I’m usually pretty regular, meaning that I can usually predict within a couple of days when it will arrive, but every six months to a year the timeline shifts some, usually just a couple of days and then arrive then for a long while. Until this year. All this year it’s been early by two or three days each month. Earlier than the month before, I mean. This month it arrived around 10 days earlier than it had most of last year. To top it off, I didn’t feel PMSy when it ambushed at work last week, so I didn’t have much with me…and everyone likes to rush off without warning while meeting with the Department of Education. I do not like surprises like this! Stupid uterus.
Florence King wrote a great essay about menopause that includes the following:
My thoughts on the menopause do not go over well with the kind of middle-aged women who say, “You’re only as old as you feel,” and then give a pert toss of the head. . . About the most these women will say on the forbidden subject is a wistful murmur of “I miss my periods.” If you reply, as I did, “That’s like missing the Spanish Inquisition,” your name will be entered in the Index of Insensitivity under Twatist.
I hate those stupid books. I remember the one called It’s wonderful being a girl!
It seemed like evil lies and propaganda at the time. Then once I was “blessed” with becoming a woman, my suspicions were confirmed. The only thing “wonderful” is the confirmation that you’re not pregnant. Everything else sucks rocks.
They also told us in sex ed class that sex with a condom doesn’t feel any different than sex without. They were so full of shit.
I’ll be 42 in a couple of months and I’m still depressingly regular. She shows up every damn month and stays for 7 to 10 days. It sucks, it really, really, really sucks. Since all the women in my family had hysterectomies, I don’t know when I’ll actually start menopause. It can’t be soon enough for me!
Mine has been shifting to showing up later, and I’m stupidly and anxiously hoping she shows in the next couple of days because I have to go on a trip in May and I don’t want have the ol’ pain in the butt visiting me at that time.
Aunt Flo skipped town about a year ago…but dropped in unexpectedly around the holidays. I can’t wait 'til she DIES.
I have nice underwear for exactly one wearing. Well, until now anyway. Like clockwork, Aunt Flow would show up unexpectedly when the new underwear was making its debut.
I was on Depo for 9 months with no period. Great! Except for the side effects. So I’ve gone off of it, and now I’m just waiting for Aunt Flo to reappear. And I’ve run out of black pants to wear so today I’m wearing white jeans. Wanna take bets on my chances of getting my period while I’m wearing white??
Same with me. I never know when I’m going to get my period. Go without one for several months? Normal. Thank goodness I don’t wear white pants that often, because when she shows up, it’s usually at work, and it’s usually with a vengance.
I’ve never found a reason why I’m not regular. I even went on the pill for a while, and that still didn’t make me regular. And yes, I’ve had blood tests - nothing wrong, as far as anyone can see.
Susan
I really need to do more research on menopause - I understand that you are in full-on menopause when you haven’t had a period for a year. So, if you go nearly a year, then that bitch comes back, do you have to re-start the clock again? This sounds like something that could go on for decades.
Angua, have you considered an endometrial ablation?
I’ve got a moderately painful cyst on my right ovary and today Aunt Flo came with the Cramp Kids and made me the bitchiest bitch in the East. In the last week, there have been more people investigating me south of the Equator than there have been since I was in college and at least enjoying it. My reproductive system is staging a coup because I’m not using it for anything and it’s pissed at me. That’s the only explanation.
Oh, and taxi, I do not envy you spending the entire day running to the bathroom “just in case.” Good luck with the white jeans. :eek:
You’re overhydrated. Mother Nature and Aunt Flow are conspiring to make you collapse into a heap of powder.
Preach it, sister! That’s absolutely true.
Only when it’s been late and they were worried about being pregnant, AFAIK.
That is misery. I’m getting over either a bad cold or a mild flu and got the flow, and that’s bad enough.
I would miss the monthly reassurance that I’m not pregnant, though my amazing powers of denial might take care of that. Besides, I’ve heard that you still spend roughly the same amount of time on the rag on those pills- does that mean that your period lasts three times as long when it does come? I definitely wouldn’t like that. Depo’s not an option because I’m deathly afraid of needles.
Ooh, just a little spotting? I’m starting Nuvaring in a couple of days. That sounds awesome! I hope I get that side effect!
My 13 year old daughter called my cell phone in a panic, at first whispering then talking with her mouth right up against the mouthpiece so I couldn’t understand her.
I get her in a position where I can finally undertand her. Her brother is standing right there, and we know how fragile 13 year old girl’s egos can be, so she’s telling me that that Thing that comes once a month is early! It’s not supposed to be here until next week!
I get her to say the word “period” out loud a couple of times to stress that it is not a bad word, she can certainly say it around her brother, who has a mother and who will eventually have a wife, and I explained the whole 28 days vs. once a month thing.
Yeesh. How I’m going to survive her until college I will never know.
Yes, the clock starts at zero again. I’ve been going like this for 2 1/2 years. It’s driving me nuts. I guess it’s partly because I started menopause so young. I actually had two periods in a row around the holidays. It totally blows, except for the menopause patch, which I credit for saving both my life and the life of my husband.
He probably would snicker, though. What you do in that situation is, you tell him all about what’s coming out, in explicit detail, until he starts to look like he might throw up (this doesn’t take long for most guys). Continuing after that point is optional, depending on how evil you are 
Periods can be wonky in young teenagers. You should tell her that irregular periods are normal at her age. Some women’s periods never become very regular. Mine is- even before I went on the Pill, it was normally regular to within a few hours. That’s why I was so unprepared for it to start a day early yesterday. Some women have a regular cycle that’s longer or shorter than 28 days- anything between 21 and 35 days is normal, too.
Food poisoning, the flow, and a kidney stone.
I promise you I have encountered no more wretched feeling than (TTTTTTMI alert)
kneeling on a cold wet university health center bathroom floor, crouched vomiting over a toilet while you feel yourself soiling your pants, all the while in the most agonizing pain this side of being kicked repeatedly in the back with steel-toed boots.
I once had a period that started the day I had to fly from Germany to the States. Fucker.
Now I’m on Mirena, and I haven’t had a period or cramps or PMS or nuthin’ in a year. Angua, I never had cramps as bad as yours, and mine responded well to birth control pills, so I don’t want to say that Mirena is the answer you’ve been looking for, but it’s definitely worth looking into. What’s more, my insurance paid for mine, so I basically got free birth control for the next several years.
I’m starting to like aspects of perimenopause. For one, Aunti Flow is virtually nil after the second day. Two, I no longer have gut-wrenching cramps nor tender aching breasts.
The flip side? I used to be sickingly regular. I could predict within 2-3 when she’d appear, based on how quickly the cramping/bloat/PMS angry-bitch weirdness escalated. I now have no freaking clue when she’ll appear next. The only intermittent clue I get is inexplicible RAGE the day before.
The kids thng? Never had any. Now that I have physical reminders that the window is closing, so to speak, the “what if’s”? are becoming more frequent.
Mine didn’t become regular until I was about 35.