Most ladies are well aware of what it’s like to deal with a period. Our nemesis Aunt Flo comes to town every month to fill our lives with blood, cramps, tears and chocolate for 5-7 days. These days we can usually continue living our normal lives without anyone knowing we’re menstruating since we have tons of ways to keep everything in order. However, as we all very well know, women have been dealing with periods since the beginning of time. And they had much bigger concerns than staining their favorite jeans. According to Medical Daily:
Often, menstruation was completely omitted from man’s documented history, relegated to the “woman’s sphere.
Since it was omitted from history and women’s history is obviously important, we have a brief rundown of how women dealt with their periods throughout the ages that will make you happy to be living in 2017.
Ancient times:
Period blood had different meanings in different parts of ancient culture. Menstruating women were often associated with mystery, magic, and even sorcery in many parts of the ancient world. In biblical times, it was known as a “cleansing time” for women where they had to go into seclusion away from society until their period was over.
No one really knows what exactly women used to handle their flow. Again – since men wrote the books, they didn’t find it necessary to include women in it. There have, however, been assumptions that women used ragged cloths or tampons made of papyrus or wooden sticks wrapped in lint. This sounds like a lot of work and a lot of wasted time since they literally sent women away.