5 Women Reveal Their First Period Stories

Having a biological inevitability of around fifty percent of the population is a biological fact. However, to most young girls, the first occurrence of a menstrual period in their lives is not seen as an achievement of maturity but a time of severe fear. The story, however, is almost the same in both generations, as it goes all the way down to Millennials and Gen Z, with fear, confusion, and shame being the common denominator.

“I Thought I Was Dying”

In the case of Aneesh Rawat, 44, a Delhi resident, the recall is several decades old, but the panic is still fresh. She was still in Class 6, at the age of about ten or eleven. One minute she was sitting in school, the next she could see that her dress was stained with red. She failed to realise that the stain was blood and did not appreciate its normalcy. She rushed into the washroom with one of her friends.

She remembers nothing about periods. We believed that I had been injured internally. We had even said to the teacher that I was dying.

A fear of death is a universal aspect. Blood, without previous experience, is universally viewed as an indicator of injury. Her teacher took pity on Aneesh. She did not chastise her; she probed the matter, gave her a pad, and softly advised her on how to use it. The rest of the gaps were later filled by her grandmother. The goodness of that teacher saved her from the permanent disgrace, though the first terror might have been prevented altogether.

The Trauma of Misinformation

Shruti Das, aged 29, of Kolkata, had to deal with another form of horror. She had an older sister at the age of thirteen, but she never heard about menstruation. Her thoughts went through turmoil when she found blood on her pants at home. She had heard rumours amongst acquaintances, but children are prone to spreading myths and not facts.

It occurred to me that it was going to happen on a daily basis, Shruti says.

The idea of bleeding on a daily basis was crushing. She spent days crying and was traumatised by a biological action merely because nobody had taken the time to discuss the cycle. The facts that she had compiled in the playground were not true and just served to intensify her pain.

Silence at Home

The experience of Noida of Srishti Srivastava reflects this confusion. She is 31 years old and can remember an incident of a wet afternoon way back when she was twelve years old. There was no talk at school or at home, and she sat hours and hours, bleeding, without sanitary articles, and without knowing what was going on.

It was only resolved as her mother got home, but the experience was met with ambivalent feelings: anger and embarrassment.

it is a pity, I wish somebody had prepared me, Srishti says. No girl must have fears of anything so natural.

Her biography highlights a bitter truth. Parents tend to postpone the discussion until the right moment. In the case of Srishti, it was already late.

Bullying and Public Shame

Ignorance is not only a girl’s issue, but it goes to boys, which may prove to be cruel in its ramifications. Sharanya Awasthi, 28, was brought up in Melbourne. Her account shows that it is not an Indian problem alone, but a failure in education all over the world.

Her first period in school occurred when she was eleven years old. She was in a panic, and internal panic was replaced at a very short time with external humiliation. Boys in her class noticed.

They made fun of me since even they were unaware of what a period is, she describes.

They failed to understand, and thus they laughed at her. This episode did a lot of harm to her self-esteem. Sharanya feels that the shame would be eliminated once they start teaching girls and boys about the issue of menstruation the right way, in educational institutions. Boys need to know it is normal. Ignorance breeds bullying.

The Power of Preparation

Of these five women, there was only one who was ready. Sanskriti Sharma, 23, of Delhi, was the beneficiary of inquisition instead of a school syllabus. At the age of ten, one of her classmates began menstruating; this raised a furor of quiet gossip in the classroom. Sanskriti did not heed the whispers at all, but went back home and demanded some truth out of her mother.

Not hesitating to tell Mom, she shared everything. When the time of Sanskriti, herself, came, a year later, the response was quite different.

“It was uncomfortable, yes, but I wasn’t scared,” she says. “I was prepared. That made all the difference.”

Also Read: 6 Clear Signs You Are Skilled at Reading Others