Bleed Free
Image: Pixabay
I was a late bloomer for my time. I guess my body was not ready to shed the drop that would permit me to enter this so-called “womanhood”. As friends and family around me came of age through this pseudo right of passage, I waited. It was some months before my body was ready. Some very long months with friends and family posing that dreaded question at me. “Did you get your period yet?”
At last, it came, that drop on my undies which caught me by surprise. Amma told me to put a pad on it, I did and went on about my day as if nothing happened. I knew something had changed, I felt it in my body. Every month for the first half of this journey I would find a dash of red, a signal my time was here. As mother nature did her thing, I aged, somewhat comfortably to my surprise. Slowly but surely understanding the rhythm of my organ as it cycled and shed.
I could not remember when it was that I found a sensation based indicator that my time was here. I never tracked my cycle in those early days. However, symbiotically I knew when I felt a whoosh it meant the floodgates were opening, my time was here. From the moment of the first drop to ten years later, I relied on poison to capture what fell out of my body. It was either inserted in my vaginal canal or stuck on my undies. Catching the flow of red as it came out in coagulated chunks and injecting me with chemical toxins.
“Have you ever tried a menstrual cup?” The question came from a colleague of mine who has been using the product for some years now. Intrigued I shook my head ‘no’ and asked her what it was. She happened to have her cup in her bag and pulled it out. This little cone-shaped cup was placed into my palms as she explained to me the benefits of the product. By this time in my life, my cycles had become irregular with the sensations now changing to shooting pains in my pelvic region. Intrigued by the idea of this product I agreed I would give it a try. The same week I went out to my local pharmacy and picked up the product, a branded menstrual cup with pretty packaging.
A month after the purchase it was go time. I followed the instructions as I inserted the cup into my vagina. Insertion was the easy part. Some ten minutes later panic set in. I panicked as I attempted to pull the cup out and it remained wedged in my vaginal canal. ‘Fuck’. The thought set in as I tried to collect my cool and went in again to pull the cup out. Success! It was out. Relief came with courage as I felt invincible. I gave myself a day and tried again. The second insertion and withdrawal of the cup went well. Intrigue had set in the moment I pulled my cup out, filled with a jelly-like substance.
This was what my body produced. This was the blood that held stigma, shame and the “definition of purity”. I held the cup in my hand and climbed into the shower with the residual blood running down my leg. I poured the blood out into my palm, the same one a similar cup was placed in some months ago. I cradled the blood and observed it. Passing it between my hands as the stains left its traces. I let it fall into the shower and watched it wash away with the water from the faucet. Fascination overcame me with mixed excitement. For once I looked forward to bleeding.
I felt a release within me. This feeling of being trapped letting go as I went the next few days of this cycle with a cup. It gave me the courage to research menstrual cups and other relevant, eco and biologically friendly products. It was not too long after trying my first menstrual cup did I come across the whole free bleeding movement. Following my research, I gave that a go too. The feeling of true liberation was undertaken that following cycle as I bled at home and used the cup at work.
I felt empowered stepping into the shower watching the remnants of dried blood become diluted with the water. I felt whole sitting on the toilet as the coagulated blood hit the water in the blow and dispersed into rings of red. It was beautiful to wake up on my days off during my cycle to know that I could just bleed. A bleeding that did not have to be contained. This was one little step in my journey toward breaking the stigma of bleeding as a Tamil womxn.
