It seems like periods are slowly losing their status as a taboo topic. There’s period leave being instituted at a company in the UK, and then there’s this guy who somewhat randomly carries tampons on his person.
Except that this is by design, as Mic points out. Chance Ward was at the gym recently when a girl asked her friend for a tampon, saw that Ward had heard, and apologized to him. He actually had tampons in his fanny pack, and gave her one. He then reflected on why women are so ashamed of menstruation, and how men often fail to help them with this shame.
The whole story is in Ward’s Facebook post:
Ward thinks that everybody should have pads or tampons on hand for their friends in case they have their periods. That we don’t think to make this allowance for people, or that women have so internalized shame about menstruation that they’ll apologize for referring to it in a man’s presence says a lot.
As Ward writes:
This is so sad. Why don’t y’all love y’all friends that menstruate? Like men will make whole guest rooms in their house just in case someone needs to stay. But god forbid that person menstruate, because I bet you won’t be no extra pads or tampons under that guest bathroom sink.
Another reminder for us to be more thoughtful and kind to the people around us, specifically when it comes to periods and the fact that “half this world goes through this.”
(via Mic)
