Let’s be real. No one looks forward to getting their period. In all honesty, the entire process is a messy, unpleasant business that leads to overflowing trash cans and last minute runs to the store to stock up on more panty liners. At the end of every cycle it’s all you can do to let out a sigh of relief while waiting for the next visit to strike in a matter of weeks.
If you think the pain of this disposal will only be felt by your trash can, think again. Your period is more expensive than you know. Spending just $5 a month on disposable period products (a very conservative estimate) will cost you close to $3,000 over the course of your menstruating life. My guess is that there are plenty of ways you’d rather spend your hard earned cash than dumping it in the bin.
The Environment and Your Tampon: A Bad Combination
But there’s more to worry about with your period than staining your favorite pair of underwear. In truth, your easy access to modern period-care products is coming at a sinister cost for the environment. The average woman uses more than 16,000 pads and tampons throughout her lifetime, creating more than 300 pounds of plastic that will never truly go away. Multiply that figure by the 3.5 billion woman on the planet today, and you have roughly 12 billion sanitary pads and 7 billion tampons winding up in landfills every year. It doesn’t take a lot of imagination to realize this is a major problem.
The problems with your period products go far beyond their disposal issues. It turns out that many pads contain special chemicals that make them extremely efficient at absorbing fluids, often up to 10 times over their weight. While this is a great way to keep leaks in check, these chemicals come in some crazy combinations, and far too little research has been conducted concerning their effects on the environment, much less your body. Until these chemicals can be thoroughly studied (which is unlikely to happen anytime soon), your best solution is to keep them away from your skin.
Cotton Is Not Your Friend. Here’s Why.
Cotton commercials are amazing, aren’t they? Pretty women dancing in snow-white fields, their cotton skirts twirling in perfect sync with them. Life would certainly be better if this was an accurate depiction of the cotton industry, but the truth couldn’t be more different. Most tampons actually contain rayon, not cotton (a synthetic fiber that is known for drying out the vaginal wall), but the ones made from cotton are hardly better.
In fact, cotton is one of the dirtiest GMO crops on the planet. Four out of the five common pesticides used on cotton have been found to have adverse environmental impacts, and Aldicarb, a common insecticide, is known for being a real nightmare for the natural world when it mixes with wildlife and wetland systems. If these growing conditions aren’t bad enough, commercial cotton goes through some equally damaging post-processing that leaves it chlorinated, bleached, and re-treated with pesticides before you get the pleasure of putting it next to one of the most intimate parts of your body.
Putting Your Body at Risk For No Good Reason
There are an awful lot of weird plastics in pads and tampons, many of which contain chemicals that no one fully understands. Some of these chemicals, like BPA and BPS have been found to change the ways that embryos develop in the womb while also increasing your risk of developing certain types of cancer and even heart disease. Phtalates, a chemical found in many tampons, has been known to affect the way the body expresses genes, and it has occasionally even lead to organ failure.
Take a moment to think about the logic of placing plastic-based, largely untested synthetic products right at the most sensitive part of your body. There’s no way to justify it! The skin around female reproductive organs is extremely thin, meaning your blood vessels run right up against the surface. Skin is surprisingly permeable, which makes it simple for the synthetic chemicals in your pads and tampons to be absorbed into your bloodstream and travel throughout your body. In the same way that a tobacco patch floods your bloodstream with a taste of nicotine, your synthetic pads are slowly leaking a cocktail of chemicals into every corner of your body.
Choosing Natural Alternatives For Your Period
When you look at the facts, there’s not a lot to like about conventional period products. However, the good news is that companies around the world have woken up to this fact and have created a vast array of alternative products that keep your body safe while reducing your impact on the environment. Best of all, most of these products are reusable for months, even years, meaning that you’ll save gobs of money after your one-time investment to buy them.
Are you ready to ditch your disposables and enjoy some alternative period products? Here are some of the latest options.
Period-Safe Underwear
Sometimes it takes a little out of the box thinking to find the best period solution for you. Thankfully, many clothing companies are doing just that, and innovative new underwear is beginning to change the game for good. THINX underwear is designed to be period safe, and its built with an absorbent layer that keeps leaks in check all day long. Different pairs even have different absorbency levels, meaning it’s possible to wear underwear with the carrying capacity of two tampons. Because they look and feel just like any other pair of underwear, period safe undies are a comfortable, discrete way to keep your cycle in check.
Reusable Pads
The idea might sound gross at first, but hear it out. Reusable pads are as simple as they seem; they are cloth (often organic cotton) pads that can be washed between uses to keep you stocked up for every occasion. Not only are reusable pads often more absorbent than regular ones, they are far more comfortable. In most cases, reusable pads come in three pieces that include a holder and two inserts, making it simple to change up the absorbency depending on how heavy your cycle is. While it costs a lot to buy enough reusable pads to last throughout your entire period, the money you spend is a one-time investment because these pads can be used for years to come without any extra expense.
While these pads are handy to have available, a big disadvantage is that they need to be carefully washed. Before tossing the liners into the washing machine, they need to be soaked in cold water, and if you find yourself putting off laundry, day you might come up short on supplies by the end of your period.
Menstrual Cups
If you haven’t already been introduced into the wonderful world of menstrual cups, be prepared to change the way you deal with your period forever. While they look like a simple substitute for tampons, menstrual cups are actually far more useful. There are plenty of brands of menstrual cups available, but in most cases they are silicone cups that are easy to fold up and insert right at the base of the vagina. When inserted, menstrual cups create a seal that keeps them in place and allows them to collect period blood without leaking for up to twelve hours. When the cup needs to get changed, all you need to do is pull it out, empty it in the toilet, wash it out and stick it right back in. After a few uses, most women find their menstrual cups as simple to use as tampons once were- and far more convenient.
When you use a menstrual cup, your purse will never again be filled with annoying tampons, and you’ll never need to worry about getting caught unprepared. Small, easily packable and simple to wash at the end of your period, you’ll never want to switch back to regular products. Best of all, most cups cost less than $30 and will last a decade or more. Your wallet will be fuller and landfills will stay a little emptier, thanks to the fact that your dirty pads are no longer landing in them.
Softcups Cups
If you’re eager to try out a tampon alternative but aren’t sure you’re ready to commit for the next ten years, a Softcup is a smart option for trying them out. Like most menstrual cups, softcups are flexible menstrual discs that are worn right at the base of your cervix. Rather than absorbing your flow like a tampon does, softcups collect it and can be dumped out when they get full. Unlike other menstrual cups though, softcups are single use.
While you won’t be reducing as much trash as you would from sticking to strictly reusable products, softcups are a great in-between menstrual option that will allow you to experiment with alternatives without investing in pricy products. Also, because they are made from medical grade material made with elastomers, they eliminate any chance of developing toxic shock syndrome. Best of all, softcups can be worn for more than 12 hours, making it effortless to go hours without thinking about your period.
Conclusion
There’s no reason to pollute the planet every month just because you’re on your period. There are plenty of alternatives to conventional menstrual products that are made from natural products, reusable for years, and so comfortable you’ll forget you’re even on your period. If you’re ready to try out some alternatives to your icky pads and dangerous tampons, take the time to give some of these alternatives a try.
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