An Open Letter to My Period

Dear First-Day-of-My-Period,
Helllloooooooo, jackass!
You know, usually I’m too busy to dedicate a huge chunk of my time paying attention to whatever it is that’s bothering me, but since we’re already here, I decided I might as well go for it. You suck. Big time. And not just for the obvious physical pain that accompanies my body’s mission to simultaneously shed its uterine lining and punish me for not getting pregnant that month. That is a crucial point, a point that has sharpened me into a woman well-versed in the tiny print on the Ibuprofen drug facts label, but not the point I am here to make.
I’m here because, emotionally, on the first day of my period, I feel like the human equivalent of a dead raccoon at the bottom of a 7-Eleven dumpster that is also on fire. The acute physical pain is secondary to the emotional pain I feel on the first day of my period, lying on the floor of my bedroom, listening to Neutral Milk Hotel and sobbing uncontrollably about how meaningless my life is.
You make me do crazy things, First-Day-of-My-Period! At the same time every month, without fail, my mom receives a barrage of text messages from me, depicting an evening of despair in detail. Texts such as: “I’m never going to make a meaningful connection with anyone ever again,” “If you think about it, parents only love their children because they’re their children. You don’t love me. You love that I’m half you,” and, “My peepee hurts ☹.”
You make me do things like climb into the empty bathtub, fully clothed, and stare up at the ceiling, dramatically pretending to be in an indie film about depression. When I splash cool water onto my face, I gaze up at my reflection in the mirror, dutifully contemplating the inconvenient existence of a corporeal form, desperately wishing I could shed it and ascend into some higher plane of being. I sit on park benches and stare wistfully off into the clouds, reminiscing on every rejection I have ever experienced in my entire life, a single tear rolling down my cheek. I see a child unsteadily riding her bike, and I melodramatically recall the days of simplicity gone by.
Some first days I feel like my world has shattered, my aspirations crushed by the iron fist of fate. I’m a tiny wriggling bug pushpinned against the corkboard of life, and my friends are beautiful blossoming butterflies making bold strokes in the world. Everyone else has more drive than me, more friends than me, more success than me. Everyone else is skinnier than me, or if not skinnier then prettier, or if not prettier then funnier, or if not funnier then richer. I’m a painfully average, sloppy, lazy, no-good couch of a human being left out on the curb who desperately needs to be reupholstered and definitely has an everlasting and mysterious cum stain on one of its cushions.
Some first days I text every single boy I have ever had any kind of weird sexual tension with, except I’m so painfully afraid of vulnerability I can’t have a conversation with them. Instead I send them disturbing pornographic videos like the one where a guy squeezes eight double A batteries out of his urethra, and most of them don’t respond. And the ones who do respond express a deep concern for my well-being, which is the exact opposite of what I wanted out of the interaction. (Although, on a subconscious level, maybe that’s the response I was looking for all along.) Either way I apologize and spend a solid hour alone in my room masturbating to their profile pictures and also to various outtakes from Harry Styles’s Gucci campaign.
Some first days all I want is to unhinge my jaw and devour the entire contents of my refrigerator, shapeshift into an eagle, and go peck out the eyes of every smug fucking bitch who constantly feels the need to remind you that she, oops, forgot to eat today! (Who the fuck does that?!) And then I black out and eat an entire package of Oreos until my stomach is so stretched out I can’t lie down and I get so mad at myself I stoop over the bathroom toilet and shove fingers down my throat to make myself puke it up, only to discover I don’t have a gag reflex. And an earnest little voice in the back of my mind says, “Wow, maybe I am the perfect woman.” And then I remember that’s not very feminist of me, and I collapse into a pile of gooey self-hatred that is extremely hard to extricate myself from. Right then is about the time I start writing a list of all the ways my father ever wronged me, and then I alternate between diet advice websites and “My Anorexia Story” videos on YouTube until I can’t take it anymore and I go crazy eating peanut butter out of the jar until I fall asleep with my makeup still on.
And then I wake up the next morning and everything is fine!
I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m still on my period. But the suffocating storm clouds of insecurity and self-absorption and overwhelming depression have vanished into thin air overnight. The air is crisper. The birds are chirping. My pillow is streaked with foundation. And every self-destructive urge I felt the day before has gone away. I can be a productive member of society again. I can clear all of my text conversations. I can look at a couch on the side of the road without falling into a bottomless existential pit of despair. Life is good again.
At least, you know. Until next month.
So thanks, jackass. For making me do and feel and say all of these insane, destructive things every month without fail. Of course I hate you. You’re objectively the worst. And yet some part of me, on a deeper level, is fascinated by you. Almost grateful for you. Maybe it’s because I feel the most alive when I’m caught in the whirlwind of emotional volatility that accompanies the first day of my period. Maybe I spend so much time suppressing my true feelings that any semblance of honesty, no matter how destructive, is cathartic.
Or maybe I’m just glad I can conveniently blame all my issues on an involuntary biological cycle that’s out of my control.
Regardless,
Yours,
Me.
