an extremely young age, instilling in her mind that menstruation was a gross thing. “In fifth grade we were watching videos and one white girl looked at me and said, ‘Your period is probably dirtier than all of ours.’ When I asked why, she said ‘because of your dark skin.’ At that point it had nothing to do with what was learned in class. It a matter of associating the color of my skin with dirtiness of my period. That I still remember that inci- dent says a lot.” In order to alleviate this burden, we need to find a way to accept and welcome discussions about the period, without making it the core of who we are as women. “In fifth grade we were watching videos and one white girl looked at me and said, ‘Your period is probably dirtier than all of ours.’ When I asked why, she said, ‘because of your dark skin.’” “It is an important aspect of women’s health and sexuality. Menstrual shame reflects body and genital shame,” Johnston-Robledo says. “Reducing the stigma attached to menstruation can help women with body literacy, healthy sexual decision making, other reproductive health behaviors, etc. It is not an isolated sys- tem we should hide or eliminate. …That doesn’t mean we all need to be free bleeders, paint our lips with men- strual blood, or create menstrual art. We just need to recognize menstrua- tion as an important aspect of women/menstruators’ bodies. It is worthy of conversation and academic scholarship.” So many different influences silence women, shame them. Ignoring that shame is not tackling that prob- lem. We need to face the root of it. Talk about it. Make it normal. Make it acceptable. Say the word. Say ‘period.’ It’s our only hope for change. -Shivani Narang
struation is often omitted. Also pads and tampon containers should be stocked! They are always empty.” The Emotional Toll of Stigma I remember the first time I saw my blood at 13. I didn’t know what it meant — were my breasts going to grow hugely? Was I officially a proper woman? Did God not want me in His temples anymore? Was I dirty? At 13, I already felt disgusted with myself for something I couldn’t con- trol. The emotional burden of that is something I cannot fully express in words. It makes me feel subdued, hypervigilant, and minimized. “I think this unnecessary stigma against periods teaches girls from a young age that they need to be ashamed of their bodies,” Patel said. “The amount of energy and stress this causes young girls creates yet another barrier that girls face in excelling in the ways they want to excel. I think young womxn and espe- cially young womxn of color, queer womxn, and low income womxn are criticized heavily for decisions they make about their own bodies. This in turn results in social isolation, emo- tional distress, and low self-esteem.” For Narang, menstruation became associated with racism and sexism at
fearless and comfortable about her “body and whatever secretions come out of it,” a widespread conversation has not yet been sparked because of the way the administration is set up. “I think there’s a lot of resistance from the administration. For example, even attempts to address sexual assault are just to show that something is being done rather than actually accomplishing progress,” she said. “A lot of departments have yet to get in on the conversation [about periods], but then it just goes back to the admin- istration not taking the issue of men- struation very seriously.” So, what can we do to make men- struation a greater topic of discussion on campus? “I think normalizing menstrua- tion is important,”Johnston-Robledo said. “Open conversations that do not pathologize and stigmatize menstrua- tion can go a long way. There is so much interesting coverage of periods in the popular press these days. It would be great to post those stories on social media, comment on them, bring examples up in class. You could also encourage your campus resource staff to incorporate menstruation into their resources and workshops. It is funny that, even for workshops about women’s health and sexuality, men-
This article is first published in Uc Berkeleyʼs Weekender.
17 www.indiaparentmagazine.org
October 2018
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online