First Blood
Well I guess someone is bound to tell us the story of their first period…it may as well be me.

I was an early developer - 5'4" by the time I was 10, took a size 5 in a shoe and a size 10 in proper ladies clothes. I was taller than pretty much all of my teachers in my last year of primary school and so it was naturally time for my body to start the messy business of growing up.

Except….

I was a good Catholic girl from a good Catholic family who went to a good Catholic Convent school.

Sex didn't exist.

Babies were planted by divine flashes of light and earnest prayers.

'Family planning' consisted of saying Hail Marys and having a funky sense of rhythm.

I knew that sex existed, I knew it was fun - I can't say where I got these ideas from but I remember playing with the girl next door and our Sindy dolls would have sex - I had a doll with short hair so she was the man and he would lay on top of the long haired woman Sindy and writhe around in pink plastic ecstasy.

I had no conception of how babies were made. None.

And because of this I had no idea whatsoever about periods, menstruation, and even less idea about the male reproductive organ…

I was, dear reader, a total innocent at the grand old age of 10.


And it was at this age that nature decreed I should climb aboard the cycle of female life that is menstruation.


I don't remember the moment I started producing blood but I do remember running constantly to the loo and then fashioning makeshift sanitary towels for myself from toilet paper.

It was the school holidays so only my mother noticed my strange behaviour.

My mother kept asking what was wrong with me, had I diarrhoea?

No, I was fine.

I kept this up for three days before I finally cracked.

I honestly thought that it would go away if I ignored it.

I was fine.

I was bleeding to death slowly.

I was fine.

It would go away.

It just kept on coming.

I was ruining pair on pair of knickers.

Finally on the morning of the fourth day I got up and discovered it still hadn't stopped so I gave in and ran into my parents' bedroom crying,

"Mum! Mum! I can't stop bleeding!"

The look on my mother's face was that of pure fear and horror.

My dad sighed and got up to make breakfast.

My mum took me into the bathroom and talked to me while I had a bath.

She gave me the basic rudiments of knowledge - ladies have these so they can have babies.

No, they don't go on forever, you get a break - they only last for around five days each month.

I asked a similar question some months later when I was taken to purchase my first bra - Will I have to wear this all the time - in bed too?



And with that my mother handed me my first packet of stick on sanitary towels. She was modern - none of this looped stuff for her! But sadly these lumps of wadding bore more in resemblance to a shedding cotton wool house brick than an all action skinny winged piece of freedom.

So my days of wearing two towels, two pairs of old knickers, no swimming and avoiding PE began.

Once my mother had finished talking to me she got straight on the telephone to my grandmother and my headmistress to tell them that I had become a Woman.

One benefit was that I got to use the staff loo at school as it had a bin in it.



And the sex education?

Eventually when I started senior school - all girls' Convent - we were given five pages of notes on human reproduction to read for homework in the first year (year 7).

Thank god for magazines like Just 17 - my parents were only too happy to order these from the newsagents for me. I became an expert.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Thu 7 Aug 2008, 17:16, 16 replies)

I was 12
and well prepared by a very modern minded mother. Still scared the bejeebus out of me the first time though.

Twenty odd years later, I just wish the bloody (pun intended) things would stop!

Same with sex education - I got waaaaay too much info from mum, which rather put me off. Briefly.
(TheWeeWitch hasn't been here much recently .., Thu 7 Aug 2008, 17:27, closed)

Of course someone would tell the story of their first period
And it had to be you didn't it!

*clicks*
( Bazongaloid, Thu 7 Aug 2008, 17:31, closed)

Al
I see it as my duty to humanity and b3takind to leave no stone unturned in my experiences of life.

Nothing is too personal or humiliating for me to share.

I do it for you so you don't have to.

;)
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Thu 7 Aug 2008, 17:34, closed)

My daughter got hers
at the same age. But it didn't happen while she was at home with me. Oh no.

She was on a cruise with her mother and her mother's new husband.

And she got the runs from the water in Mexico.

And she got seasick.

