I don’t have a vagina. I am curious about the whole mensuration deal and exactly how inhibiting this has been for women throughout history. I ask because I wonder how much you believe your life would differ if you lived several hundred years ago - assuming you lived in a stable community without o-en politics regarding differences in sex. I’m asking this due to several considerations in world building involving dozens of different species. In societies that are labour intensive (no/little industrial power), and where females are roughly as physically strong as the males yet otherwise like humans, would the females ‘suffer’ more in terms of the amount of labour they could manage simply due to lack of modern sanitation, issues regarding nausea/cramps, or other items that don’t immediately spring to mind? Note: Anything else you can offer would be very much appreciated (including literature) as I have had a particularly strange idea that I don’t think I’ve heard of before. Could add a whole new layer into my story. Thanks
Honestly, given the whole, women stay at home and manage the household whilst men go out to do their thing, unless your period was debilitating, with pain, nausea, vertigo, general weakness, it wouldn't be a huge inhibiting factor. Washing clothes once a month that are covered in blood and bits of the lining would be icky and probably all kinds of difficult if there's an absence of soap to remove the blood from the fabric. The main thing holding women back in mensuration is the feeling of your insides in a very specific area (the pain is extremely localised) being twisted with a clamp with a crushing vice grip that is simultaneously burning hot and cold. Nausea from generally feeling kinda ill to vomiting your guts up. Vertigo from anaemia that leaves you unable to get up on your own without wanting to vomit. Literally not having the strength to get up. That's not mentioning the cold sweats, shivers and feeling like you're pressed at the bottom of hole you can't even see the top to due to hormone fluctuation. Do keep in mind that none of these are an exaggeration though they can be on the extreme end of symptoms and can happen to any woman during any round of mensuration in any combination of symptoms regardless of how it has previously happened. Even if all previous periods had been a total breeze, no pain, no nausea, no vertigo, no difficulties at all, it can still just happen one day. That may be the only time it happens or it could start happening every time after that or via no pattern at all. In your verse I'd say women would be at a slight disadvantage due to mensuration. It could be embarrassing if periods aren't openly talked about and accepted as a part of life with no stigma about it. Another thing to keep in mind is that periods can range from 3 days to 7 days, the majority having 5 - 7 day periods, once a month for the rest of their life once they start getting them. That's roughly a quarter of life spent on their period until menopause. If the expectation in your world is that the women would have to just carry on the same as men during mensuration, many of them simply wouldn't be able to due to the debilitating side effects of expunging their insides once a month. But the level of debilitation can fluctuate from period to period. Only some have consistent periods and as far as I've seen that's mostly those who have such debilitating pain that they can't do anything for it.
It would be easier to answer your question with a better idea of what your story will actually contain, what the setting is like, what the women will be doing as work, what the attitudes of society is towards menstruation ...and also whether or not good sanitation is available AND whether effective painkillers exist. I spent many years working in fairly physical jobs. Some 'months' were harder for me than others, in terms of cramps and debility, although I usually only suffered for the first day or two (at most.) However, there were a few times when I needed to call off sick. Yes, bleeding is certainly an issue, unless you have good sanitary pads (or substitutes) and plenty of break time during the day in which to change. All sorts of things have been used to absorb the blood ...from disposable stuff like moss, to re-usable sponges and old rags (which needed to be laundered) and other absorbent things. Excessive bleeding can also remove nutrients like iron from the woman's system, so if she bleeds excessively, this will need to be compensated for, or her overall health will suffer. What transformed my life was my discovery of Advil/Neurofen in the early 1980s. That is the only painkiller that actually nailed the cramps and made life easy for me, even on the first day. I never needed to 'call in sick' after that. So finding an adequate painkiller—one that addresses cramping—if you're constructing a fantasy world—would be fantastic. Another issue would be the view of society. It's always amazed me how, in so many societies, menstruation (experienced by half of the population) could be seen as 'taboo.' However, the habit in some primitive societies of isolating the woman during those times actually makes perfect sense, and isn't as 'cruel' as it may sound. If she's not expected to assume full duties, and is allowed to rest in isolation, well...hey. I can see where that might actually be good, especially if she has to work VERY hard the rest of the time. It was probably seen by these women as a welcome break, rather than as a punishment.
