Happy Periods? Hah!!

Whoever came up with “Have a happy period” tagline should have glued up their ass and made to sit on a chair tied down with a rope with a sign on their forehead “Have a happy seating”. Seriously, who has a happy period? Ask any girl, any woman, does she have a happy period? What about those PMS days when we need medicines to keep ourselves from murdering someone out of frustration? What about the psychotic mood swings, emotional attyachar and stress and confusion that make it hell for us? What with all the prayers to mother nature that we don't want her monthly gift, but she didn't give a refund option?

Jokes apart, periods can sometime be royal headache (along with waist ache, back ache, stomach ache, etc etc) if we don’t get people who understand what it is for women to keep working on these 5 painful days. Sometime it leads to mental stress to the extent of blood pressure. Sometime when it happens unexpectedly in public when you are still due 5 days, it leads to embarrassment and humiliation too.

I remember how it felt when it happened to me. I was 16 and was giving 10^th boards. I was due 10 days, and suddenly menstrual bleeding started in the examination hall while writing science paper. Waist and back ache were making it impossible to sit straight and bleeding was increasing. I tensed up. I thought sooner or later some lady teacher would come and I might be allowed to go to washroom…wrong! The two male examiners never got replaced. After half an hour I decided it was no use waiting for a lady teacher, else I might spoil my paper (and my seat and be center of joke and humiliation) and called the examiner. I thought so what if he was male, he was a human, must have a wife, he would understand. Wrong again!! After explaining my embarrassing situation patiently and frankly, all I got was a smirk, and an ultimatum that nobody could be allowed to go out before 3 hours of exam were over…board examination norms.

“Only 2 and half hours more, sit down and don’t argue. And if you really want to go, submit your paper and don’t come back.”

I gave up on trying making him understand the urgency of situation and sat down to write in that state.

Two hours, and my situation worsened. I am one of those girls who get spasms/cramps and pain on the first day. All such women reading this would know medicine is needed if we want to keep going, and here I didn’t have a napkin even! Horrible! I was unable to concentrate in my science paper. Finally, after writing as much as I could, I gave up. I left a 10 marks question even though I knew the answer very well. It was in heart, wanting to come out from pen. But by then I was too upset with what was happening and didn’t feel like writing.

Before leaving the exam room, I made sure I was still in a condition to walk out in public, and then faced the teacher and said, “Just because of you I lost 10 marks. If I get poor marks, sir, you will be the one to its blame”. He shamelessly smiled and I walked out of the class with an angry face, still glaring at him.

This is my story, but it’s actually not just my story. Many girls face this daily just because people, men, don’t understand what it is to women. Such men are not social animals. They are just animals.... You show off your pride by humiliating girls? And you call yourselves men? Go drown somewhere you peanut brained morons!

Even if I leave out those who take pride in women’s humiliation, then frankly, how many of you have noticed your wives go cranky for a week? How many of you really help her in cleaning and cooking when she is down? I can bet on anything, most men do not even notice when their women are down with stress and back pain. Just because she doesn’t complain, you go on loading her with your daily burdens. Too lazy to get a glass of water yourself, aren’t you? I have seen girls bursting out in tears when their periods start in public. If a woman is not around, not many men come forward to help, they are too busy pointing at the girl and giggling like a girl trapped in man’s body.

Periods are not something to be embarrassed of. Please understand this, and fix this in your brain. Just because it started in class or on a picnic or in situations you cannot escape, you need not cry. Patiently look for someone who would understand and without any hesitation explain your problem. You are not tainted if you are menstruating. Forget what Nani and Dadi taught you about menstrual rules…don’t walk into temple, don’t touch this, and don’t do that, don’t speak it out loud before members of male species…blah blah blah…these things are not tradition or culture. These things are blind superstitions. This is hesitation that makes these 5 days much more difficult than what they really are. Every such tradition had a scientific logic behind it in old times because in those days we didn’t have as many facilities as we have now. Now there is no need to feel ashamed. If you are calling the menstrual cycle impure, you are calling whole process of reproduction impure. It is nature’s rule, how can you judge it to be pure or impure being an insignificant human? I don’t think girls need to be ashamed of it. Can you men bleed a week and not die working? You won’t come to this world if this reproduction cycle doesn’t exist, and you make fun of a girl and enjoy in her despair? Shame on you!

If our strictly traditional elders loosen their mythological, ancient, superstitious-and add whatever adjective you wanna add-traditions, and men become more understanding and start treating us as humans when we are down, we might really have a Happy Period. Mere saying doesn't make it happen.