My DD14 and at least some of her friends seem to be extremely nonchalant about period stains. DD aware of walking around the house in stained pants with her brother and a friend there, without a care in the world. At another friend’s house (girls and moms are friends) and the daughter’s bed has stains and they just carry on like normal. These are all “normal” girls who are well liked, play sports, all the normal stuff.
When I was growing up this would be mortifying. I thought it was something you just knew to avoid and not walk around with stained pants. is this just an effect of body positivity? Anyone else noticing a difference in today’s teen girls how they view these things or are my DD and friends outliers? We are UMC in DCUMland. |
I mean, it is odd to be mortified about blood. You wouldn't be mortified if you skinned your elbow and it was bleeding. |
+1. It’s very normal to have period stains, especially when you’re just starting to get used to having a period. I’m glad the girls aren’t flagellating themselves over this. |
I don't see this as a stigma issue but a hygiene issue. Maybe they're lazy or not good at cleaning and don't want to be bothered with getting stains out of their clothes?
I would be mortified about having such a huge bodily liquid stain on my clothes, even if the blood was from a cut/scrape and not my period. |
Stains like just happened or stains in the lowest sense that it happened, was washed, and didn't come out? The former is nasty and a hygiene issue. The latter, if it's PJs or sheets, less so. |
Corrected a typo. |
You should be glad you didn't pass on your insane misogyny to your kids. Good riddance. |
It is also normal to pee and poop - basic human unctions but I have no desire to see that on people’s clothes or beds or furniture. Same is true with period blood. Bodily fluids should be cleaned up. Additionally blood should be rinsed out when fresh to keep from staining. |
I thought this was going to be about how to remove stains from your laundry. |
Maybe next we can normalize spitting, skid marks, and wiping your nose boogers on your clothes. All normal human secretions. |
Totally normal. Adjacent to the free bleed movement. It's totally mainstream Brooks Nader period stained skirt at Wimbeldon was all over the place |
In your world, being female is such a burden. In theirs, it’s not.
Do you know what boys leave in their pants? Anything to say about that? I have a son and daughter. We have clean stains, and no stains on outer clothes where people can see. But other than that, I have never wished for my children to feel shame over normal development. My very uptight parents never made me feel shame when I stained anything. You should feel some mortification over how you think about this, OP. |
I’m so proud of them tbh. |
I have two DDs, both 17. They’d be mortified by having visible period stains, but they’re otherwise very nonchalant about menstruation-related things. In middle school, one of my DDs used to carry her pads openly and would even have one out on her desk. The other was asked, in front of her entire class, if she was on her period when she got a bathroom pass while holding a tiny purse, on the first day she went to school during her very first cycle. She didn’t die of embarrassment and treated it like a badge of honor. |
You can teach them to dress nicely without shaming them for stains. Just tell her nobody wants to look at blood, please change your pants, then help her get the stain out. Also teach her how to wear dark clothes or old clothes so she’s not ruining everything. It’s NBD to bleed on yourself but not changing when you can and making everyone stare at your dried bloody discharge is just gross. |