I'm pretty certain that humans are the only animals who menstruate, so not all of your non-human races even really need to menstruate. And the societal expectations and understanding of it can vary between your species. It can be a taboo in some cultures, but just a regular fact of life in others, or maybe even some consider it a kind of blessing or honor (like some kinda warrior tribe...or a species that's just made up of a buncha sadomasochists ) As for like, the physical ins and outs and how they'd relate to daily life in a not-so-technologically-advanced society, it could be worth doing some research. Sanitary pads didn't come around until WWI, when nurses couldn't stop working during their periods, and just used medical gauze to soak up the blood so they could keep going. But if your society has access to cotton or something similar, it wouldn't be unrealistic for them to come up with some form of sanitary pad earlier in their historical timeline. Another thing worth considering is their food. If this is a healthy society with plenty of food to go around, then your average human would menstruate regularly no problemo. But if food is scarce, or there's a famine, starving people typically stop menstruating.
Technically all mammals menstruate, they just do it differently than humans. If a mammal goes into estrus and no fertilization takes place, the uterus will then either reabsorb the endometrium (called covert menstruation) or, like in humans, discharge it vaginally (called overt menstruation). What makes humans (sort of) special is that while most mammals have an estrus cycle, humans are one of a couple of dozen (mostly primate) species that have a regular (depending on the person) menstrual cycle.
Here's an interesting website that more or less covers the territory. https://www.thethings.com/15-things-women-actually-used-before-tampons-came-to-the-rescue/
No time to get into detail, but it's been observed (I've experienced it myself), and maybe even scientifically proven, that after a while of living close together (in a household, a women's dorm, an all-female regiment), women's cycles will fall into sync and we'll all have our periods at about the same time. That doesn't necessarily mean woe to the men, as misery loves company and we can wear off our kvetching on each other. Just a detail that may or may not affect your story. Also, I always found that hard physical labor made the cramps feel better. By the way, the idea that "women's work" has always been confined to the home and all the men "went out" to work is a modern fallacy. There were no factories in the modern sense before the Industrial Revolution (hitting its stride by 1800 on). Before then, most businesses (including farms) were home-based, and everyone pitched in, husband, wife, kids, apprentices, and all. Sure, there were day laborers who would go to the marketplace to get hired on for a few hours of work and get paid at the end of the day. And their wives at home would be doing what they could to augment the family income. Spinning, selling eggs, taking in laundry, whatever.
Yeah, if you can ignore the drama and the silly-ass GIFs. And the fact that until the 20th century, most women didn't wear close-fitting underpants, or any underpants at all. So the various pads would have to be tied on in some way.
Some have little or no problems like cramps, severe pain, headaches, nausea.... Why does it have to reduce what the woman can do, could it not give her extra powers during that time? I wonder if you could find anything about sanitation by looking at African or south American tribes because they may be using more basic methods than walking to a shop for sanitary pads.
Are you certain this is legit information? Some of it might but some of it... Ancient, wooden tampons? Never have I ever heard of such a thing. It sounds way too impractical. I'd guess that they used some kind of pads in ancient times. I think that this is tampon promotional stuff.
No, I'm not sure at all. If I was actually going to write about this, I would certainly do more research. But this kinda gives lots of ideas for writing about menstruation, or at least it did me. (Wooden? Nope, not quite what I would pick either.)
One thing that struck me was that in more ‘natural’ circumstances - pre labour (as in toiling away) - women would suckle their young more frequently and have maybe half a dozen periods in their life times as suckling children (up to around 6-7 years?) producing a hormone that acts as a natural contraception. Since I heard about this it has made me wonder a lot about the kind of suffering women go through - perhaps needlessly, yet a circumstance of the modern world and sedentary living. I’m going to play with this idea with one specific species where the ‘males’ and ‘females’ are pretty much different species. There are some fascinating talks about different species online. In some the ‘males’ don’t actually contribute anything in terms of DNA and in others the females rely on stimulation from completely different species in order to kick-start the reproductive process. I got to think about this because you hardly see female characters in fantasy type novels having to deal with such things - at least, not in my experience! Immaculata from Weaveworld is possibly the only time I’ve seen graphic (and horrific) depiction of the colloquial ‘women’s business’ witnessed with an expression of full male enigmatic fear of the whole ‘bloody’ business.
If you only knew what I've read while researching about how people used to wipe their asses throughout history. Sometimes I take living in the 21rst century for granted. Anyhow, just a thought about menstruation. People before modern technology where not as well fed as our generation is today and menstruation is directly connected with eating habits. So, in the old times women during their menstruation had possibly less blood than we do today. That's why in ancient times in some civilizations the model of beauty in regards to women was rather fat. That's because feminine beauty was related with fertility and health (the ancients were quite practical). The fatter the woman, the more well fed, the more stable menstruation cycles, the more fertile, the more offsprings she would produce.
