My Period: We’re getting personal about our periods. The path to menstrual equity starts with talking about it.
Trigger warning: This article discusses symptoms and treatment some readers may find distressing.
“Are you…eating ice?” my mom asked me quizzically one evening. My parents have one of those large, fancy fridges that makes crushed ice at the touch of a button and I was overcome by an intense, mouthwatering desire to fill a glass with crushed ice and gobble it down. Soon after, I’d regularly crunch ice cubes the same way you’d eat a packet of chips. The thought of my next ice cube fix would cause me to salivate and I’d hide my camel-like chewing from my horrified friends and family. Biting through sharp cubes of ice would send pain shooting through my back teeth but I didn’t care; I would continue crunching, wild-eyed and manic. Looking back, it sounds almost comical. What I didn’t know at the time was that I had developed pica — a strong compulsion to eat inedible objects — as a result of iron deficiency anemia and my extremely heavy periods. Eating ice would be just one of the many insidious symptoms that would take over my life throughout the next year. My physical and mental health would both be significantly impacted.
Nearly a year before my ice fixation took hold, I found myself standing at the sink in the office toilet cubicle, washing blood out of my linen dress. Panicked and covered in antibacterial hand soap, I rummaged through my arsenal of period products. I’d bled through my change of period pants. I had no more tampons left. I’d switched to a period cup but I knew it wouldn’t last long. I was bleeding through my period products on the hour. At the time, it was the heaviest period of my adult life. Right on cue, pain gripped my stomach, thighs and back. In my soaking wet dress, I slipped out the back door of the office and grabbed a two-hour train from London back to Manchester, where I live. Standing in the train aisle, my eyes dimmed. I felt weak and like I was about to pass out. A doctor on board asked me if I was okay. I wasn’t but I smiled and said I was. I would continue to bleed like this for 10 long days, every single month for the next year. I stopped leaving the house. A period this heavy should have sounded the alarm. Get this checked out. Sadly, it would take a long time before the cause was investigated.
Like many Black women, I have uterine fibroids: benign, non-cancerous growths that develop in and around the womb (approximately 80% of Black women will suffer from fibroids by the age of 50). Fibroids don’t always cause symptoms, although many people, like me, experience unbearable abdominal and back pain, and heavy and painful periods (known as menorrhagia) that last longer and are more frequent than average. Much like conditions …read more
Source:: Refinery29
