Essays on All Things Menstrual
Let's begin with the ending! Some final words from...
"The Bloody Truth:
A Psychological and Cultural Study of Menstruation as Lived and Experienced by Women"
(pp. 379-381)
On the whole, this study shows that in many areas of the culture there is a thin
vein of knowledge, understanding, and intuition which supports an altogether different
vision of menstrual bleeding and of being a woman, bodily and concretely. However
slight or small it appears, this understanding is lying dormant, waiting for its seed to
blossom and grow. Ideally, if this seed were to blossom, women and menstruation would
be viewed, as Tavris, Martin, and others suggest, as a taken-for-granted, accepted natural
part of woman’s being.
In this respect, menstrual bleeding might be viewed in the culture as skin, hair,
and nails are viewed, i.e., aspects of the body, all of which shed and renew. All three
aspects may or may not be treated with elaborate rituals, but nonetheless, they all involve
and require some degree of attention and care, in either female or male being. In the
current culture, the importance of one’s hair, skin, or nails may or may not be amplified,
exaggerated, or become occasions for adornment or regular celebration. The decision is
left up to the individual and her peers.
Ideally, by the same token, if women were fully accepted in the culture,
menstruation could take on the same sort of physical and cultural meaning. Menstrual
bleeding, accepted outwardly as a given of female being could be personally celebrated
or not, outwardly announced or not, but could always openly remain part and parcel of
the uniqueness of being female. Indeed, such an appreciative acceptance of the female
body could herald a world in which bodily being itself might be valued, noticed, enjoyed
– not merely as commodity or appearance to others, but as a living reality which opens
us to our human world with all of its particular colorations. Even further, a society which
finds menstruation worth mentioning, or at the very least, too important to ignore, would
also make space for and conclude that the whole of female being is worth seeing,
hearing, speaking, and being understood. Within this framework, the whole of male
being could also take on a new coloration, no longer needing to stand against or opposed
to supposedly inferior female being. As a result, in such a world, all relationships would
shift, e.g., between mothers and daughters, sisters and sisters, brothers and sisters, and so
on. Relationships between men and women, platonic and romantic, would foster a new
sort of non-possessive and non-oppressive love between two sorts of valued beings, both
appreciated for their unique embodiment. Neither would ever have to apologize for their
particular kind of being again.
Finally, at the start of this research, my director asked one thing of me, which is
what she should tell her own daughter about menstruation. Whereas, at this point, her
daughter may very well be grown, married, and have her own children, perhaps a
granddaughter or two may reap the benefits of this study. Overall, what one says to a
daughter or a young, developing girl is not necessarily the point. Rather, the point is how
a mother or any significant person in the life of a girl regards her own body, her own
menstrual cycle and those of others. What makes a real difference is how shamefully
she lives or how much she lives without shame. Avoiding conversation about bleeding
when it is perfectly acceptable to do so is a mistake and a reflection of one’s own
absorbed shame about menstruation and about being a woman. Reflecting on and
coming to terms with one’s own menstruation is the best gift of all for any girl or young
woman. As Northrup asserts, “Clearly, we cannot take our daughters into a space where
we have never been” (1998, p.161).
However, just in case any mother should go looking for words to actually say to
her daughter, which is also not a bad idea, here is a brief something which makes for a
perfect beginning or a perfect ending to any conversation:
Menstrual blood is not exactly like the blood in the veins and the arteries. …
Sometimes menstrual blood is pink, sometimes it’s scarlet, sometimes it’s
purple-black, or reddish-brown. It’s the special blood in which all our lives
started. (Sheffield, 1989, pp. 15-16)
References (for these pages of the research only)
Martin, E. (1992). The woman in the body: A cultural analysis of reproduction. Boston: Beacon Press.
Northrup, C. (1998). Women's bodies, women's wisdom. New York, New York: Bantam Books.
Tavris, C. (1992). The mismeasure of women: Why women are not the better sex, the inferior sex, or the opposite sex.
New York: Simon & Schuster.
Sheffield, M. (1989). Life blood: A new image for menstruation. (Bewley, S., Illustrator). New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
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