Question up for discussion...

[inchcafe.livejournal.com]

Do you remember your very first period?

It was August 19th, 1993. I can't believe I've been bleeding for almost ten years! I was at my grandma's house, sleeping in her bed with her. I couldn't sleep well at all and kept waking up, feeling like I had to pee, but nothing would happen. Then, at some point around 3am, I had a pink tinge on my toilet paper.

I put some toilet paper in my underwear, crawled back in bed and tried not to cry. I was silently sobbing and sup-supping and my grandma asked me what was wrong. I repeatedly told her nothing was wrong, but she kept asking. Finally, I said, "I *sup* I, I *sup* think I got my *sup sup* pe-ri-od!" And I cried and cried and she laughed at me and said, "Well, let's go get you taken care of."

She took me into the bathroom, showed me where the pads were, got me some Advil and water, then let me call my mom (who was babysitting) and tell her. All I remember about that conversation was after telling her, she said, "OH JESSIE!!!" The rest is a blur.

Then I didn't have a period for 3 months, and being the naieve child I was, worried that I was pregnant (from being raped when I was quite small)... And now, here I am.



What's your story?

Comments

[bezajel.livejournal.com]

I was 12, I never paid much attention to the date, which is sort of sad I suppose, but it didn't seem all that important at the time. (It is hard to beleive... 8 years.. woah). Anyway, it was during the day, and it must have been a weekend, because mum was home. I went to the toilet, and my undies were red. I think I stuffed them with toilet paper (I was too scared to use the sanitary products in the cupboard), and I went downstairs and told my mum that I thought I had my period. She said "let's see?" or something. So i showed her my undies, and she set me up with pads and things. No drama, not very memorable at all in fact.

[cuzgoatsrkool.livejournal.com]

May 1998..i was in grade 8....quebec trip..staying at la maison demiers. had to share a bed with a girl older than me. in the middle of the night i had really bad pains and i wanted to get a teacher but i didn't know which room they were in and the girl next to me was so asleep she couldn't help me....so i went back to bed...then next morning i went to the bathroom and my underwear was all stained reddish brown and it didn't clue in to me what had happened..so i waited and then called my mom and said i thought i had my period and started crying lol...then she said thats why she packed me pads, because she got hers when she went away from home the first time for a couple weeks.....i put a pad on and thought it was the most uncomfortable thing..so i took it off...of course i didn't stop bleeding...so then i put one on again lol...it was hot out..and i wore long dark pants and my jacket the entire trip....then i got a "mariner pride award" at the end for wearing my school jacket the whole time when everyone else was in shorts and tank top..lol....i was weird...but i was so paranoid about someone seeing..i sometimes even wore shorts under track pants, and my jacket to cover myself completely up...
i didn't get my period for a few months after....was very irregular..then i went on the pill lol..and here i am.

[skunkchild.livejournal.com]

I never paid much attention to the date either. I know that I was in seventh grade though, so that would make it oh, 1991 or 1992. I was 11. I was making dinner with my mom in the kitchen...chopping mushrooms for dinner. I felt like I had to pee and went to the bathroom. My underwear was rust-tinged as was the toilet paper I wiped with. I know that I mini-panicked. My mom was cool about it, but I was upset. We continued making dinner. I've grown to appreciate my period, but I still don't like cutting mushrooms.

[chewybarf.livejournal.com]

It was April 19, 2000. I was at my aunt's house, for my cousin's birtday. We were set to leave that day, and around noon, when I went to the bathroom, I saw that my underwear were stained with something that might've been blood (it was pretty dark, so I wasnt sure). I told my mother, who was in the living room. I wasn't crying, or scared. I was just suprized that it had come at that time. After i'd been done taking a shower, etc. we drove home. I felt sortof akward, but... that was it.

[one-more-grrl.livejournal.com]

For me, I know that I was really anxious to get my period because I was in 8th grade and every one of my friends got theirs in 6th or 7th. And everytime I went to the bathroom, I thought the slightest discharge might have been my period, and I prayed to get it so that I could be "normal."

