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Bleeding Women

  
  

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Olulabelle
20:40 / 30.08.06
Female bleeding traditionally plays a large part of some magical systems and for many women it is an essential part of their magical being. Simone de Beauvoir, in The Second Sex says that menstrual blood represents the essence of femininity.

Women who live together find that their menses synchronise with each other, in essence their bodies recognise the process in others.

Australian Aboriginal men take part in ceremonies in which they symbolically menstruate and give birth. The resultant power of this is conceptualized as the Rainbow Snake, said to be the source of life.

Ater being told that Jewish men will not shake hands with women who may be menstruating because they are 'unclean' I researched it and found out that in Judaism saving a life is equable to saving the world. 'Words like "unclean" and "contaminated" are common, unaccurate translations for the Hebrew word which describes the state resulting from menstruation, tuma. The dead body of a human being is the strongest form of "tuma" because it represents the greatest loss of spiritual potential. Similarly, the unfertilized egg that is shed during menstruation is also a form of tuma because it could have housed a soul if it had been fertilized.'

I think that's fascinating and an amazing way of looking at things.

I found in thinking about this and looking stuff up that many organised religions have taboos or rituals surrounding menstruating women and we can talk about those things if you want in this thread.

We have had discussions on blood magic before which cover this, but we have not yet had a discussion about how a female who doesn't bleed can follow a magical pathway.

There is a personal side to this.

About seven years ago I had a coil fitted, a Marina coil. This is a Swedish brand of coil that releases a certain amount of hormone and for some women it can completely stop your period. I am one of those women. For a while I liked not having my period and I enjoyed the freedom of not having to worry but over the last two years I have begun to 'miss' my menses. This, in one sense, is ridiculous; why would a woman miss the pain of a period, the hassle of bleeding? But I do. I still have sore breasts and I think I still get pre-menstrual but I can't attribute it to any sort of cycle and it isn't the same as going through the process of your monthly bleed.

Lately I have begun to think of it as an evacuation, a release if you like of the past month's happenings, and it occurred to me that as a woman who has not bled now for a good few years it's possible I may have a large amount of energy 'stored'. In some ways this may not be a bad thing but I think for me it may be. I kind of want my periods back and I don't understand why.

I am not a traditional witch in that I need my menses, I have blooded things but never with menstrual blood, although this is probably from lack of opportunity rather than deliberate intent; if I was bleeding, I am sure I would have used it.

So in some senses, I have started to feel less of a woman.

I have been thinking about removing the coil and rediscovering my menses. I am interested in how this will affect me personally and how it will affect my magical practices. If I am bleeding will I be more aware of my cycle, of the moon, of the femaleness of me? Currently I do not feel a lot of the things my female counterparts do; I suffer little from PMT, I have forgotten my cycle, I don't know when I should feel pre-menstrual or when I am ovulating and I think this has a great affect on me as a woman.

One interesting thing about not bleeding is that I feel less sensual. I am less aware of my 'time of the month' because I do not have one. I do not worry about sex during my menses and I do not worry about the smell of a menstrual woman, or the affect I may have on others.

It appears that the less I bleed the more I focus on it.

I had a conversation with some Barbelith Temple posters at the last Barbmeet about how I don't post much personal stuff to the Temple regarding my magical practices, and I would like to try and rectify that, to begin to contribute personal documentation and experience at a higher level than I have previously. So I thought I would start this thread in part to discover how other people view a woman's menses in regard to magic and in part to document my potential journey from who I am now magically (in relation to not bleeding) to who I may become when it begins again.

I am glad that I have had the opportunity through science to be menses free but I think I would like to now give that way of life up, and to follow my womanly cycle again. The intent of this thread is to be about that journey.
 
 
Princess
22:09 / 30.08.06
I probably won't contribute loads to this thread (lack of womb etc), but I'm really glad it's here. I love this as an idea for a thread.
 
 
iamus
22:41 / 30.08.06
I'm on the same page as Princess here.

Can you tell me, though, a bit more on how the Marina coil works? It must stop the buildup of the endometrial lining in the womb, but how does this effect the release of the ovum?

Though I obviously can't comment from experience, I couldn't imagine inhibiting the process. I reckon I'd have to endure it monthly for a while before I could say that with any conviction though.
 
 
Tryphena Absent
22:54 / 30.08.06
why would a woman miss the pain of a period, the hassle of bleeding?

