I just skimmed the thread, so I apologize if I overlooked someone’s post, but in fact the person who suggested that pads were better for women with heavy periods than tampons is wrong - before I started using tampons, leaking through pads was a regular occurrence. Well, not leaking through them so much as leaking in the front or back - yes, even with the extra long size. Since I discovered tampons and started wearing them in combination with pads I’ve never had that issue.
I don’t flush them though. Used to, too, because as mentioned earlier it said they were flush-able on the package. But after our plumber cited tampons in the pipes as the reason for the fact that our toilets kept stopping up and flooding the house, I stopped. If the folks who posted in this thread don’t want to have to replace their flooring or get their ceilings repaired, I suggest they follow my lead.
Also, WOW, thanks for making me feel like my completely normal bodily functions are disgusting. You win a gold star today.
If we all stopped flushing tampons and condoms and kittens, wouldn’t that take away a big chunk of their business? Why do you hate plumbers?
As someone said above, as long as I can help it, I try not to change my tampon in a strange place. And, some people may have issues with it, but in my whole tampon-wearing life, in every house and apartment I’ve lived in, we’ve never had to call a plumber for tampon clogs. The only plumber we ever had to call was to find out there was an old weeping willow root system that took out the toilet in my childhood house, and the only plunging we’ve had to do was for the kids, when they’ve used too much TP.
I’m not some delicate flower - I’ve installed toilets myself. But, based on years and years of tampon flushing, I’ve not had a problem. Among my friends and loved ones, I don’t know of any raging plumbing clog problems.
Maybe you’re used to shitty (ha!) plumbing, but I’ve been lucky enough not to have to deal with it. That makes it very hard to see the value in carrying plastic bags and moist towelettes, in addition to several extra tampons and pads, and going through some complicated process when I can flush them. I am always aware of the possibility of septic homes, and when I don’t feel comfortable enough to ask, I just don’t change anything.
If their system has a problem with tampons being flushed, they need to make that clear. I’ve said *repeatedly *that I don’t mind throwing them away when it’s explicitly stated that the system can’t handle them. Otherwise, if they’re too lazy to make a sign, I have no problem also taking the easy route and flushing my tampons instead of pitching them.
If you’ve gotten the impression that I refuse to do anything *but *flush mine, that’s because **gaffa **is a fucking tard.
No.
The major problem right now is that the same big-ass tubes (technical term) handle raw sewage and runoff water, so when we get a big storm, everything overflows. Redesigning the system would be very expensive, so they’re dragging their heels over it.
You still haven’t answered whether you drop your epic shits in the garbage.
Translation: I wear ugly grandma pants, and so should you, you filthy harlot.
QFT.
Mine *doesn’t *say it’s flushable. Mine *explicitly *says that I should deposit it in the garbage. And the first time I used it and made the mistake of thinking I could flush it, my backing-up toilet quickly demonstrated that I was wrong (and caused me to look at the box and verify that yes, I just hadn’t actually bothered to read the instructions). You know what’s never caused my toilet to back up? Tampons.
As others have noted, I have always flushed tampons, because that’s what the box says you can do. One of the advantages of Tampax over Playtex was that the Playtex applicator wasn’t flushable.
Now, if a particular bathroom has a sign saying not to flush feminine hygiene products, I always figured that they had noted an inability of that specific building’s plumbing to cope, and would wrap and trash. But it honestly hadn’t occurred to me until reading this thread that you shouldn’t flush in general.
I also use the flushable toilet cleaning brushes. The whole point is that they’re flushable - it says so on the package! I’ve never had a problem with them.
From now on, I’ll wrap & toss in any situation I suppose. But don’t blame everyone who flushes - it’s just following the instructions!
My best friend often worries that her pad is showing through. I can never see any such thing, but she is certain so she switched to tampons. Made her feel better.
I can’t imagine my pad is showing at all, and my pants are definitely always too tight. But, then again, I have ‘fat crotch’, so the pad doesn’t really matter.
The people I know with heavier periods swear by a tampon, but for me, whose periods are light, a pad is fine. Change it often and there isn’t any odor (that I have noticed…yikes!)
I agree with the poster that says that if the packaging says they are flushable, then you really should be pitting the company, gaffa.
But this post is really to congratulate Guns on her first pitting! I haven’t had an official one yet, but, oh, I’ve got lots of threads and posts that I consider just as good, including being called a cunt on this board which is famous for banning that word. So yeah. Enjoy.
I can’t believe this is Guns’ first posting. Hell, I got pitted for a throwaway comment in an IMHO thread, and Guns is way snarkier than I am.
If a woman sits right or you are sitting close to her, it is possible to tell if she is wearing a pad. Cross-legged on the floor? Absolutely, and it doesn’t have to be tight pants.
It just seems weird that Shot is so insistent on flushing unless told otherwise when it seems most logical that NOT flushing should be default. It takes so little effort not to flush them that I’m really not getting why anyone would.
Because there isn’t always a waste receptacle nearby (by which I mean within reach of the toilet). If there is, I use it. If there isn’t, I’m flushing.
If there’s one in the bathroom but not in the stall, you wouldn’t just take it out and throw it out? I mean, you have to throw the applicator out anyway.
How is it different? I use tampons and I don’t really see a difference. Usually I just put the applicator in the wrapper of the new tampon and toss it out if there’s no bin in the stall. I’ve heard women go on about how it’s so messy and hard to wrap up a tampon but I’ve wrapped up saturated tampons, and it’s really not rocket science.
Tampax *applicators *are flushable? :dubious: Now *those *I’ll pitch–even the cardboard ones. 'Cause to me, there’s a huge difference between “blob of cotton” and “solid tube.”
Thank you, thank you! Bows all around.
Right?!
Flushing is the most clean, hygenic, and efficient option. Throwing away the tampon means (a) wasting a bunch of toilet paper to wrap it up and (b) disposing of bodily waste fluids in a receptacle where they’re probably going to sit for at least a few hours, if not days. And that’s if there’s a can–which *usually *there is, but not always. When I think of someone throwing away a tampon, I think of Phil Hartman’s anal-retentive chef sketch from SNL. It’s a waste of time when it’s not necessary. Which, as far as I’m concerned, it’s not, unless you take *five fucking seconds *(or less than that, if you average out the time it takes to make a sign across the total number of women who will read it) to tell me that your system can’t handle tampons.
I try not to be snarky on this website. Really, I try to limit my snarkiness in general - it just isn’t my way.
I was pitted for saying “organized religion is worse than organized crime”, in an IMO thread. And I didn’t see it for like three days - so by then the Pitting was just about over.
As for the flushing, whatever. I am simply not going to carry my bloody tampon out of the stall/bathroom. You can rant and rave and complain all you want. I am just not going to do it. I try and be a good human being and work with the Earth and all that but I certainly do have my limits, and you’ve come upon one of them…you want me not to flush? Make sure I have a garbage right there. Also, make sure it’s not overflowing.
Luckily most of the time there are those metal bins stuck to the walls right inside the stall.
Man, I was all excited when I heard Guns had her first pitting. Then I discovered it was the thread whose title I’d been studiously avoiding the past several days.
I use Tampax, with a cardboard applicator, which gets flushed along with the tampon. It’s thin-ish cardboard, and starts getting mushy the minute you get it wet.
What about women who use OB? Nothing there to throw away at all.
OK, but for women who do have a plastic applicator, I don’t see the big difference. When they’re all wrapped up in tiny bundles, there’s no difference. If anything, the tampon looks smaller when it’s wrapped than the hard plastic applicator.
Really, I try to limit my snarkiness in general - it just isn’t my way.