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TTelling people that you are writing a book about menstruation and menopause is an excellent litmus test for the strength of the menstrual taboo. Most often, people skip a beat and force a strange smile, before saying something non-engagement, as "good for you". Or they laugh nervously (especially men) and say, "Oh wow, okay, I do not know anything about ha ha ha ha". They rarely say, "I am completely disgusted by this," but one can usually tell if there is a reluctance to go further or to have a critical factor at work.
Conversely, other people (mostly women) virtually identify me and engage in their own TED talk, consisting of all the thoughts they had about the rules. I love when that happens, but I also feel a desperation that emanates from my permission. "I'm dying to talk about it" is a common refrain. And I know what they mean. Apart from close friendships, it can still be a little risky to talk about menstruation and menopause in a "polite" conversation.
This is instructive for a number of reasons, not least because it taught me that the menstrual taboo works in a sophisticated and often subtle way, which is quite different from what we might suspect. Of course, there is a real disgust, shame and stigma badociated with menstruation and menopause, where women and girls feel ashamed of menstruation and then a different stigma at the end of menstruation. This has been corroborated by our research. But there is also the strong impetus to stop any conversation about it. These are real problems.
The menstrual taboo is essentially a kind of imperfect cultural logic, where we are asked to participate in a lie: the lie that there is something wrong with menstruation, that it is fundamentally impure, strange and not natural, whereas the opposite is true. When you start to look, you can see evidence of the menstrual taboo everywhere. Researching this book has certainly made me believe that it was ubiquitous, rooted and harmful.
By interviewing nearly 3,500 women and girls about their experience of menstruation and menopause, we found that negative attitudes dominated the results in all age groups, from menarche to post-menopause, but that the lack of knowledge was also obvious. And where there is a void of reliable and quality information, misinformation can flourish. This is the prerequisite for menstrual taboo, but it also perpetuates it.
It is not a coincidence that our data suggest that girls found in school a frightening and sometimes traumatic place, and women reported the same thing in the workplace – they asked girls and women to to hide even the fact of their menstruation to suffer social or professional consequences. In both cases, girls and women felt judged and ashamed if anyone knew that they had their period, they were afraid of a visible leak and they often had to get through despite a discomfort or even pain. Considering how much of your life has gone to school or work over the course of your life, this is a matter of serious concern.
We also heard that girls felt that they could not talk to their fathers about their periods, or that in some cases their intimate relationships had changed after they started having their period, one respondent describing how she loved sitting on her father's lap and her menstruation started, it never happened again. I really did notice how destabilizing it had been for all concerned and how terribly sad for men.
It's the truth of the menstrual taboo: it hurts everyone. Women and girls have their periods (with some trans men and non-binary people), which already represents a majority of the population. But for boys and men, damage and damage are also real.
It is not only because they have relationships with women and girls who are their mothers, sisters, partners, friends and colleagues; they are negatively affected by the badociation and the fact that they can not see the full humanity of their loved ones.
But it is also because we are all human beings and we all come from the same place – a womb – so belittling and despising the process that gives us life probably diminishes everyone. The menstrual taboo can arise between people seeking to create true intimacy and understanding, but it also creates an absurd paradox: each person's original story is shrouded in shame, stigma and disgust.
Shame is a powerful thing. When we feel it individually, it has the power to disconnect from our self-esteem and interfere with our ability to trust others. When deployed on a large scale, it can invalidate whole communities and deprive us of unimaginable contributions. The shame of menstruation, like that of other people in the body, is particularly destructive because it tells you that something is wrong with your personality, the body in which you live and that you carry everywhere, and that you have forever .
It is also completely constituted and socially constructed. So, it can be deconstructed. There are lights on the horizon. We can celebrate the Victorian government by promising to put free menstrual products in schools. We should be hopeful about the significant funds recently allocated for the research and treatment of endometriosis. And of course, most of us applauded the long overdue removal of the GST on menstrual products. These are all positive developments that correct historical errors. But we still have a lot of work to do. Because as long as the menstrual taboo is active, everyone suffers.
• Karen Pickering is the co-author with Jane Bennett of About Bloody Time: The Menstrual Revolution We Must Have, published by the Victorian Women's Trust.
• Comments on this article are pre-moderated to keep the discussion focused on issues raised by the author
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