I was on the pill for a while and I felt out of the seasons. I was still menstruating and my cramps were cut in half but something wasn't right. I used to bleed with the full moon, every month without fail and now I feel like my body is shifting back into the tides and I missed that. There's something about menstuation that connects us to the planet, the way it reacts, responds to the passing of time, counts us through every child we don't have, our bodies have a mechanism built into them. I always found that this connection to my body was incredibly important to magic, that there was something innately organic about me that rooted me to the earth and to mortality and that was a very important aspect of my relationship with Hecate and to shed that blood was to lose something every month and that loss was like connective tissue to my practice.
 
 
Olulabelle
23:07 / 30.08.06
Well.

Fact number one: I didn't know as much about my coil as I thought I did. Fistly, it's brand name 'Mirena' and it's an IUS not an IUD. It works as follows:

It works by thickening the mucus inside your cervix, so making it very difficult for sperms to get through. Also, the hormone thins down the lining of your womb – thus making it unlikely to ‘accept’ an egg. And in some women, the hormone has the effect of preventing the ovaries from releasing eggs. (This helps to make the IUS more effective than the IUD.)

And if you look on the forums many women tell stories of putting on weight (me) and being diagnosed as depressed (me).

That's interesting but not really relevant other than it's another reason to carry on with my resolved plan of action.

I'm glad this thread is interesting, thank you.
 
 
Olulabelle
23:11 / 30.08.06
I always found that this connection to my body was incredibly important to magic, that there was something innately organic about me that rooted me to the earth and to mortality and that was a very important aspect of my relationship with Hecate and to shed that blood was to lose something every month and that loss was like connective tissue to my practice.

That's pretty much exactly how I feel now. Like I'm missing out on a vital part of my magical ability. And maybe that's why I'm having problems with magic - because I don't currently have my bodily tie, my connection to the earth. It's almost like cutting off your power supply but still expecting to charge; in a very weird way of looking at it.

I keep being reminded of gaming and of medical 'powerups'.
 
 
EmberLeo
03:03 / 31.08.06
I'm getting used to the idea that anything I need to think about will just so happen to have a thread here in the top 5 within a few hours of the subject coming up. Weerie.

I've thought about taking birth control like Seasonale, so my period is once every 3 months instead of every 3-5 weeks. But I, too, have the idea that I'd miss my periods, that I need that cycle to keep me aware of time passing, and to re-set periodically. I hadn't heard it put quite that way, so I'd like to thank you for articulating it.

A couple ideas came up to me recently. One was in dreams - the idea that the Vagina is, itself, an altar. In discussing this with a friend of mine, she brought up the idea of menstral blood as a ... sacrament? It's an idea she got out of a fiction book, but I find it fascinating anyway. I haven't wrapped my brain around the implications yet.

The other thing I have heard from my American Indian studies teacher is that her tribe has traditions that keep menstruating women out of group rituals (other than with other menstruating women) on the theory that they're so much more powerful during that time, but in a sort of wild, uncontrolled way, that they would be potentially disruptive to the work being done.

She described it in positive terms, but I find myself automatically interpreting it from a Feminist perspective of "Too powerful, eh? So what you're saying is you men are scared of me when I'm on the rag, so I should go away?"

I'm going through a bunch of stuff right now challenging the feminist assumptions about feminine traditions, and whether they automatically create a situation where women can be treated as inferior, and should thus be rejected, or if it's just that they, like anything, can be twisted to imply inferiority, and the treatment itself is what should be rejected.

--Ember--
 
 
illmatic
05:18 / 31.08.06
Bella, I mention this in every thread about this subject but have you read Peter Redgrove and Penelope Shuttle's The Wise Wound? You really should. It's a brillant book. Lots of practical stuff in there also.

Yup, still in print! I'd imagine you could turn up a cheap copy on ABE, it's been around for so long. It was the first book of it's kind. Their Alchemy for Women is also meant to be very good.
 
 
Goodness Gracious Meme
11:22 / 31.08.06
Great thread.

I hope this isn't too offtopic, but I've been thinking about this from the opposite direction alot recently. Also, long.

I've never taken any form of hormonal contraception, so I've always had periods.

For years, I barely got any side-effects and if I'm honest, was a little stereotypically masculine in that I wasn't convinced by the horror stories of pain/mood swings told by my friends. Appalling, but true.

