I'm talking about it ... period

So, if you are not interested in my bitching about my period and all that entails, sayanara. And if you are, then welcome to my world, as they say.

Like many women, I enjoyed a rather benign state of periodhood for the majority of my life. Every 28 days like clockwork, no exceptions besides pregnancy, I would get my period. It would arrive for a few days, and then it would leave. I had no PMS, I had nothing other than the inconvenience of having to have a few tampons on hand, and that was it.

When I entered my 40's, I noticed small changes. Like cramps. And then breast tenderness. Suddenly my period had a whole set of "reminders" in place, just in case I couldn't count out 28 days. And then ... then the bleeding became unpredictable. When I say unpredictable, I don't mean it showed up on day 23 with the announcement of a drop or two. I mean it came in on a wave of gushing announcement that instantly changed my life. No longer could a couple of tampons swimming about my pocketbook keep me safe. No, now I suddenly needed the biggest tampon on the market (OB super-ultra cannons) and boxes of them, along with heavy duty pads and a change of clothes.

WTF?

Any woman who has gone through this has their stories: My first time, I was in TJ Maxx with Maddie about four years ago, so she was 12. We were school shopping when I felt that now all too familiar feeling of WHOOOOOOOOOOOOSH. I looked down at the floor, nope, hadn't progressed to that point yet, but that gives you an idea of the force, I was sure I'd just left a puddle by my feet. I started walking up and down the aisles in search of Maddie, and the movement was wreaking havoc. She had an armful of clothes and I yelled at her to hurry. As we approached the front where the cashiers were, I knew things were not good, and I grabbed a pair of hot pink terry sweatpants that just happened to be hanging on a rack as I walked by. And after I paid (and inquired if there was a restroom, which there was not) I scanned the parking lot and saw a Panera. THERE, I pointed to Maddie, I am headed there. Please put the bags in the car and empty one out with the exception of the pink pants, I ordered her, and made my way, drip by drip, to the restaurant, only hoping that no one would actually look at me.

I rushed to the bathroom and I won't go into minute details, but it involved Maddie handing over wads of wet paper towels and me commandeering a stall for like 20 minutes. Once I'd cleaned up the gore and dressed myself in my sexy pink terry sweatpants, I emerged thinking that I would stick out like a sore thumb. Except that I didn't! All about Panera were women wearing really ugly bottoms. I just hoped that they were in the same position as I was, because my terry pants had one purpose in life, to get me home. Then they were trashed!

This type of experience has continued with no pattern ever since, and all across the country I have disposed of undergarments that made it look as though I had murdered someone. Of course I am reinforced with super-duty paraphernalia at all times, but not always, because the days of predictability are long gone. What used to be a guaranteed 12-period a year existence has now turned into upwards of 15 lovely experiences a year. I mean, how lucky are we women that we not only get to have babies and somehow figure out how to survive that; then we get to enter this ridiculous phase called "peri-menopause" for however long and just bleed all the fricking time. And my husband wonders why I often find myself in a bad mood. Well why the hell not? I have no clothes that don't contain some remnant of a super-duper blow out, all of my sheets, including my top-of-the-line over-the-top in price ones -- ALL RUINED -- an exciting event for me is finding more than one box of the cannon-sized tampons in a drug store -- because apparently many women in my position are hunting for them too. Used to be we were hunting down Cabbage Patch dolls for our children; now we are looking for tampons.

It's pathetic. Yesterday I blew out my back cleaning the shower. Which is odd, because it's not like it's an activity I haven't done before. But I didn't really blow out my back, it is just a new symptom that has entered my world; because my period walked in right after that. Did I have any reminders? Oh, sure, my boobs have been killing me for well over a week, worse than usual, I've had some cramps and a quick check on the calendar said 23 (or 24 or 25 or 26 or 27 days, since it falls on any of those) was right around the corner. So, lucky me, this is my second period of August and it came on day 22 with the worst backache of my life, so bad I thought my back was out. But no, it's period-related. AND WE'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE IN A BAD MOOD? Why the hell not?

I take maca powder, which greatly reduces all of these symptoms. But I have been running low for weeks now, so I have been using less. STUPID. STUPID STUPID STUPID. If I take it religiously, I can even escape with no symptoms (well not the excessive bleeding, but all the other crap).

I'm not really in a bad mood, but when I am bleeding profusely and changing tampons every half an hour and I can hardly get out of a chair because my back hurts so much and someone asks me if I am going to do anything today, well then pardon me for snapping at them to shut up. Do exactly what? Clean the goddamn shower? Go singing in the rain? Fuck that. I am going to wallow in my misery as long as I damn well feel like it, because it's all I got.

That and only half a box of the cannon tampons. Already, I am screwed and it's not even noon.

And that's it for now.

PERIOD!