Becoming a Woman

If you have followed my blog with any regularity you already know that Mama was not good at talking about sex.  She had a major hang up with the topic. I suppose I haven't reached forgiveness with her yet on this one.  Yes, I understand that this failure comes from her generation's understanding that talking about sexual issues only promoted sexual activity.  Today educated folks accept that nothing could be further from the truth.  Here's another blog dedicated to Mama and Sex.  

Around the age of 11-12 I, like all my girlfriends, wanted to find answers to all our sexual questions.  Some of the younger mothers were honest and shared information which eventually found it's way down to the rest of us who had older Mamas that told us nothing. What facts we could not find out, we guessed at.  Sex was the number one topic in 6th and 7th grade. Some of the 'early bloomers' already had their periods so the rest of us 'late bloomers' got our information from them.  I got lucky one day while looking through a magazine and found a Kimberly Clark advertisement for a booklet titled, "What Every Girl Needs to Know About Becoming A Woman".  For me, this ad was like discovering gold.  I ran home; read the ad fully; copied the address carefully on an envelope, and sent it off along with my dime which was to cover 'postage and handling.' The ad promised to send the booklet in a plain brown envelope.  


My next big problem to solve was how to retrieve the plain brown envelope from the mailbox without Mama knowing I had sent for it. I dedicated myself to being the person who got the mail each day until that brown envelope arrived. It seems like a month before it arrived, but, on the day it arrived I hid it and myself in the barn till I could get it read and understood.  


It was amazing with diagrams, pictures and ANSWERS I could understand.  I must have read it six times that day!  In the front of the booklet there was an explanation of why girls have periods and how to know when to expect your period. There was information about how to manage cramps. Toward the back of the booklet was a list and pictures of Kotex products to use during that time of the month.  There were sanitary belts, a variety of sanitary napkins, tampons and pictures explaining where they were placed and answers to such questions as, "Can a tampon become 'lost' in your body?" Here were all the answers I wished my Mama would give me. After I read the booklet several times I shared it with my friends at school.  

About a year after the booklet arrived I had my first period.  It was there one morning when I awakened.  As excited as I was to have finally arrived at womanhood, I still had to tell Mama about it. How would I tell her that it had occurred when we had never discussed the process?  Mustering up all the courage I could find that morning, I walked into the kitchen were Mama was scrambling eggs at the stove.  I simply said, "I've started my period." She looked shocked, stopped working with the eggs which then burned as she walked away saying, "I'll take care of it."  She walked into her bedroom.  I stood by the stove and the burned eggs.  About ten minutes later she came back with a pair of my panties to which a thick layer of clean cloths had been pinned into the crotch.  Handing them to me she said, "Here, put these on.  We will need to change the rags daily." That was it!  I was horrified! What was this??? I had imagined a sanitary belt and a Kotex pad, at least. Recovering a bit from my shock, it finally occurred to me that she had prepared for me the same solution she had used herself to manage her own periods. Later that day I told my Dad that I needed to go to the drug store to get some stuff.  I didn't know what he knew, and didn't care, because it was something I had to manage on my own.  I bought a sanitary belt, a box of Kotex, and from that point on Mama and I never had another conversation about the issue for the rest of my life. This was an important lesson for me personally because I took control of my own body from this point forward. 



As a college professor for over 30 years I shared this story with my students each semester when we covered body changes across the lifespan. I used it to launch a discussion about the importance of teaching children about sexual matters and body changes. Now as an older woman well past menopause, I look back on this story still trying to glean the many lessons from this small chapter in my life.


Now I present this story for you to reflect on how you managed your own body changes related to menstruation and other sexually related topics.  When did you take charge of your own body and sexual issues?  I would love to hear your comments.