out of a fear of menstruation or, even more likely, a fear of seeming insensitive, guys tend to be incredibly generous when it comes to giving you freedom to tend to your “feminine needs.”
Don’t overuse this power, though. That one girl in eighth grade who claims it’s her “time of month” every day for a whole semester just ruins everything for the rest of us.
Don’t overshare.
Your period is not gross or shameful, and if it’s relevant, or if somebody asks, it’s more than okay to talk about it. And when you’re among friends, you can also talk about it just because you feel like it — I know I don’t have to tell you this, because you’ve probably been doing so since you were a kid. However, there are scenarios in which you should dole out your ladyblood info on a need-to-know basis. Says Kim,
[Y]ou have to weigh the situation and your relationships. I think it can be an overly personal and inappropriate thing to share with someone you’ve just met; for example, mentioning your period on a job interview with a woman can come across like you’re trying to force a sisterly intimacy that doesn’t actually exist.
It’s maybe a good rule of thumb that if you wouldn’t talk about peeing with someone, you should not launch into a detailed discussion of menstruation either. Both are worthy topics for many settings, but that doesn’t mean your body fluids have to be all over the boardroom.
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