Kelsey W. • New Hampshire • 20
Picture it: January 2009. Your classroom is a mess because it’s a Friday and you’re most definitely not doing any learning. In fact, it’s polar express day. Everyone is drinking hot chocolate and trying their best to actually watch the movie while teachers call us over for the big old 5th grade reading assignment.
I left to go to the bathroom, enjoying my polar express day like any other 10 or 11 year old. Then I noticed. My yellow frog underwear that read “Tuesday” had a stain of blood. Although I was only 10, I was lucky enough that my mother had told me all about periods. Even though I knew this was all supposed to happen, I still panicked. A girl who I barely knew entered the bathroom, clearly trying to mind her own business. I blurted out that I got my period and started crying. She didn’t even respond.
I went from the bathroom, to my classroom. I begged my teacher for a pass to the nurses without telling her why I needed to go. She was sitting at a table with a group of the so-called “popular guys.” I panicked. I just said I had to go and left anyways. (I made it all much more dramatic then it needed to be.) The nurse comforted me and called my mom.
Eventually, my teacher came down and wanted to have a small celebration for becoming a woman. A woman? I was only 10! When my mom arrived, I got hugs from every woman in the nurses office and pats on the back. Maybe I was an adult now!
My mom called my dad in the car on the way home. He left work. (I wasn’t the only one being dramatic, apparently. I also have really good parents.) He came home with shopping bags full of pads and tampons. He also shed a tear. “The care and keeping of you” had never told me that getting your period would make your dad cry, but alas, it did. I also cried the rest of the day.
