Weddingbee Blog

(Picture courtesy of www.igougo.com
No matter how much marketing Tampax, O.B. or Always do,
getting my period will never make me feel like
joyously skipping through a field of flowers.

People always tell you what a joy it is to be a woman and three weeks out of every month, I completely agree with this statement. I love the fact that my body has nice curves and that I have the option of getting all dolled in a dress or a skirt to show off my legs.

However, on that fourth week, when good ol’ “Aunt Flo” comes to town, I deeply envy all the men I know.

Much to my chagrin, Aunt Flo and I are old bedfellows at this point as I was lucky (or unfortunate) enough to get my first period when I was 10 years old. In a serendipitous twist, it all happened a week after my fifth grade class had its first health lesson, or as I like to call it, “The Southern Ontario Sex Ed Special.”

Whether or not they still do this to unsuspecting preteens, I cannot say, but back in 1992, our class was forced to watch, co-ed, a neon coloured film called “Changes” before being introduced to “Bernie” and “Bernice.”

Life-size cloth cutouts, their surfaces were covered with Velcro, so that, as the Peel Board certified sex-ed instructor talked about our changing bodies, she could rip off and smack on body parts to aptly demonstrate what these changes would look like.

Unfortunately, Bernie and Bernice had already seen their share of bewildered elementary schoolers, so by the time they got to us, they looked a little mangled. Plus, their Velcro was severely gummed up and wouldn’t properly hold their assigned body parts, a fact that we became aware of in the middle of a vague discussion about what was going to happen to us “down there” (this was the fifth grade, remember, so there was no talk of what those parts were used for, only that they would become different).

As though it had somehow been carefully orchestrated, in the middle of what was actually a reasonably somber moment (we had all finally stopped giggling over the word “penis”), disaster struck and Bernice’s left boob (a flesh colored beanbag) and Bernie’s boy bits (a pair of stockings stuffed with cotton and shaped to look like male genitalia), fell straight off, leaving them the victims of the first (and thankfully only) felt mastectomy/castration I’ve ever been witness to.

Needless to say, the second they hit the floor, we erupted into gut-clutching laughter and the lesson was over. But like a character in a cheesy after school special, five days later, I realized I probably should have been paying attention when I got my first “monthly visitor”.

In spite of how “magical” everyone insisted this turn of events was, it made me feel like hell as my cramps and headaches doubled me over in pain. My mother tried to cheer me up, telling me what a beautiful change this was and that we should talk about it, but I remained mute and eyed her suspiciously from under my blankets. You said I could go swimming and horseback riding with this stupid thing but it’s all a lie! I thought angrily as I lay in bed with a heating pad pressed against my abdomen.

Slowly, I began to discover why some people referred to it as “The Curse.” Not only did it hurt, but it was often highly irregular (ranging anywhere from 20 to 40 days between periods) and seemed like it went on forever (10 days at a time). It was only five years later, when I finally went on the pill, that I gained any control of my cycle and started to feel like a normal person again.

However, recently, I’ve started to experience pain again as my pharmacist switched the brand of birth control I was on. For the first month, I did not notice a change, but for some reason, the second completely took the wind out of me and left me nauseated and reaching for my trusty old heating pad again.

I plan to switch back next time I get my prescription refilled, but on the off chance my body doesn’t automatically react to the switchover and I’m laid up like this the week before the wedding, I need some advice from the Hive - what do you do when you’re suffering through Aunt Flo’s visit? Do you drink teas? Do you eat or avoid certain foods? Do any of those over-the-counter remedies actually work? Share your secrets!

(Also, to help some of you ladies out that are dreading the red sea will interfere with your big day, go check out mymonthlycycles.com. It’s a period calculator that will help you figure out when you start and when you’ll end.)