In the last few years, I've been paid back for that, bigtime.(probably age-related, as I understand that there's often a period of change in one's late 20s/early 30s)

My menstrual cycle seems to have elbowed its way from the periphery of my life to the centre, and I'm not entirely happy about this.

This is intimately connected for me to my absolute lack of desire to have children.

At times, it seems like a jolly wheeze to give someone like me an apparently-functioning womb and ovaries, and the stuff that goes with that. I have joked with MtF trans friends who want these bits that I'll have it whipped out and stored until science makes that possible. (And I have looked into hysterectomy, but the sideffects appear to be pretty full-on.)

Now, as a person who experiences life pretty holistically - emotional energy manifesting in physical sensations, for example, this is interesting, and a little distressing.

This becuase 'fertility' and all that goes with it are a point of extreme disconnection for me.

My identity as 'female', which isn't solid, certainly isn't, to me, connected to my ability to reproduce.

But am I being self-hating/betraying a feminism that would have me proud of my femaleness in all its manifestations?

Or, should I maintain my feeling that femaleness doesn't have to relate to fertility, that this is an essentialising notion.

I'm posting here instead of the Head Shop because part of what concerns me is whether there is a magical relationship that I'm turning my back on, or whether I can make my way to a energy/connection with my body(something that is very important to me, my embodiment in other spheres has been magical to me and continues to be) that circumvents menses.

For eg, I'm very interested in previous comments relating to desire/sex drive, and how these interconnect.
 
 
Tryphena Absent
12:10 / 31.08.06
should I maintain my feeling that femaleness doesn't have to relate to fertility, that this is an essentialising notion...

part of what concerns me is whether there is a magical relationship that I'm turning my back on

If you don't feel the draw then I don't think you're turning your back. The way that people individually connect to these things varies massively and just because you're female doesn't mean that magically you're drawn to something innately female. I've always felt that magic is 9 parts instinct (instinct being a whole host of things including psychological make up) so if that aspect isn't calling you then you're meant for something else.

Okay, now I'm going to be a bit weird. Your body is the sea. How do you feel about the sea when it isn't tidal?
 
 
Goodness Gracious Meme
12:18 / 31.08.06
Ah, thankyou. That's articulated something I've only had as a fuzzy notion. I think if anything, I feel a very strong pull *away* from fertility-aspected parts of my embodiment.

(and not, as per above, from embodiment in general, nor particularly, I don't think from aspects that relate to what I find to be female in that embodiment. My SM practice, and the power it has for me/those around me, for eg, is very much entwined with these 'pulls')

And you've hit on an interesting comparison, as I *love* the sea. As you know, I live near it, and really can't concieve of not doing so.

I love the sea when it's a calm still summer or winter day, sunlight glinting off it, I love it when waves are crashing, and insofar as I do any regular 'ritual' work, it's connected to my relationship with the sea, and its place in my personal history.

But I think I see what you're saying. In fact, I'm far more uncomplicatedly drawn to the sea than I am to my body. (although I say that, but being drawn to the sea carries connotations of drowning in it, which are complex ones given a personal history in which drowning (in this specific stretch) looms large. So, hum.)
 
 
Goodness Gracious Meme
12:22 / 31.08.06
Thinking further (really, thanks heaps N, your post has already been astoundingly useful), I think I feel a strong pull towards a 'female' embodiment that is to some extent *defined by* the pull away from female as fertile.

Which is interesting, given that, in comparison to other posters in this thread, I've never used hormonal contraception so have always had a menstrual cycle 'as nature intended'.

Thinking more, I have occasionally exulted in the rushes of anger and power that the mood swings bring, regarding this, if exterior life allows it, as riding a different me to places I might not neccessarily go.
 
 
Tryphena Absent
14:32 / 31.08.06
I think that the sea acts as both a substitution for and a connection to menstruation for women but I don't know why. I'll talk about this more when I'm not at work and I think there are a few other things I would like to talk about in relation to femininity, femaleness and expectations that are brought about specifically by Wicca and the individual response to this and they would sit well within the context of this thread.
 
 
EmberLeo
18:15 / 31.08.06
Well, I do a whole lot of fertility-oriented work, and am very drawn to it, but I have to say that there's an awful lot of other stuff out there, including distinctly female stuff.

That, and "fertility" refers, metaphorically, to an awful lot of stuff that involves creating things that aren't human children. Do you dive into the creation process in other areas of your life?