I finally got it in January when I was in 8th grade (1995) and it was a Saturday ... I was relieved that I was at home, and I had a few pads just in case that my mom gave me with the "talk" ... her talk which consisted of giving me a book about puberty and blossoming into a woman and all that lovely crap, and a box of pads. I didn't freak out, or cry, cause I was happy I finally got it. I didn't tell my mom either cause I feel like I don't need to share with the world what's going on in my panties. (and yes, I realize the hipocritical irony how I'm sharing this with a LJ community, and I wouldn't even tell my mom)

[bezajel.livejournal.com]

lmao...
just that last bit, thats so funny :)

[mactavish.livejournal.com]

It's weird for me to read all this "it was 2000," or "it was 1993," because for me, it was early 1976 -- very late February or early March. There was snow on the ground. I was wearing white Levi jeans, a white snap-at-the-crotch body suit, and a maroon nylon track jacket with white stripes up the sleeves. (We were dirt poor, and yes, I was cold.)

It was second period of the day, gym. I went in to take off my clothes, pulled off my jeans, looked down, and gasped at the huge red stain in the crotch of my white jeans. I knew about periods -- it's hard to be the fourth of five girls (and a boy!) in a one-bathroom house without knowing about periods, and my mom had never been shy about biology with us. I have never had a myth about where babies come from, either. I took off my jacket and tied it around my waist, cut gym, went to the bathroom and stuffed my undies full of toilet paper, and stayed that way for the rest of the day. I walked home like that, and yes, I was cold!

I was living with my older sister at the time, and the next morning I finally said, "Oh, my period," pretending it had just shown up that morning. She got so excited, went to the store and got me mini-pads, assuming that was all I'd need. (It was a gusher of a period, I went through those like crazy, and used toilet paper when those were all gone.) When my brother-in-law came home from where ever he was that morning, she yelled across the parking lot to him, "MARY GOT HER PERIOD!" and my initiation was complete. ;)

I've been mostly regular ever since.

[circumspectly.livejournal.com]

me too, me too!! well, it was july of '76, at any rate. it was the night before my 4-h fair started, and i didn't want to tell my mother...i don't know why, except i never wanted to tell her much of anything. when my grammie came to pick me up the next day to take my stuff to the fair (a whole carload of food goods and craft goods) i told her, and she got me the necessary stuff. i guess she told my mother, because suddenly there was this discussion about periods which i was appalled at. i don't know why. i'm not sure i want to know why.

so anyhow, i never had cramps, never was impacted in any way at all until much, much later.

[jynxgirl.livejournal.com]

I got my period in 1991. I think it was January.
I was in math class, and had to pee, so I went to the bathroom. My school only had one at the time. I sat down, and noticed there was something in my panties. I freaked out thinking that I'd maybe crapped my pants (I'd had the flu at the time.) I was only 8 years old, and my mother had never explained menstruation to me.
She also never explained sex to me. I learned all about that the hard way.
Anyway... I went home, called my best friend, who was much older. I told her that I was bleeding, and she said, "Wow.. you're kinda young to have a period."
Then she explained it to me.
I got my period every month for a year, then it stopped because I was pregnant (yes... I said that right.) It started up about 6 weeks after the baby was born, and now here I am, infertile, with really irregular periods.
Sometimes I wonder if my childhood mistakes have come back to haunt me.

[prettynpink106.livejournal.com]

did you keep the baby?

Re:

[jynxgirl.livejournal.com]

No. I gave her up for adoption. The father killed himself when he found out, and my mother never knew (I'd ran away from home.) I wanted to. But couldn't.

[dwarfstar21.livejournal.com]

I believe it was in the summer before I entered sixth grade. I was 12. My mom and I were getting ready to go the pool, and I went into the bathroom, and there it was. I said to my Mom, "Mom, I think I started my period...". So she did the underwear inspection thing (how embarrassing) and set me up with pads. I also bled all over my sheets before I realized what was going on. So, then we went swimming, with a huge pad in my swimsuit! My mom was all choked up about it, and I guess if I'd learned how sacred my body was then, it would have been a bigger deal. Now I wish we had celebrated more...

[brokenclocks.livejournal.com]

I.. don't think I've introduced myself yet, being non-introduction-liking o.O or whatever. But.. I got my period three or four years ago-- I didn't tell Mother, nope.. I waited two or three days before I told her. I used the stuff we had in the cupboard because since Grandma was obsessed with teaching me all I'd need to know -- the summer before fourth grade, mind you.
Anyway, hi.. and.. I'm probably younger than most [if not all] of you.

