# Before Kotex----What was used? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 19, 2000, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911 "2000-06-19T23:39:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![insider](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/bbe5ce/32.png) [@insider](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/insider)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2000, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/1 "2000-06-19T23:39:25Z")
Before commercial products such as Kotex, what did women use during that time of month? What about 500 or 1000 years ago? ---
**Author:** ![Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2000, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/2 "2000-06-19T23:44:35Z")
Don’t have a link for this, it’s just the Straight Dope. Women had special cloth rags that they fastened to their underclothing with pins, hence the slang term “to be on the rag”. Dunno what women did in eras when women didn’t wear underclothing. But almost all primitive cultures prescribed a period of isolation for menstruating women, so she probably basically just sat there and dripped. ---
**Author:** ![Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2000, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/3 "2000-06-19T23:46:14Z")
Could have had some kind of absorbent loincloth, I suppose. ---
**Author:** ![madd1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ecc23a/32.png) [@madd1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madd1)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/4 "2000-06-20T00:20:18Z")
This is sort of an addition to the OP… Not to be gross or anything; But why doesn’t it just ‘scab’ over? ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/5 "2000-06-20T00:44:06Z")
While I think the idea of rags which could be washed and reused is what I’ve always heard, this link [Tampax](http://www.tampax.com/first.html) indicates tampons were around in ancient Egypt among other early societies. ---
**Author:** ![sailor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@sailor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sailor)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/6 "2000-06-20T00:51:41Z")
ah the chinese maxim: Kotex not best thing but next to best thing! Or as a friend of mine once put it: “Like Kotex, I was at the very best place… at the very worst time”. ---
**Author:** ![robinh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b77776/32.png) [@robinh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robinh)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/7 "2000-06-20T01:15:40Z")
madd1, It doesn’t “scab over” because menstrual fluid isn’t blood. It looks like blood, but it lacks clotting properties. (Or at least it is supposed to; some women will pass clots and they are painful.) ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/8 "2000-06-20T02:23:11Z")
See: British reality series “The 1900 House.” [http://www.salon.com/ent/col/mill/2000/06/19/1900/index.html](http://www.salon.com/ent/col/mill/2000/06/19/1900/index.html) ---
**Author:** ![Gunslinger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/4491bb/32.png) [@Gunslinger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gunslinger)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/9 "2000-06-20T04:19:07Z")
First of all, it is my duty as a man to say: ewwww. Interesting historical trivia: Kotex was developed as a field dressing for military use in WWII. after the war, it was found that the same properties that made it a good battlefield bandage (light weight, small package, super absorbency) made it ideal for its current application. ---
**Author:** ![lee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lee/32/7455_2.png) [@lee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lee)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 5:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/10 "2000-06-20T05:09:21Z")
Well, the clots I pass are not painful. They are jelly-like in consistancy and sometimes rather large (up to the size of my hand.) I can feel them passing though. YUCK. The bad part is they are very slippery and are not absorbed easily by pads or tampons. If I feel one, I cautiously head for the bathroom before the slippery thing can wander. Clots are associated with heavy cramps though. The cramps are uterine contractions that help the lining shed. Once out the flow can form an almost scablike sustance on the hair on the labia majora (this doesn’t stay long in my experience because I wash if it is like that. I wash frequently during my period.) The reason it doesn’t scab over the cervix and vagina are many. Partly it is due to natural declotters the body produces. 1. The cervix is moist an scabs don’t form well in the vagina or even near the labia minora. It would be like getting a crusty scab in your mouth. Doen’t happen usually. 2. the flow is absorbed in a pad or tampon and never makes to a place dry enough to form a big scab. 3)that which does kinda scab up is washed off before it builds up. 1. there is no wound for the scab like stuff to really adhere to so it washes off easily. Not every woman gets clots. I had a friend who thought she was dying because she experienced clots for the first time. I always have a heavy period. lucky me. See [http://www.mum.org](http://www.mum.org) for some history. ---