My curiosity is whether your push away from Fertility is throwing the bathwater out with the baby because you feel so strongly that definitely don't want children, so anything near that idea feels anathema?

I'm curious if you feel as though you are in some (abstract or concrete) danger of being forced to have children, and are therefore pushing against that?

--Ember--
 
 
Olulabelle
19:27 / 31.08.06
GGM, you say that My identity as 'female', which isn't solid, certainly isn't, to me, connected to my ability to reproduce. so if you were to lose that ability you wouldn't feel any less female. But menses are the result directly of having not reproduced and as such have a slightly different role in femaleness I think than the actual creating of life itself. Although obviously they go hand in hand with reproduction the actual period is about cleansing and clearing and in some ways returning a woman's body to it's most sensual state. It's at that time a woman's body is most 'hers' I think, it's powerful and strong yet no child can grow.

Then the body returns to preparing for the potential creation of life again and the body becomes a tool again, if you like. So, in some ways, if I were not keen on defining my femaleness around the ability to reproduce I think I would feel very strongly about how my menses did define me as a female, but distinctly and separately from the ability to reproduce.
 
 
Tryphena Absent
21:52 / 31.08.06
Olulabelle I agree with you about menstruation and possession of the body, my experience of it is very similar.

Ha, now I'm going to quote myself for clarity.

I think that the sea acts as both a substitution for and a connection to menstruation for women but I don't know why.

Okay I'm going to start by trying to elucidate what I mean by this. Water is essential to life and so is the fluid in which we house children. There's something about losing that fluid, that blood and all of the other elements that go with it that is both the very basis of the organic and a mirror of the motions of the planet that we live on and that's precisely what the sea is. Menstruation is an aspect of magic and femaleness because it's a change of seasons for the body that experiences it. Female magic is often about change and movement and cycles and extremity. In no way does this have to relate to menstruation because those things don't have to be expressed by the body anymore then by ritualistic expression. They can even be created by your treatment of your body in other ways and men are as capable of engaging with femaleness in a magical context as women are. It's about the way that you choose to inhabit what is there and how you connect to it and in no way is magic necessarily about your planetary environment either. For me they are because my own period always mapped on to the cycle of the planet and I came to magic through witchcraft, which often puts emphasis on the moon. The moon controls the tides and I think affects our bodies in the same way making us tidal creatures.

femininity, femaleness and expectations that are brought about specifically by Wicca

Wicca is the point at which a lot of women enter magic and it has expectations about the planet and also in my opinion gender. It's an extremely polar form of magical practice/religion and I dislike that, primarily because the connection between those things is a very individual relationship and the Wiccan structure is very set and thus I worry that women feel magic should be deeply related to fertility for them and feel that they are missing out if it is not. Magic though is an individual calling, something that we respond to personally and if it fits for some that doesn't mean it fits for others. The empowerment that some gain from menstruation is not necessarily empowerment for all women.
 
 
Haloquin
22:07 / 01.09.06
This is an interesting thread. I've been on the pill (hormonal contraception) for several years. It means I have a kind of period once a month, when the pack ends, but its lighter than it normally would be (apparently) Occasionally I run packs together and I miss a month, in fact I just have, and something earlier in this thread about periods being about a kind of release resonated with me. I'm currently feeling really tired and weighed down. All I want to do right now is withdraw and be alone, but I have to work. Strangely I'm due for a bleed this weekend. i hadn't properly put the two together.
Its strange, before I started the pill I wouldn't bleed for anywhere from 5 weeks or more, so my cycle wasn't very regular, and it certainly didn't match the moon. I like that it does when I'm on the pill, but I do wonder how I'd feel if I was in my own rythm. Keep meaning to find out, but I mostly enjoy my periods as a sign that I'm not pregnant... I'd like this to continue.

I do find my periods are linked more directly with non-babymaking methods of creativity.

I've used menstrual blood in occasional pieces of magic, mostly as offerings recently.

I'm really not thinking straight tonight as its past my bedtime, but I had a thought to contribute... but I'm not sure what it actually was now. Mostly, thanks for starting the thread. I'll try and post properly when more awake.
 
 
Princess
14:24 / 13.09.06
Not to innaproprietly ask the intimate details of an almost strangers realtionship to her menstrual cycle, but

any updates?
I'm finding this really interesting.
 
