I was in grade 7 when I first got my period. It was on a ski trip with my school. On the second night of the trip, my best friend (a guy) asked, quite nervously and in a whispery voice, if I had gotten my period. I hadn't, and I told him I never wanted it.
The very next night, I went to change after skiing and there was a brownish stain all over my panties. My period had started. I wasn't scared; for some reason, I was angry.
I hated my period. I didn't want it. For the first six months, I dealt with it by stuffing a rag, or a wad of toilet paper in my panties. I didn't want to use a menstrual product, because I didn't want to admit that this was really my period.
I never told anyone in my family (mom, dad, siblings, anybody) that I got it. My mother (who had been menopausal for some time at that point) had a stash of freebie tampon and pantiliner samples that she had chucked under the bathroom sink... I started stealing those. Eventually, I'm sure she noticed.
I came to terms with it by the time I was in grade 10, and started managing to buy my own tampons.
To this day, I have no idea why I reacted so negatively. Some of my friends had had their periods and were proud of them; though at a young age I resisted all parental attempts to talk about puberty, my parents were never body-negative. I had four much older sisters who had been menstruating since I was born... I mean, I grew up surrounded with used pads and tampon wrappers.
And yet, something about it was so awful to me, so unwanted. It felt like an invasion of my body, a loss of control.
These days, I'm fine with it. I don't like it, and I'll never understand what many women find meaningful about it. But it's a neutral subject. It's just there. I'm very open about it with friends (not family... that's just off-limits) and my partner... I'll talk to ANYBODY about my periods... but to a certain extent, it will always be the thing that came into my body that I didn't want.
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Date: 2006-04-21 05:27 am (UTC)The very next night, I went to change after skiing and there was a brownish stain all over my panties. My period had started. I wasn't scared; for some reason, I was angry.
I hated my period. I didn't want it. For the first six months, I dealt with it by stuffing a rag, or a wad of toilet paper in my panties. I didn't want to use a menstrual product, because I didn't want to admit that this was really my period.
I never told anyone in my family (mom, dad, siblings, anybody) that I got it. My mother (who had been menopausal for some time at that point) had a stash of freebie tampon and pantiliner samples that she had chucked under the bathroom sink... I started stealing those. Eventually, I'm sure she noticed.
I came to terms with it by the time I was in grade 10, and started managing to buy my own tampons.
To this day, I have no idea why I reacted so negatively. Some of my friends had had their periods and were proud of them; though at a young age I resisted all parental attempts to talk about puberty, my parents were never body-negative. I had four much older sisters who had been menstruating since I was born... I mean, I grew up surrounded with used pads and tampon wrappers.
And yet, something about it was so awful to me, so unwanted. It felt like an invasion of my body, a loss of control.
These days, I'm fine with it. I don't like it, and I'll never understand what many women find meaningful about it. But it's a neutral subject. It's just there. I'm very open about it with friends (not family... that's just off-limits) and my partner... I'll talk to ANYBODY about my periods... but to a certain extent, it will always be the thing that came into my body that I didn't want.