Many of us can recall lines from books that will haunt us for the rest of our lives. One line that comes to mind is from the book Carrie in which the protagonist experiences having her very first period; unfortunately, her mother has never explained to her the importance of a woman’s menstrual cycle, and so she is terrified and believes she is bleeding to death. The rest of the girls in the locker room only exacerbate the issue by throwing tampons at her as they yell “PLUG IT UP!” It is no surprise why she takes certain actions at the end of the sad story ...
The base at such a tragic experience is simply ignorance, and not ignorance on the part of Carrie, but that of her mother. There is a dark line between wanting your child to remain innocent for as long as humanly possible and keeping vital (and inevitable) information from them. Stephen King wrote this book in 1974, but recently, I became very aware that this type of ignorance is still quite prominent today. You can imagine my surprise and disgust to realize it was happening in my own family.
It was summer of 1989. I was in the shower at my sister’s house getting ready to go to Disneyland with my summer camp the next day. Upon towel-drying I noticed something strange; a few drops of red stained my towel. Not once did I think I was bleeding to death, instead I was the angriest I had ever been in my entire life. How could this happen the night before Disneyland?! I told my sisters who then proceeded to squeal with delight and invite everyone just short of her neighbors to bask in the glow of my newfound womanhood. The word “humiliated” does not even begin to cover it. My mother and sexual education course in fifth grade had already taught me all about the wonders of the menstrual cycle (no matter how hard I tried to avoid it); I was one of the lucky ones ...
Years later, as my sisters began having daughters of their own, I realized that they were not as well informed as I was. For some mysterious reason, nearly all of my sisters and my brother were terrified of speaking to their quickly-blossoming girls about what happens when you become a young woman. In retrospect, I think the fear stemmed from the fact that almost all of them became unexpected parents at a very young age. I am thirty-one years old and sans child. Giving birth will never be a part of my future, but I have been around children my entire life and so I do not feel sad or unfulfilled. Sometimes the stars just don’t spell out certain words for some of us. My fiance and I receive great joy whenever our nieces or nephews are left in our care. Sometimes we even fool ourselves into believing we are the “cool” aunt and uncle. Recently, I have begun to see a disturbing new trend.
As my nieces grow and their bodies change, they have no one to turn to. Their parents, as I mentioned before, turn a deaf ear when the questions about sexuality begin to pour forth like so many unwanted marbles spilling from a broken vase. Several times, they have come to me in confidence, asking questions about birth control, cramps and even whether or not a tampon will make you lose your virginity. The last question is always the most unsettling. For some strange reason a few of my sisters and brother have convinced them that if they use tampons they will lose their virginity and, in conclusion, also lose their innocence and trust. How can this be? I ask myself. The moment a girl begins to menstruate she has two choices: 1) Use a pad or 2) Use a tampon. Simple as that. I personally started using tampons when I begin taking Tae Kwon Do. One look at the white uniform and high kicks spelled disaster if it was that time of the month. Now, I will never go back to pads.