 
Ticker
15:38 / 13.09.06
I've been reading about Persephone's sacred Lake Pergusa in Sicily and the evidence of a menstrual cult (including menses initiation rites) on its shores. The lake turns red supposedly from a sulpher-algae interaction every so often.

Anyhow it is an amazing article with numerous scholarly footnotes. The high points (for me) include the archaelogocal evidence of a neolithic women centric worship center predating Demeter/Persephone that was apparently dedicated to the Spring (as in seasonal) & Death Goddess and Her bleeding womb of the Lake. Then the later Demeter/Persephone cult arrives and this all gets bundled in. A point which is often overlooked is that Persephone, while married to Hades, doesn't have any children. In fact the pomegranate is listed as a contraceptive (and here I thought it was a fertility symbol because of all the seeds). So again there is a connection with fertility, bleeding, and death without directly resulting in progeny.

There was also a fair amount of mention that women who do not live in electrical light based societies tend to collectively bleed around the dark of the moon as the increased light of the waxing moon triggers ovulation.

Persephone's Sacred Lake and the Ancient Female Mystery Religion in the Womb of Sicily -Marguerite Rigoglioso

For myself I use my blood to feed magical items that I do not wish to make blood thirsty (as in life taking) but to create a bond between and to appease any blood needs. I have no idea what my neighbors think when the see me pouring bloody water on the tires of my auto and motorcycle. When I water the garden it is a lot less obvious.

I use washable pads purchased online from women raising children and supporting themselves with earth friendly practices. I keep organic cotton tampons in the house for my female guests' emergencies.

A few years back I tried the pill as a science experiment ( I kept saying it was evil to other people and then decided to see how evil). I cried every day at 3 pm for a week like clockwork and that was enough.

My spouse elected to be surgically sterile a few months back so no babies but still blood. It struck me as rather profound when reading the research on Goddesses that are revered for creating the world from Their blood not with definable offspring.

I know someday I will stop bleeding and all that bruterus (say it with me: brute-r-us) bite your head off power will shift from cyclical to full time. I'll get hairy and wizened and finally be able to shake my cane properly.
 
 
Princess
16:19 / 13.09.06
Is this an internet thing or is in one of those bothersome "book" objects?
 
 
Ticker
17:26 / 13.09.06
I had to get the book because I don't belong to a library that has access to the online thingmo. The book is a journal btw is tiny and great and I'm reading an article on The Women of Sodom and Gomorrah: Collateral Damage in the War Against Homosexuality.

Online article requires MUSE login

here's the lake and a nice shot of the racetrack killing it
Lake Pergusa

the Lake restoration project
 
 
Princess
17:29 / 13.09.06
I will have MUSE access in a fortnight! HOORAY!
Thanks xk.
 
 
Elettaria
00:06 / 17.09.06
Olulabelle, if you need contraception, you'd rather be menstruating and you don't mind your periods getting a little heavier, have you considered switching to a copper IUD? The effectiveness rate is pretty much the same, it's marginally higher for Mirena but since it's well over 99% for both I wouldn't let that stop you.

I spent the best part of a year once being amenorrhoeic due to Depo Provera, and while I was overjoyed to be spared the menstrual migraines at first, after a while I just found the whole thing creepy. It's like being stuck in a room with a strong light on 24 hours a day, you feel a little lost without your personal biological rhythms. I hadn't noticed how important they were to me before, but I sure as hell appreciated them afterwards.

I do know what people mean about not feeling quite like a woman if I'm not menstruating, and politically I resent it somewhat because it implies that you're not a woman if you're post-menopausal, say, or amenorrhoeic due to illness, and that your gender identity has to be tied to your bodily functions. The feeling persists, however. I'll do what I can to make my periods shorter and more comfortable short of hormonal intervention, but I'm happier bleeding once a month. Oddly enough, I've felt more in touch with my menses since using a menstrual cup, which actually hugely reduces the amount of time I spend in contact with my blood or able to see any signs of it.

The fertility thing is strange. I do appreciate knowing that I am a (presumably) fertile youngish woman, which I am reminded of monthly. Having a copper IUD means that I'm still menstruating, a little more emphatically than before, and that probably makes me feel like I'm still fertile; I'm certainly still ovulating, the mechanism which prevents pregnancy happens further along the process. I can't get pregnant, though, and the heavier periods are in fact a sign of this rather than of increased fertility. It's a sort of strange doublethink, feeling like my body is normal (once I got over the initially weird idea of having a small device in my uterus, of course) but also feeling completely safe from pregnancy.

