For young girls, learning about menstruation can be scary depending on how it is presented. Before I got the accurate story, my friend Dodie Stein in the fourth grade whispered under the covers during a sleepover that pretty soon our mothers would force us to start wearing a tight elastic belt around our stomach, and it would be so tight that it would make us bleed from down there. She looked horrified, and who could blame her? Even at age nine I was a skeptic and so scoffed at this news, saying it was pretty unlikely. Dodie insisted. "Well I'm certainly not wearing one," I declared, "Or if they make me, I just won't pull it that tight."
Soon enough I learned the facts when my mother showed me a Kotex pad, which in those days was attached to an elastic belt worn around the waist. But instead of saying it was a terrible thing that would happen to me each month, she described at is my "monthly letter from God." She explained that every time I got my period it was God sending me proof that my body was working perfectly. Consequently I never minded it, never had bad cramps, never complained or called it "the curse" like so many of my girlfriends did. In fact, when I stopped menstruating at age 50 I was bereft. Now what? No more Godly encouragement? I had to go it alone?
Miraculously, a new thought popped into my head and since then, my proof that all is well has come through the healthy, normal workings of my body, most notably the evacuation of waste products, to put it delicately. When constipation (a common condition as one ages) comes along it's a bummer since the nine-year-old in my head believes that God has forgotten me. But when all goes smoothly, if you get my meaning, I thank Him profusely for taking the time out of his busy day to send me a note that "all is well."
Call me crazy, but I remain convinced that God and I communicate most profoundly while I am sitting on the toilet, which explains why I never go to church. (I wonder if Dodie Stein does.)
Soon enough I learned the facts when my mother showed me a Kotex pad, which in those days was attached to an elastic belt worn around the waist. But instead of saying it was a terrible thing that would happen to me each month, she described at is my "monthly letter from God." She explained that every time I got my period it was God sending me proof that my body was working perfectly. Consequently I never minded it, never had bad cramps, never complained or called it "the curse" like so many of my girlfriends did. In fact, when I stopped menstruating at age 50 I was bereft. Now what? No more Godly encouragement? I had to go it alone?
Miraculously, a new thought popped into my head and since then, my proof that all is well has come through the healthy, normal workings of my body, most notably the evacuation of waste products, to put it delicately. When constipation (a common condition as one ages) comes along it's a bummer since the nine-year-old in my head believes that God has forgotten me. But when all goes smoothly, if you get my meaning, I thank Him profusely for taking the time out of his busy day to send me a note that "all is well." Call me crazy, but I remain convinced that God and I communicate most profoundly while I am sitting on the toilet, which explains why I never go to church. (I wonder if Dodie Stein does.)
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