[sashajohnston.livejournal.com]

It was 4th May 1999 when I got my first period, I was on a 6th grade camp and I remember feeling really "sick" the day before (I had cramps, but hadn't put two and two together) and then the next morning I woke up, decided to go the bathroom and then pulled my knickers down and sat on the toilet. I was so sleepy I didn't even noticed for a few minutes that my undies had a big red brown stain on them.
I didn't have a clue what to do, so I stuffed them full of toilet paper and then rushed back to my sleeping bag in the bunk bed and started to cry. I was absolutely terrified, not because I didn't know about periods or anything, but it had just scared the crap out of me and I didn't have pads or tampons.
I told everyone I felt sick and then one of the teachers came in to see if I was okay, and I just broke down crying and told her about it, she got me a pack of pads and I was fine for the next two days until I got back home.
When my mum picked me up, I asked her if we could go to the supermarket, she asked why and I said to buy pads. She just said "Oh, did you get your period?", I nodded, we went, we bought, and that was it.

Trauma!

[thezerosystem.livejournal.com]

I got my period in the spring of 5th grade, the night before the day of open house. It was really light and my mom got me mini-pads and I felt all special, thinking 'this period stuff isn't a big deal at all!' The next day at school we ran the mile, and someone (a nasty girl who always made fun of others) yelled out "oh my god, you've got blood all over your shorts!" I was mortified and ran inside and locked myself into a stall, crying my eyes out. It took the school nurse, my gym teacher, and my classroom teacher to coax me out of the bathroom. They made sure the hall was empty so I could make it to the nurse's office. Then I called my mom, still crying. My teacher went and got all my things and said I didn't need to worry about homework tonight. Then she told me of when she got her period at a friend's house and she cried then, too (I remember being astonished at thinking of my teacher, seemingly old as dirt, as a kid like me!) Everyone was really nice, but it was so upsetting. And I lied to everyone why I went home, too. But everyone knew and some made fun of me. :/ Kids can be mean sometimes. I do sometimes wonder if I was older, if it wouldn't have been as big a deal (I remember how traumatized my best friend was that she hadn't gotten her period by 8th grade). One of those growing up experiences that's hard to forget!

[therealocelot.livejournal.com]

My real first period came in May or so of 1992. It was very light - I never actually used a pad, and didn't stain more than my panties. I think it only lasted a day or two.

My mom noticed the stains when doing the laundry, and commented on it, but I said it wasn't my period (I don't know what I thought it was...), and she didn't really say or do anything else.

The next one (which I generally consider to be my first period, since it was the first that had any real flow) came in late June, when my family was on a two week car camping trip all over the western US. I started the second day, and used toilet paper since I didn't have any pads with me. That didn't work terribly well. I stole one of my mom's pads when we were visiting the Mormon temple in Salt Lake City, but then got scared (why? I don't remember) and took it off again. By the third day of my period, I was on my last pair of unstained shorts, and just praying it would be over soon.

I went to the bathroom, and discovered that this pair of shorts was now stained as well. I sat there and cried till my mom showed up. I told her what had happened, and she got me some clean something (I can't remember...her shorts maybe?) and a pad, then washed out the stained shorts for me, and that was that.

[shannonbobannon.livejournal.com]

April 15, 1985--I was 12. It was a Sunday. Last day of Easter Vacation. We watched Poltergeist on tv and then I went to the bathroom. I have a habit of checking the toilet before I flush, in case anything out of the ordinary appears, I guess. And there I saw it. "Hmm," I said. My mom passed by in the hall. "What's that?" I pointed, knowing what the answer was. "Looks like you got your period."
Well, the only pads we had left in the house (mom had a hysterectomy young) were the HUGE pillow-like Kotex pads that you needed a belt like thing for. God, they were horrid. So I do that and go to bed. I remember we were sleeping on the living room floor cuz my grandma was in my mom's bed. I cried myself to sleep that night with the realization that, technically, I wasn't a little girl anymore. Twenty minutes into womanhood and I missed being a kid already.
I got ready for school the next morning, I was convinced the world could see the pillow I had to wear until we got to the store later that day. I've been more or less regular ever since.
Sorry this was so long.

[sashajwolf.livejournal.com]

I was 13, and I think it was late winter/early spring, which means it must have been 1983. My mother let me have the day off school to get used to the practicalities of it all, and took me out for a Likörschokolade to celebrate (hot chocolate with an added liqueur, kind of like Irish Coffee; mint liqueur was our favourite at the time).