All while sharing a cabin with the aforementioned newlyweds and both brothers.

When she told me of this I didn't know if I should laugh or weep.
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Thu 7 Aug 2008, 17:38, closed)

I knew my sister had started when
there was a sudden abundance of tampon-packets in the house. I honestly thought my dad and the cat had started too.
( mistaspakkaman and the inedible shifting caterpillars, Thu 7 Aug 2008, 17:46, closed)

@TRL
Oh laugh for sure, but probably not in front of her.

@chickenlady - and I'm grateful for the sterling work you do.
( Bazongaloid, Thu 7 Aug 2008, 17:46, closed)

Fortunately
she now has a sense of humor about such things and tells the story with a laugh.

At the time she told it to me she had the expression of one who is very aware of how embarrassing the story is to them, but is telling it anyway to see what the reactions will be- a sort of grim half smile, with lots of direct eye contact.

And it being me, I cringed and laughed and said, "Oh god, I'm so sorry you had to go through that!" And then we both laughed.

A good thing she has my sense of humor.
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Thu 7 Aug 2008, 17:56, closed)

Loon
you must be a hell of a parent. I was really close to my dad growing up, but I'd rather have scooped out an eyeball with a spoon than told my dad a story like that!

When I told my husband that our daughter had had her first period, he looked me in the eye and asked,

"Why did you think I'd want to know that?"
(TheWeeWitch hasn't been here much recently .., Thu 7 Aug 2008, 18:02, closed)

Well...
It was a year or two later that she told me the story- I guess she was 12 or 13 at the time. She'd had time to process it by then.

I remember the first time she asked me to take her to the store and refused to tell me why- she just insisted that we needed to go RIGHT NOW.

A light bulb went on in my head. "You need to go get... ahem... feminine supplies?"

Through gritted teeth: "Yes."

We got to the store, and I was firmly instructed to stay in the car by my 11 year old daughter. Classic.

Now she just goes with me, gets them from the shelf and tosses them into the cart with the groceries with as much emphasis as if it were toothpaste.
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Thu 7 Aug 2008, 18:14, closed)

@TWW
my mother insisted on telling my father, over the breakfast table, that I had become A WOMAN. was quite excruciating, for him and for me.
( ascorbate, Thu 7 Aug 2008, 18:51, closed)

I was blessed.
Started at 13 and knew exactly what it was and it didn't concern me in the slightest. More of a 'Oh shit! this is it for the rest of my bloody life'.
( girlinthehole, Thu 7 Aug 2008, 19:20, closed)

I'm still trying (unsuccessfully)
to picture a Catholic with a "funky sense of rhythm" - class!
(Che Grimsdale Best before:, Fri 8 Aug 2008, 10:18, closed)

^VitaminC
I got mine when I was 12. After trying to ignore it for a day, I finally cracked and told my mother. And do you know what she made me do?

Tell my father myself. At supper. It was so excruciating. I really didn't want to, but she just sat there and shouting at me till I finally cracked and screamed "IGOTMYPERIOD" and ran upstairs to plot her doom.
(The Empress it seems you CAN polish a turd!, Fri 8 Aug 2008, 10:53, closed)

I'm starting to think that maybe I'm unique.
My ex was the one who told me that my daughter got it, though both boys mentioned it as well, but my daughter also said something about it to me and I reacted as though she had told me she had cut her hair- polite interest, nothing more. Since then she's been very matter-of-fact about it and hasn't seemed overly embarrassed about it.

Am I the only father who reacted that way?
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Fri 8 Aug 2008, 12:54, closed)

TRL
Nope, my dad has always had pretty much the same attitude.
( Madam Marlboro wonders if you've found her yet, Fri 8 Aug 2008, 14:23, closed)

My dad and I have never discussed it
It's just not the sort of thing I would discuss with him.

The only men I do discuss it with are boyfriends/partners or mates. But men in their 60s tend to not have a great deal of interest in menstrual cycles strangely enough ;-)
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Fri 8 Aug 2008, 18:04, closed)