While I’m not sure what statistics are now days for when young girls get their first periods, I remember that I got mine when I was in 8th grade. The exact day is something I don’t recall either, but I remember trying to figure out what was going on with me, and later on figuring out how to properly use a tampon applicator with much trial and error. Shoving it up there several times wrongly, and it going in painfully crooked, but I'm assuming a lot of girls experience this.
Fast forward to 12th grade, with several years of Mother Nature generously giving me my gift on the correct date that it was due, I started my first regimen of birth control. I was not sexually active, but I wanted to be prepared. I started out with a shot called the depo, after which Shark Week basically went away for the first month, but I decided that I didn’t like the rapid weight gain that came with that prick so I didn’t get a renewal. And off birth control I went, still not sexually active. The Painters were horribly hit and miss at this point on scheduling. Finally, I started dating my husband and we got married as soon as I turned 18.
We pretty much started right away trying to conceive a baby, but my Crimson Wave never really recovered from the shot. In addition to having my Monthly Visitation messed up by Depo-Provera, I went through 3, almost 4 miscarriages. The 4th was my eldest son, and the doctors had said that I had miscarried him because they couldn’t find his heart beat in addition to bleeding for over a month straight. Needless to say that when I found out I was still pregnant it was quite the emotional roller-coaster.
After my first son was delivered via c-section, Rag Time never returned to any semblance of normalcy. Aunt Erma’s visits would occur anywhere from 4 days after the previous one had ended to 4 months later, and would last ranging from 1 day to 3 weeks. It was horrible, and frustrating and it made getting pregnant with my second son very painfully emotional. My husband and I would have sex constantly so that we didn’t miss any chance of my day of ovulation. We spent hundreds on ovulation and pregnancy tests and had finally given up hope of having another child after being diagnosed with PCOS. Finally, one day, we had a wonderful little surprise of a positive pregnancy test.
After my second son was born, again, Code Red was unpredictable. My husband and I wasted no time and we started trying again for a third child, mainly because we didn’t think it would happen. When my second son was 9 months old, BAM, we found out we were expecting our daughter. My daughter arrived, and I will just say that having a girl is a completely different feeling than having a boy.
Miscarriage is definitely a painful topic, but I like to think that the baby’s soul is just passed on to the next child waiting to come to you, and if you decide not to have any more, they are still yours in the afterlife. In between pregnancies, I had an additional two miscarriages, but I’ve come to terms with them.
I had originally planned to wait longer until having #4, but when my little girl was 1 and a half, it felt right to have my potentially last. We decided that the best way to try to get pregnant was to do 30 days of sex. Sure enough, not only was it super fun, but we conceived. After our sweet boy was born, Mirena was the birth control of choice, because while I wasn’t 100% sure I didn’t want another, I didn’t want to get pregnant for at least 5 years, nor did I want my husband’s tubes snipped yet.
I have a super high riding cervix. With each of my children, the doctors, nurses and midwives would always put their hands together to compare hand sizes. This would allow them to see who had the longer fingers as to best reach my cervix. Well, getting the Mirena in was just as difficult. It took 3 different midwives to come in and, at last, shove it on up. It was very painful getting it through, but they did it. I’m not a big fan of having sex when the Beaver is Angry, and quite frankly think it’s gross. It’s okay if other people want to do it, I just don’t like it. Well, the Mirena is a very effective kind of birth control for me because it made me abstinent. I bled for basically 6 whole months so I had to get very creative with how I would please my husband. Finally I was done with my extended red beast so I went and had the bloody Mirena removed.
The Tide was finally turning! After dealing with a little bit of aftershock from the removal, I was able to eventually hang up my open for business sign for my husband. One month later, on the 2nd, I knew the Redcoats were coming by the telltale painful throbbing of my lady parts. A month after that to the exact day, I had to hang up the Out of Order sign again. ‘Was this a potential pattern?’ I thought, and sure enough, another Blood Moon passed on the same day only a month later! I don’t think I had ever been so excited about seeing TOM regularly.
Well, as of August 2016 I decided to get a job to help out a little with expenses around the house. Baby was old enough that I didn’t feel guilty about going back to work. It was a short search, surprisingly, because I had been out of work for 6 years taking care of my kids. I am a huge fan and contributor to the arts, as well as having a love of psychology, photography, therapy, and being understanding of those struggling. So when this perfect job presented itself and the hiring manager just jumped at hiring me, it felt really good to be wanted. I would be working at an all girls private high school. The school is also an institution for those struggling and they partly do therapy through all forms of arts. The girls suffer from depression, eating disorders, body image issues because some of them are in transition into becoming men, and many other issues that require therapy.
Back to being less serious; the very first month I was there, the Carpet Stainer (yes I know that’s not technically a word) didn’t show up until the 5th. For a few days I was terrified that I might be pregnant. This is where having a regular meeting with your Red Headed Friend comes in handy or makes your stomach tie itself in knots. After the Flood Gates had finally opened, I couldn’t figure out what had thrown it off.
Biology and Nature!
I had only ever heard of the syncing of Menstrual Cycles in a large group of women, so experiencing it first hand was highly odd. I am around about 60 other women on a daily basis. 60 other women who have their cycles slowly converging onto the same time frame. This was a little disheartening knowing that my precious Lady Days would no longer be on a regular schedule for the first time in many years. Well, here I sit on the 31st, starting another wacked out Menses.
Long story short, when you work around a bunch of other women, you can no longer use your Regularly Scheduled Bloodletting as a sign that you are not pregnant.
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