‘Powerful, Connected, Grateful: How I Learned to Love My Period
By Harmi Eunoia
Powerful. Connected. Grateful. These are just a few of the ways my period makes me feel.
Powerful. Without periods none of us would be here. I wouldn’t be writing this and you wouldn’t be reading it. If periods were to be completely eradicated, then the creation of all human life would cease. For me, the mere thought of this causes an electrical charge to surge through my veins and energise my entire being. It makes me realise that we are not only powerful but strong.
Connected. Periods can open up a can of emotional worms. I use my period (those incredibly lengthy six days) as a time to reflect and connect to my inner emotions. To confront any issues I’ve been facing emotionally that have been secretly lingering in the background. To embrace the power of being someone who menstruates.
Grateful. Not everyone gets to share the same relationship I have with my period. Not everyone has the same ease of access to sanitary products as I do right this minute.
It was my aunt who told me that my first period had started. We were getting dressed after going for a swim and as she was handing me my clothes, she brought up whether or not I had been introduced to the phenomenon we call the menstrual cycle. Looking at her confused, I said yes. Why?
She proceeded to present my blood-stained white knickers to me and watched as tears welled up in my eyes. The primary reason I broke down was the fact that my journey into womanhood had now been confirmed. A voice in my head was telling me to start ‘acting my age’, whatever that meant for a thirteen-year-old girl. The idea that I was growing up and now had more responsibility filled me with so much unexplainable dread that I hated life whenever I was on my period.
Because of that little voice, my period began to affect me, more so mentally than genuinely menstrually. As someone who never took pride in embracing their emotions and their softer side, living through those six days was unbearable. Whenever I think back to that time now, I am reminded of how selfish and ungrateful I had become.
This enlightenment didn’t hit me until a few years later during a trip to Paris. We had stopped at a service station on our way to Dover and on the back of one of the toilet cubicle doors was an Act!onAid poster about girls and women in war-torn countries who have no access to hygienic sanitary products. It made me think how much I take all these things in my life for granted.
Who’s to say I won’t be one of those girls in my next life, free bleeding, or using dirty rags? Or the unfortunate 1 out 10 schoolgirls in Africa who has to miss school because she doesn’t have access to any sanitary products, or feels unsafe using the toilets at school? What if I become part of that 50% of young females in Kenya who have no access to period products? Or any one of the over 40 million menstruating women in India who cannot afford them?
Most period-oriented taboos originate in countries that lack the resources to help their women get through this time of the month: taboos such as the one maintaining that a period makes a woman impure, dirty and sinful. In many places, women are made to refrain from washing their genitals whilst menstruating. However, bathing regularly, especially whilst menstruating, can prevent bacterial infections.
If there’s one thing I’ve learnt from my relationship with my period, it is that the experience is unique to everyone. Some will be filled with hatred and dread for the bloody week that lies before them, fearing the intense cramps, emotional toll, uncontrollable outbursts of anger and frustration, endless cravings, late-night body temperature switch-ups, leak scares and everything else that can come with our time of the month. Others will maintain a more reflective approach, making it a time to help understand themselves at their most vulnerable and truly figure out why they feel the way they do.
Whatever your relationship with your period, know that it is a totally normal and natural thing.
