tw:menstruation
I was 9 when my period started and about to start 5th grade. It was a fabulous summer day when I started. I had a horrible stomach cramps for a few hours and my grandmother suggested that I go ride my bicycle to alleviate my cramps. After I rode around for a bit I noticed my cramps were gone so I thought everything was all fine and dandy. I went to pee and my underwear was covered in blood. Of course, being that it was the rad mid-90s, I had seen that awesome video starring Orphan Annie so I knew what was going on. I told my grandmother and I got to wear a huge pair of underwear she had just bought (that was more embarrassing to me then my period for sure). She gave me some water and said that I’ve taken my final steps into womanhood (I was already developed and hairy). When my mom came by to pick me up she flipped out. I remember her crying and saying I was a woman now in that depressed voice moms get but I certainly didn’t feel like a woman. Basically all I wanted to do was call my best friend and tell her then go out and play some more. I never thought my period was gross or weird and I carried around my period kit that my elementary school provided with pride. When people say it’s disgusting and nasty it reiterates that women are still seen as unclean which is obviously wrong. Be proud of your body and your period!
submitted by: fictionalindependence
9:40 am • 6 August 2011 • 2 notes
tw: menstruation, worry
I didn’t have the greatest first period because I was stuck in school, aged 14 , in Maths. My teacher said I looked “green” and told me to go the medical room. Once I arrived I was told to go home and upon my arrival I realised that I’d finally began my period. All I remember is feeling really sick and unwell during Maths but as soon as I was home, I felt so reassured; it’s my first period, what’s so bad about that? I told my mother when she got got home from work and it was just a really cool thing. No worry, no fear anymore. Just a little cramp which painkillers can help :)
submitted by: robynsucre
4:40 pm • 5 August 2011 • 1 note
trigger warning, menstruation
The first time I got my period I thought I pooped myself. Then my Mom gave me a hug and said “Welcome to womanhood sweetheart”.
- Lauren (sugarbutch)
4:34 pm • 5 August 2011 • 2 notes
tw:menstruation
My parents had just divorced, and there was a restraining order against my mom. I was barely 10, and didn’t really understand what was happening. I guess the stress brought it on early.
Anyway I went to the bathroom one day and noticed a weird brown sludge. I showed it to my dad and asked him what it was. He was totally uncomfortable, but told me that it was my period (because really, that’s all he knew/cared to know) and quickly scampered away to get the most uncomfortable no-name brand of pads that existed.
I feel like I was pretty oblivious due to adult discomfort and my mother’s absence. I was old enough to know in theory what a period was from rudimentary sex-ed, but only through strange abstract diagrams and allusions. There wasn’t any hostility, but there also wasn’t any help.
It was pretty uneventful, especially compared to everything else going on in my life at the time. I was always pretty independent, so I started buying decent menstrual products on my own pretty soon afterwards. (Now I use a mooncup - delightful! GO GET ONE.)
submitted by: enviablememory
10:41 am • 5 August 2011
Menarche. tw:menstruation
It was the first of many, of course, but it was much unlike the rest.
I didn’t get The Talk beforehand or afterwards, but I was excited for it to come.
I had my own stash of tampons (to the chagrin of my mother - probably because she came of age when TSS was still a reality) and I was absolutely, completely ready.
When it came, it was quiet and warm and tame and docile. There weren’t any surges of heavy flow or intense emotion or searing pain or anxiety or weird dreams or huge waves of libido crashing over me just beforehand.
It was brownish-red, copper like a shiny new penny, and I welcomed it like a new friend. I felt lucky, blessed, relieved.
My period ended three days later.
I missed it.
submitted by: goodgeology
10:30 pm • 4 August 2011 • 1 note
It's Just A Period, People!
Here’s the pro-menstruation blog I’ve been co-moderating for the past couple of months. Please be sure to stop on by and check it out! :)
10:29 pm • 4 August 2011
gummygumzyumz:
This is my photograph. This is my body. This is my menstrual blood. I took it for a introductory digital photo class, submitted for a texture and balance assignment. I think I got a B. It’s art. It shows reality. It shows part of who I am. It shows part of who most people on the earth are. There is a ridiculous amount of notes on this, and I am proud to have taken a photograph that many enjoy.
To those who like this photograph:
Here is my final project for the same class, it is a series of 15 photographs of women, myself included, and its purpose is to show the natural variety in areolas and nipples.
Also, let me take this opportunity to promote the feminine hygiene product I use: The Diva Cup. It’s the most economical option, and if you care about the amount of waste you produce using tampons, it is a wonderful alternative. It is made of silicone. Doesn’t silicone sound so much nicer than cotton? It is :)
——————————————————————————————————————-This photo was also blogged here, and was generally received negatively. Let me post some of my favorite comments in the reblogs:
- why do people feel its necessary to make posts about ovulation fuck you your pussy wont be the only thing bleeding if you dont shut the fuck up
- and women wonder why there is no equality for them. they do dumb shit like this
- this is plain disgusting. i find my own period horrid enough, i don’t need to see other people’s as well thanks
EW WHAT THE FUCK. PERIODS ARE VILE, GROSS, PAINFUL, AND UNNEEDED WHY CANT OUR VAGINAS JUST SEND OUT A LITTLE NOTE THAT SAYS WE NOT PREGNANT?! lol jk that’s not possible. But I still hate my period. Ishh
- periods are fucking gross. They hurt, they make women mean and lethargic, period tissue smells like a dead animal and on top of it all, its unsanitary. So nobody wants to see that shit. Including other women. And especially men, who oppress women. Put a tampon in it and act fucking normal and maybe we’ll have some progress.
- ^^^ WHY IS IT ON HER LEGS? EW EW EW. >
(Um, do they think this is a candid shot?)
I understand, most people do not find blood beautiful, and it would be ridiculous for me to think that everyone would feel “fine” with looking at this photograph- what bothers me that it is being received by some as offensive because it’s menstrual blood. A great deal of the people reblogging this and adding “grossed out” comments also reblog shittons of self-injury photographs. Because blood is only gross when it comes from a vagina. Grow up, you fucks. Nevermind, the majority of tumblr users are 14 years old. Maturing might not be feasible. Not while you still think your own period is “horrid”.
(via plantaplanta-deactivated2015022)
10:00 pm • 4 August 2011 • 4,759 notes
tw:menstruation
I am fourteen years old, and have always been overwhelmingly well informed on sex, bodily functions and puberty, having grown up with a crass father, who shared his outrageously sexual sense of humor with me from a young age, a mother who disapproved greatly of such a young girl knowing so many adult things, whom I was desperate to displease, and six older cousins who took delight in teaching me everything their was about girly-bits, boy-bits, and the like.
I got my first period last October. I had just gotten home after a two hour drive, during which I had what I believed to be agonising stomach cramps and throbbing backache. I went to the toilet and found a small brown stain in my knickers. Despite my common sense and my profound knowledge of “what-vaginas-do”, it didn’t even occur to me that I had experienced my period.
I was, for two hours (before my mother corrected me) absolutely terrified and convinced I had bladder cancer.
submitted by: placesweonlydreamof
1:23 pm • 3 August 2011 • 1 note