I vividly remember the cold, winter morning thirty odd years back that marked an eventful start to my physiological fertile years and the crazy ride that is puberty. I find it oddly amusing that I attained physical maturity on the day India celebrates its constitutional freedom – the Republic Day.
That morning, the air was abuzz with excitement and anticipation. Morning chores were completed with dexterity, breakfast was gulped down quickly, as we all awaited the spectacle of the year – a grand parade comprising colorful platoons from all states and a showcase of the military prowess. The parade would pass through the street right in front of our house, rendering the balcony of our 2-bedroom government flat a coveted watching arena as its position gave us a vantage view. The view was somewhat marred by the tall billboards erected in front. We cursed greedy, inconsiderate businesses and the lax municipality and then resigned ourselves to peeping under or around them.
Neighbors streamed into our house in dozens to watch the parade with us. On hindsight it would have made more economic sense to sell them tickets for the viewing space rather than serving them tea but hospitality was our pride & soul, even though it meant jostling for standing room in our own house! People lined up on the streets and thronged the rooftops, bracing the cold, little boys climbed up trees and some adventurous ones perched on the hoardings too. It was like a mela (carnival) of mega proportions as events usually are in India.
Then there was me – a dreamy, carefree girl on the cusp of teenage whose interests in life were simple – reading books, acing school tests and writing poetry. I stood in the balcony watching as the parade started with loud drumrolls and trumpets with the army band marching ahead of the platoons. A few minutes later, I felt a weird churning in my stomach, that I could not dismiss as pride or fascination! I rushed to the washroom and was horrified to see what I did. In panic, I called out to my mother who looked at my ashen face and knew exactly what was going on. She delegated my older sister to the task who tried her best to calm me down and also explain the mechanics of my first menstrual period – all in a rushed monologue, acutely aware that our house was teeming with people and anytime soon, someone would knock on the door. So, I was delivered a lesson on one of the most important facets of life in a cramped toilet in under 3 minutes!
When I emerged from the washroom, I didn’t feel carefree or dreamy anymore. It was as if something or someone was weighing me down and I had received a dose of reality. My mind was teeming with unanswered questions. Those were simpler times, there was no internet to guide us and parents shied away from uncomfortable discussions till they possibly could. Biology lessons were unable to keep up with the pace of our biological clock. We were truly innocent and ignorant till something hit us like a bolt of lightning.
I escaped to the room I shared with my siblings but was soon summoned to watch the parade which failed to hold my interest now. The next day in school, I shared my misery with my friends. To my surprise, some of them had beaten me to the puberty race and were aware albeit still confused like me; the others were not sure whether to feel relieved or feel left out (FOMO as they call it today).
In the ensuing years, my periods and I have shared a hate-hate relationship! They detest it whenever I travel, want to go out with friends, celebrate any special occasion or be active– they gatecrash into my life completely uninvited and unwelcome. Need I even explain why I loathed them? Of course, the added nasty side-effects like pain, cramps, fatigue, headaches, nausea ensured the permanency of this feeling.
Fast forward to now when I seem to be nearing the end point of the fertility journey and arguably my youth. I think I am more self-aware than when I embarked on the journey but equally confused on how I should feel. Should I feel happy that it’s finally time to say goodbye to the tampons and the pads, the painkillers and the heat packs and that I can finally be carefree again? Or should I bemoan the passing of an era, the decades in which I gave birth to my two sons – the only tangible practical purpose the periods served me. Am I getting FOMO over what I have despised for all these years?
Even though my life will no longer be ruled by the “first day of my last menses”, the joy is short lived when I think of hot flashes, weight gain, hair loss, mood swings, brittle bones, dry skin, brain fog- the whole slew of undesirable side-effects that come with the peri-menopause / menopause deal, as the magical hormone “estrogen” bids us adieu! Couldn’t the Gods have been kinder to us even in this penultimate phase of life? Sometimes, it feels like I am jumping from the frying pan into the fire, especially when the hot flashes strike and I can feel my skin burning, it’s more reality than an adage.
I have always found the nomenclature surrounding our monthlies quite interesting too. Do you know why periods are called periods? Apparently, the word period is derived from the two Greek words “peri” meaning around and “hodos” meaning way/path. This gave way to the Latin word “periodus” meaning recurring cycle and was first used for menstruation in the early 1800s. This is why the period before menopause which can stretch to a few years, is called peri-menopause and not pre-menopause, signifying that menopause (which literally means a cessation to the monthly cycles) is around or near – though calling something which might be a few years away as around or near seems like a cruel joke!
However, I have always liked to draw parallels between the menstrual periods and the period or full stop in the English language. Just as the period at the end of a sentence denotes the ending of a thought/idea and the invitation to a new one. So does, the menstrual period signifying an end to a phase of life, beckoning another – from childhood to adulthood, pregnancy to childbirth and from puberty to menopause.
As I greedily try to straddle both worlds while I still can – I realize that though my fertility might wane and my youthful, feminine hormones might abandon me, my zeal for life need not pause, period!
