At the end of sixth grade, the girls in my class were given sealed envelopes to be taken home to our parents. Inside were permission slips for us watch a ten minute Disney film titled, “The Story of Menstruation”. The film was for us girls of course, no way in 1967 would we have watched a film with that subject matter with the boys. I have no idea where the boys went or what they were told.
Some of us wiser girls already had an idea of what the film was about. Either from our mothers or older sisters, the lore was passed down in hurried whispers, hand over ears to prevent being overheard. My mother had given me a brief talk when I was nine and wanted to use the lightweight cardboard from her gigantic sanitary napkin boxes to make paper dolls. All I really carried away from our discussion was that those boxes were not suitable for paper dolls and it was because of a long word I wasn’t familiar with the began with the letter “m”. For some reason, came to think the word was “manifestation”; which caused me some major discomfort during Mass one Sunday when I heard the priest use that word in a prayer. But, being a kid, I was fully aware I didn’t understand everything so just let it go.
Anyway, the day came for the film and there was some speculation on whose parents might not have allowed their girls to watch. Some of us thought that certainly the Jehovah’s Witnesses wouldn’t be allowed. After all, they had to go to the office whenever we had a party, surely this would be way out of the question. But, they were allowed. Interesting.
All I remember now about the film is that it was animated and the whole event seemed anticlimactic when compared to the hype and secrecy. This morning I Googled the film and found it on YouTube. I don’t remember it being so clinical. For some reason I remember butterflies, but those might have been the flower petals that fall in the opening credits. I think Kotex probably used butterflies on their packaging at one time; after all, preteen girls are the caterpillars of womanhood, and I thought I was one of the ugliest caterpillars in the group.
Having watched the film I and armed with a packet of samples, I went home to wait for womanhood to arrive. The movie made it look like such an exciting time in my life. Before I knew it, I’d be grown up and could have a baby. The film never said how that would happen and believe it or not, at eleven years old, I didn’t know the facts of life. All I’d heard was that if your parents slept in the nude, they had more kids than those whose parents who wore pajamas. Now it makes sense, but then it was perplexing.
So, the day came. I was excited and anxious. I had everything I needed to care for myself. I remember my mother knocking on the bathroom door asking if I needed any help. No, I told her, which was a mistake, because she probably would have advised me to wear underwear over my sanitary protection and saved me from a day of drafty discomfort. Remember, those were the days when girls wore skirts and dresses to school and skirts were short! Somehow I made it through that day and others like it for the next 43 years. By then I was entering into another phase of womanhood.
There were no films, no permission slips or even product samples to herald the beginning of menopause. Instead, there were songs, musicals, jokes; both funny and unkind and more books on the subject than anyone would care to read. Then there was the arguments both pro and con on the subject of hormones supplements.
Unlike menstruation, there is no one defining event that defines that you have arrived. Instead, there were years of seemingly unrelated symptoms that made me wonder it I was “in it”. When asked about tests, my doctors were always vague and insisted there was no test to tell one way or another. The fact that they still asked me at 50 what form of birth control I was using was extremely disconcerting – a late in life pregnancy would be another major change.
Still, there was no avoiding the fact that I was experiencing unusual bursts of warmth, especially at night, the occasional mood swing (which really wasn’t anything new) and worst of all, insomnia. Instead of hormone therapy, I opted for mild anti-anxiety meds, which didn’t stop the hot flashes, but made me not care so much and best of all, helped me sleep. There were also some tiresome “womanly” problems that resulted in surgery and ultimately ending my monthly reminder that I was made for bearing children. The surgery made life more enjoyable, but also denied me of knowing when I had arrived.
Now, at 59, the doctors just assume I’m there. Frankly, I don’t think about any of it anymore. Like my eleven year old self, I am comfortable with who I am and there is little thought of my reproductive self, except the pride I feel when I look at my children. As I look back over the past forty-three years, I do believe they were my caterpillar years and I am now in my butterfly years. They way be shorter in duration than the caterpillar years, but I think it’s time to spread my tiny wings and fly.