How it is

This post is about my period, so you know if that makes you uncomfortable ...

I have never been a fan of pads, they are so uncomfortable, and besides a couple of times when I was a teenager, and during my post natal bleeding, I haven't really used them much at all. Gotta say I am lucky (I guess) and have a very mild flow, that's probably why I could get away with it. As a teenager I just used tampons, and nothing at all on my light days, until I found the wonder of all womanly wonders; the diva cup. And bless that because tampons are gross too. Oh how I love my diva cup.
This time around the moon I couldn't find my cup. I just didn't know what to do.  I still don't know where it is! It has come to a point where I can't buy pads and tampons, it would cripple my little environmental heart, and I'd be left feeling defeated all week long. No, no, no.
Instead, I've done the obvious, which is make myself cloth pads. Nothing special, I just cut up an old towel. I may end up making myself some fancy ones, ah la Soulemama's Handmade Home, with snaps and all, but for now these are working fine. Actually better than fine, I am pumped about this. I can't even believe I've never done it before. I guess its necessity and invention, right?

 I think the terry cloth works so wonderful because of it providing a larger surface area, like microvilli of cells, for absorption, and I haven't experienced anything close to a 'leak'. I can throw them in the wash with Olive's cloth diapers and best of all there is no feeling like I am wearing a sweaty disposable diaper myself! I'm into it, thats all I'm saying.
 This has me thinking about when I was 14 getting my period, the options presented to me being pads or tampons. There wouldn't have been anyone in my life to show me otherwise, but obviously I wish there could have been. I think realistically being 14, and given a Diva Cup, I most likely would have said "you have to do what!?!" and then been embarrassed and not into it because at that age I remember 17 magazine and being bombarded with O.B ads. I would have been uncomfortable, because I wouldn't have wanted to be abnormal. At least not about this. It takes a couple of years to 'own' your period, and step away from what you think is the norm. If ever at all. BUT, there is a big but here, the Diva Cup (or Keeper) is a revolution because it was a stepping stone towards making me feel healthy and clean, NORMAL about my period. I even look forward to it, and I wish I had been given that option much earlier.
 The same goes for cloth pads. I think there is even some therapy in bleeding this way, uninterrupted, and washing it away, then starting fresh. Without chemicals next to your skin, and dyes and perfumes that suggest that you must smell bad. I think that bothers me most about pads and tampons the suggestion that menstruating is gross and dirty, I think it's what bothers me most about 17 magazine, and O.B ads. 'No applicator at all, it just hides in your hand, no one will know!' 'new crinkle free wrapper, so discrete!'
 In Islam, women don't pray during their period, so everyone knows when you are, and when you aren't. While that part of their religion is a suggestion in itself that menstruating is dirty (or unholy), and that bothers me, because in turn it is a suggestion that women are dirty (or unholy), I really appreciate that in their culture, because everyone knows, it isn't a big deal at all, and is spoken about openly. I think that is best.
 Obviously if we accept that we don't have to be like men (because they are so clean and holy all of the time!) we would feel more comfortable about ourselves and our periods. Imagine if you could say 'I'm not going to do much today because I have cramps and need rest, I think I am just going to nap, and then later wash out my cloth pads.' hahaha how wonderful.
I just might have to start saying that. You know to get the ball rolling...