TresSugar

Group Therapy: My Fiancé Kicked Me Out For Starting My Period

Tres Community — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 03:05:00 PST

This question is from a Group Therapy post in our TrèsSugar Community. Add your advice in the comments!

I had sex with my fiancé and I got my period smack in the middle of it. It was heavy! It stained his sheets, his mattress and it was all over us. This is the first time this has ever happened and he kicked me out of his apartment. I offered to buy a new mattress and clean his sheets. I apologized repeatedly and he kept rolling his eyes and making the "ugh" sound. My period was four days early and I had no symptoms but now he won't talk to me.

He ignored my two text messages and my phone call. We are suppose to take dance lessons on Saturday for the wedding and he needed to tell me what time would work best so I can call the instructor and I'm still being ignored. I'm at my wits end here. We are both in our early 30s. What should I do?

Have a dilemma of your own? Post it anonymously to Group Therapy for advice, and check out what else is happening in the TrèsSugar Community.

Tampons and Maxi Pads: A Walk Down Memory Lane

TresSugar — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 15:50:00 PDT

Whether you call it your Moon Time or the Curse, if you're a woman, you have to contend with a monthly period. Let's take a look at how advertising sold its pads and 'pons to women of yore. Whether it was through distraction (hey, look, a pretty dress!) or the rhetoric of freedom, advertisers did their best to sell a product women have never really been thrilled to buy.

Maxi Pad Ad Finally Draws Blood

Tara Sharp — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 11:00:00 PDT

Bloody hell, it's about time! Always has an ad for its ultra thin pads that features a teeny tiny dot of red blood (no carefree girl in white in sight), and it may be one of the first instances a US feminine hygiene ad has dared to reference real blood, much less show it.

Despite being about periods, tampon and maxi pad advertisements have a long history of pussy-footing around the realities of menstruation with euphemisms, metaphors, and that infamous blue liquid. The closest we've seen to a blood reference are the o.b. and Tampax ads above that use vampires and sharks to get their point across.

Is this a step in the right direction? Do you think we'll ever get to a point when a woman's period and her body are talked about openly and honestly?

Would You Talk About Your Period on Facebook?

Annie Scudder — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 11:00:43 PST

"In 2010 women became the majority in the workforce," is how the above video opens. I expected the next sentence to discuss the wage gap or how men still rule boardrooms, but instead the voice-over says: "Still it's difficult to talk about menstruation."

I guess I shouldn't have been surprised, since the video is part of an initiative by feminine hygiene brand SCA trying to make menstruation less taboo. The company conducted a study that found most women experience social discomfort while on their period. To combat that, SCA wants women and men to talk about menstruation during a 28-day period starting today, International Women's Day. If you start seeing "Period." show up in your Facebook feed, you'll know it's working.

Last year, a tampon-ad-meets-social-experiment from Kotex demonstrated a man's inability to calmly confront the idea of menstruation. A young woman stood outside a drug store, asking men to run inside and buy her tampons. If most men are like the one guy who said, "Can I get you toilet paper?" I have a feeling it will be tough to get many to talk about a woman's period openly. But maybe that just shows how much we need an awareness campaign like the one from SCA. Will you try to break down the taboo surrounding menstruation, or do you it's think a topic better suited for private conversation?

Discontinued O.B. Ultra Tampons Hit the Black Market

Colleen Barrett — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 16:15:56 PST

"Very rare!" "Unopened." "Brand new." These are words eBay sellers use to describe tampons for sale, but not just any tampons - the beloved O.B. Ultra (the purple box), which Johnson & Johnson discontinued late last year.

Soon all O.B. tampons were reported missing from store shelves, and though they've started to return, many women still can't find them. So, of course, enterprising eBay users are all over this opportunity. O.B. Ultra is going for $50 (seller also has a "cracked" box available for $45) while the same-size box (albeit nondiscontinued absorbencies) sells for under $6 on Soap.com.

The crazy thing is they're probably selling, otherwise so many people wouldn't be offering them. Once women do get their hands on the discontinued tampons they may have an Elaine from Seinfeld-like conundrum (are you sponge-worthy?) on their hands. Is today's flow ultra-worthy or just super?

Maxi Pads Turn Women Into Suspected Underwear Bombers

Annie Scudder — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 12:35:21 PST

Airports may soon become a tampon-only zone for women wanting to avoid the invasive pat down. In the latest TSA horror story, a woman recounts being treated like a potential underwear bomber because she was wearing a pad. Some background: the woman was using GladRags, reusable cloth menstruation pads that are better for the environment, but it seems that any woman wearing something in her underwear, like a disposable maxi-pad or panty-liner, would be stopped.

In a letter to GladRags, the violated passenger explains:

What ultimately happened is that I was subjected to search so invasive that I was left crying and dealing with memories that I thought had been dealt with years ago of prior sexual assaults. Why? Because of my flannel panty-liner. These new scans are so horrible that if you are wearing something unusual (like a piece of cloth on your panties) then you will be subjected to a search where a woman repeatedly has to check your "groin" while another woman watches on (two in my case - they were training in a new girl - awesome).

In addition to the personal invasion, a screening system that treats a natural bodily function as a sign of a terrorist threat doesn't sound that advanced or efficient. And if you experienced any abuse during screenings, you can always report it to the ACLU.

Best Birth Control Pills to Keep Emotions Even

Colleen Barrett — Thu, 21 Oct 2010 04:00:00 PDT

While the pill celebrates 50 years of blocking sperm, a new study says it makes women more possessive and paranoid about their partners' fidelity.

I'm not down with women using periods as an excuse to behave badly - or men using it to dismiss emotions - but anyone who's ever had a bad birth control experience would probably agree it can ambush the mood. The study does illustrate one worthwhile fact: pills with more oestrogen are more likely to cause emotional upsets than pills with less or none. None sounds like a delightful amount, so what pills are oestrogen-free? Find out below.

Hump Day: Wanting Love During That Time of the Month

TresSugar — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 04:00:09 PDT

Welcome to Hump Day, TrèsSugar's sex advice column. If you have questions about sex, send them to TrèsSugar, and our friend Dr. Charlie Glickman from Good Vibrations will offer his sound advice!

Today's question: I find myself wanting sex more when I’m menstruating. Is that normal? And how do I avoid potentially making my partner feel turned off?

To see Dr. Glickman's advice read more.

Do You Suffer From "Fat Days"?

FitSugar — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 08:00:00 PDT

Being a woman, I feel like we are prone to our fair share of "fat days." You know, those days when your pants don't seem to fit quite right, you feel bloated, or you stand in front of the mirror and look softer than usual. Our fluctuations in hormones definitely contribute to water weight gain, so we can always point the finger at our old Aunt Flow. But I also know that when I overindulge on treats, it's my love affair with Ben & Jerry that's to blame.

Whatever the reason, tell me . . .

Machine Lets Men Menstruate - Cool or Crazy?

TresSugar — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 14:40:34 PDT

Can't really tell what the above gadget is all about? Why it's a machine that lets men experience the "pain and bleeding of an average 5 day menstruation process." A student at the Royal College of Art presented the gadget at this year's Summer graduate show (check out this slightly graphic demonstration). The creator hoped the project would help us understand why many modern women choose to menstruate monthly considering contraception doesn't make it necessary.

The idea reminds me of the recent Tampax commercial that features a teenage boy who suddenly wakes up and finds out he has his period - of course, Tampax saves the day. I wonder if tampons would work with this machine.