Incidentally, you're a little off with your researches on Judaism, at least with how they appear here. For starters, it's worth pointing out that you're describing a minority practice, perhaps only done by 1% of Jews (at least in the Diaspora), the ultra-Orthodox. Men are not permitted to touch their wives during menstruation; they're not permitted to touch other women at all in case they may be menstruating. Ultra-Orthodox Jewish life is sexually segregated as a result. It goes back to a menstruation taboo based on fairly standard notions of pollution, and many Progressive Jews find the whole idea pretty offensive, as well as feeling that restricting touch, both sexual and non-sexual, in this way is unhealthy (never mind sexual repression, what about hugs, damnit?!). I've never heard the theory of tuma that you cite mentioned, and I doubt that it is informing the practice of very many people. I do know that some ultra-Orthodox Jewish women find the cleansing ritual of the mikveh very spiritually meaningful, however.

Islam also has a menstruation taboo which plays out in slightly different ways, although when it came up in a women's interfaith meeting a few months ago the Muslim women strenuously refuted the word "taboo", saying, "But it's just hygiene!" No one I have spoken to in the UK has heard of this, but a woman I know in the US who's doing a PhD in henna has written papers on Muslim traditions (I think in Africa and possibly India) of painting the hands with henna, often very elaborately, to signify where they are in their menstrual cycle. The henna stain, which shades from orange to red to dark brown, reaches its peak around ovulation, giving rise to the myth that henna aids fertility, and has faded away by the next menses. This does at least solve the problem of not being able to ask women the delicate question of whether they're ritually "clean" or not. I find it fascinating, as it's being incredibly public about something that is usually hidden and even regarded as a pollutant in this situation; it's furthering a menstruation taboo which I regard as repressive and derogatory towards women, but at the same time it's artistic and celebratory.
 
 
Olulabelle
12:36 / 17.09.06
Hello Elettaria, that was a really interesting post. Thank you for contributing to this thread.

I'm fascinated by the henna painting, as you say it's a very visible celebration of something normally so hidden. I can't translate that into a contemporary behaviour that doesn't feel weird. When I think of advertising my period it just feels a bit, well, rude. I know that's a very prudish thing to say but for Western women I think that menses are very rarely openly discussed, at least face to face. I remember when tampons were advertised for the first time and what a big deal that was.

Thanks for your advice about the copper coil, that's a really useful thing to know. I have not yet been to the Doctor and one of the reasons is that I have not settled on another method of contraception.

I've got more to write here, lots to engage with in the thread but I'm busy now so I'll come back later.
 
 
Elettaria
13:28 / 17.09.06
Catherine's no longer got her paper on menstruation and henna in Islam available free, but there's a sample here. She's possibly the world authority on henna by now. I don't know if that particular practice still exists, but bridal henna nights are common in many parts of the world, I went to one myself last year (Israeli-English bride, French-Algerian groom). Running "henna", "menstruation" and "Islam" through Google has brought up a few interesting-looking sites.

"Good afternoon, madam. I see from the vivid stain on your hands that you are just past ovulation and thus ritually clean, shall we shake hands?" Yup, it seems really weird to me as well, though I suppose it would seem normal if all the women in the community were doing the same, and I rather like the idea of being able to make something publicly creative out of my menses. And I'm fairly relaxed about discussing menstruation, though you rarely get the chance since the taboo is still so widespread. I've got a friend (who's pagan, incidentally) who has hypersensitive senses and who says she can tell where a woman is in her cycle by smell, though I think this applies more to people she lives with or sees regularly rather than random strangers on the street.

As far as I know, the only difference between a hormonal and a copper IUD is that one acts on your hormones and can thus cause many of the side effects of the progesterone-only group, such as stopping menstruation, while the other doesn't affect hormones (the copper is a strong spermicide, they reckon) but tends to make periods a bit heavier and crampier. Apart from that it's pretty much the same, you have a small T-shaped device in your uterus, insertion and removal are the same, don't get one if you have an STI or have had PID in the last three months and don't be put off by the myth that nulliparous women shouldn't have them. One bit of good news is that I hear the hormonal effects should stop immediately when you have the Mirena removed, rather than, say, cursed Depo which hangs around in your system for ages.
 
 
Olulabelle
17:59 / 17.09.06
Nulliparous is smashing word. You win Word of the Day for that.

