It's happened to so many people who menstruate: you're going on about your life and then you realize that you just got your period. The ungainly scramble to find a restroom and the fervent prayer that you packed a menstrual product leaves you feeling anxious, vulnerable, and exposed. This is compounded by the fact that our society stigmatizes menstruation — or really, anything to do with a uterus.

Having to slip a pad up your sleeve as the whole class rings with silence. Having to take your whole backpack with you to the bathroom as someone shouts ''why are you taking your backpack!''. Having to ask to go to the nurse for something that occurs monthly. this inconvenience needs to be solved. 

We need to address stigma around menstruation in order to understand and fix the challenges people face around access to menstrual hygiene products. Period poverty is real. Period equity should be real, too. Embarrassment or taboos may prevent people from advocating for themselves, but if that stigma is removed — or even eased by talking through these issues — we as a society can move forward to address the needs of half of our population. There is no equity when half the population bears the financial and physical distress as a consequence of the reproductive cycle needed to ensure human survival.

Nearly 22 million women living in poverty in the US who cannot afford menstrual hygiene products, a problem known as period poverty. One study in Obstetrics and Gynecology demonstrated that 64% of women reported ever having difficulty affording menstrual products, such as pads. And 21% reported that they were unable to afford these products every month. 

Menstrual products should be put in public school bathrooms as they are just as important as toilet paper. It is a necessity for half the population. lets stop being quiet about something every women is dealing with. Be the change.  

source: Harvard Health publishing  

June 1, 2021 By Huma Farid, MD