**Author:** ![Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 5:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/11 "2000-06-20T05:20:24Z")
Menstruation isn’t really “bleeding” like when you cut your hand. It’s a shedding of the special blood-rich lining that the uterus builds up in preparation for nourishing a fetus. If a fertilized embryo were to be implanted, then that uterine lining is what would eventually develop into the placenta. If no fetus develops, then the lining is discarded, over several days. It usually comes out as a more or less steady flow of blood, and I believe the “clots” are really just clumps of uterine lining. As Robin pointed out, menstrual blood doesn’t have clotting ability, so it can’t form a scab. The stuff that dries on your pubic hair is just dried blood, so technically it isn’t a “scab”. A scab also has white blood cells in it to help defend your body from infection, and is intended to pull the edges of a wound together to close it. Menstrual bleeding doesn’t count, to your body, as a “wound”. ---
**Author:** ![sailor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@sailor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sailor)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/12 "2000-06-20T06:55:56Z")
Gunslinger, I’m with you! Ewwwwww! ---
**Author:** ![vanilla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/f19dbf/32.png) [@vanilla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vanilla)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 7:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/13 "2000-06-20T07:34:43Z")
lovely. Now let me get a glass of that tomato juice here…heh. I dont know what they used; I’m glad I wasn’t around then. Since I had my son, its been much less in volume and pain, tampons are the only way to go. ---
**Author:** ![Silo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ac91a4/32.png) [@Silo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silo)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 8:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/14 "2000-06-20T08:54:25Z")
…and I was going to have a Bloody Mary tonight. Ixnay that idea. ---
**Author:** ![eggo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c4cdca/32.png) [@eggo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eggo)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 9:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/15 "2000-06-20T09:05:55Z")
> [@](#): > > \*\* > Gunslinger, I’m with you! Ewwwwww! > > \*\* as am i, ::yak!:: eggo ---
**Author:** ![lee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lee/32/7455_2.png) [@lee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lee)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 1:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/16 "2000-06-20T13:28:06Z")
Well, [http://www.centerforendo.com/news/clots/clots.htm](http://www.centerforendo.com/news/clots/clots.htm) says they are clots. Not everywoman experiences passing clots during menses, If these giant clots I see are really the lining, then what happens to the lining in all the women who never pass clots? must be an awful build up. There are chemicals that the body releases that cause the lning to liquefy and slough off. Apparently if flow is quite heavy and flow is not fast enough then clots form as the flow exits the uterus. [http://www.towson.edu/~hull/Courses/CGB/Discuss/Hemophilia.html](http://www.towson.edu/~hull/Courses/CGB/Discuss/Hemophilia.html) * * * ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/17 "2000-06-20T13:50:09Z")
> [@](#): > > \*\* > Well, the clots I pass are not painful. They are jelly-like in consistancy and sometimes rather large (up to the size of my hand.) I can feel them passing though. YUCK. The bad part is they are very slippery and are not absorbed easily by pads or tampons. If I feel one, I cautiously head for the bathroom before the slippery thing can wander. > \*\* I…I was going to add something to this thread re a link or… something… can’t remember now… things fuzzy…was reading this message and suddenly stomach started churning … cold sweat…felt woozy and passed out. Oh…now I remember! Slippery clots!! OH GOD!.. THUD! ---
**Author:** ![Rysdad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/7cd45c/32.png) [@Rysdad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rysdad)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/18 "2000-06-20T15:05:07Z")
> [@](#): > > \*\* > Well, the clots I pass are not painful. They are jelly-like in consistancy and sometimes rather large (up to the size of my hand.) \*\* 3 - 2 - 1 - **Launch lunch!** BLAARRRRRRGGHHHKKK! The mental picture is excrutiating…liver-filled Lady Hanes. I’m gonna go wash my mind out with lye soap. ---
**Author:** ![SqrlCub](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ea5d25/32.png) [@SqrlCub](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SqrlCub)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/19 "2000-06-20T15:19:46Z")
YUCK! I thought being a gay man that I would never have to hear those type of stories again. I don’t even like hearing them from my sisters. EEK! Sqrl ---
**Author:** ![handy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5a626/32.png) [@handy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/handy)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2000, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911/20 "2000-06-20T15:44:59Z")
Apes just go around dripping. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/before-kotex-what-was-used/22911.md?page=2)