My friend also says that he can smell when women are menstruating and he can smell when a woman is pregnant as well. He too is a Pagan. Perhaps it's a strange kind of Pagan superpower...
 
 
Princess
22:42 / 17.09.06
Weirdly, I can smell when teenage girls and cats are menstruating. Adults and teenage boys less so.
 
 
Olulabelle
08:02 / 18.09.06
One of the problems that I see in women advertising when they are menstruating is that it leaves them very open to sexist comments about their behaviour. There are so many jokes (made by men) about women being irrational and impossible to communicate with when they are menstruating; I guarantee if we had a tradition of openly advertising it, some idiot in a shop would point it out if a women was trying to return a product or some such thing.
 
 
Elettaria
12:18 / 18.09.06
Oh help, you can tell you've been hanging around an IUD forum for too long when you use terms like "nulliparous" without even noticing. I've caught myself using not only "nullipara" but "nulliparae" as well lately.

I suppose I was imagining an ideal world where there were no menstruation taboos and where female cycles could be celebrated joyously and publicly without that sort of risk. Not that I'm saying that women have to love their cycles, of course, they're perfectly entitled to be infuriated by the revolting things our reproductive systems can do to us. I do find that I get on better with mine if I'm nice to it, so to speak. At the moment we're generally taught to hate menstruation and cover up all signs of it, which I don't think fosters particularly helpful attitudes.

I don't think it's a pagan superpower in her case, she's also got ME and has had this sensory hypersensitivity all her life. This makes her a challenge to cook for, as she finds almost everything overpoweringly flavoured and scented.

Ach, the women's interfaith meeting is in two days and I'll have to think of something to say about Judaism for this month's topic, which is puberty. We could really do with a pagan or two, they seem to be the only ones who actually celebrate sexuality from what I hear, as opposed to coming-of-age rituals which happen around that time but ignore puberty. You get quite a lot of bar mitzvah boys chickening out of singing their Torah portion because their voices are in the middle of breaking.

Did anyone here actually do anything to mark their menarche, preferably celebratory, or celebrate someone else's, such as a daughter's?
 
 
Ticker
12:26 / 18.09.06
It took me a second to filter that to mean if women display a social signal as opposed to advertising on TV. Yeah it's early for me still.

Personally I'd love to go take a few days to go hang in the hut with the other ladies but given how sexist our culture still is signalling it would, I agree, lead to asshatery. The suggestion that I'm unclean or irrational would most likely lead to rousing my ire even at my most hormonally calm moments.

As for the blood scent I will always remember the fabulously uncomfortably moment while watching Pitch Black when it is revealed the bleeding gender bending girl has potentially doomed them all. (though why an alien species would care about the scent of human blood can only be attributed to the speed of plot)
 
 
Tryphena Absent
17:42 / 18.09.06
One of the problems that I see in women advertising when they are menstruating is that it leaves them very open to sexist comments about their behaviour.

Best to play up to these things. I spent my youth surrounded by boys (and quite a few uptight girls) and everytime one of them made a sexist comment involving menstruation I would clutch my stomach, bend over and start howling about the pain and the blood leaving my body in a violent rush. Generally in public. Everyone found this quite embarrassing but frankly they deserved it. I would happily do the same thing now.

I guarantee if we had a tradition of openly advertising it, some idiot in a shop would point it out if a women was trying to return a product or some such thing.

At which point you grab an applicator tampon, rip open the packaging and shoot it right in their face. Can you even do this? Hopefully I'll get an opportunity to try.
 
 
Kauna
09:24 / 20.09.06
Slightly O.T. but maybe important:

Concerning the copper IUD: women with contact or metal allergies should be tested for copper allergy or sensitivity before considering a copper IUD - the combination IUD + allergy is NOT amusing, bodywise -
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
10:10 / 20.09.06
Offtopic but can't resist: Nadezhda Krupskaya, you so need one of these.
 
 
Elettaria
12:29 / 20.09.06
Good heavens. The things I miss out on by not having used a tampon in years. I like the macho male posing with the beastie in question.

IUDs may have other metals lurking around as well, for those with metal allergies. Someone with a nickel allergy in the US discovered the hard way that Paragard (the only copper IUD available in the US) uses copper-coated nickel but neglects to mention this anywhere.
 
 
Ticker
12:34 / 20.09.06
manly men using tampon guns. I dig it the most.
 
  

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