Like many girls and women, periods have never been an easy fit for me. Every month there comes a dreadful feeling of what period symptoms to expect. Just like the current weather patterns, period symptoms are also ever changing.
From headaches to nausea to low appetite to a week’s long back ache, the list goes on and on. But, like I always say, the beauty about being born a woman is in the shared experiences we all get to have. With shared experiences comes a support system of family, friends and strangers.
This one time in Highschool my period had started. We all know the woes of the first day so it was quite hellish. Usually I would try to make it through the early morning lessons before I go to the sick bay for meds.
This time, the uterus was not having it. I had severe cramps all morning barely paying any attention to the lesson going on in the class. Just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse, a wave of nausea hit me and I puked. Thankfully I was ready for the situation so I did not make a mess. The pain I felt left me very weak that even after the lesson had ended I still could not get up to go to the sick bay.
A friend of mine noticed just before she could make it out of class to get breakfast and helped me up. Took me to the washrooms to clean up and helped me change and then took me to the
sick bay so that I could rest. Fast forward to lunch time, I was feeling much better and even found that my friend had taken down notes for me for the lessons I missed.
I was very grateful and still grateful for her kindness and support. Periods are never an easy time, it is so heartwarming when other people especially other girls and women can recognize this and try to make it easier for others. There’s so many ways to offer support, simply moving with an extra pad or pain meds or offering to do someone’s work so that they can take a break makes all the difference. Be another woman or girl’s source of relief during their time of the month.