Menstruating is one of the most natural and normal things for a girl. But it's something that we don't talk about very much or educate young girls about. The only thing we're told when we get our first period as a girl is that "here are some pads or tampons".
I remember the first time I got my period at 11, I cried because I didn't want to be an adult. I didn't talk to my mother very much about it, but it was more my sister who told me about it because she had her first period 3 months before me. I got a pad and a few cycles later I learned how to insert a tampon.
However, there is such a much deeper perspective to menstruation than just sanitary napkins. In fact, there are nature religions that hold sacred a bleeding woman and see her as a medium to the divine. Bleeding women are kept in a special red tent for 3 days to just bleed and clean out and regenerate. They take a retreat from society.
In today's modern society, however, the period leading up to menstruation and during menstruation is widely misunderstood – or rather ignored. Society is very masculine and works outwards at 150 km per hour on a very linear stretch. But the feminine cycle is (like the word) cyclical! It goes up and down.
Here are some rituals to start celebrating your period, and not just your period, but the period leading up to it.
The luteal period is the period leading up to menstruation, and it is probably as sacred as menstruation, as it is a time when both body and mind are waning in energy, and we are becoming more sensitive. If we push ourselves here, it is very normal to become very unhappy, irritable, angry, depressed and have worse PMS symptoms and menstrual cramps.
These rituals are therefore both some that you can do during the luteal period and during your period.
1. Ceremonial cacao
Drink ceremonial cacao up to and during your period. It has some of the highest content of magnesium on earth, and magnesium supports in reducing menstrual pain and cramps from the uterus.
2. Yoni steaming
Yoni steam in your inner fall in the days leading up to your period because it helps to cleanse the uterus and soften the flow of bleeding and reduce cramps. Use a handful of yoni steam herbs and boil it in a pot of water for 10 min. Pour the contents into another container and squat on your knees over it without panties and wrap a blanket around you. Enjoy it for 10-20 min.
3. Slow down
Slow down and get into your body. You can do this by taking warm baths with magnesium salts, massaging your breasts and stomach, going for a walk in nature, writing in a diary, practicing gentle yin yoga and rest rest rest.
4. Sacrifice your blood to nature
Find a way to get to know your blood. The easiest way is to start collecting it with a menstrual cup or menstrual disc . Look at it and smell it. Pour the blood into a holy vase or bowl of water. Sacrifice the blood back to nature – or a houseplant. (I heard somewhere that when women start giving their blood back to Mother Earth, the men will come back from war.)
5. Free soak on a waterproof Moonblood blanket
With the Moon Blood Blanket™, you can wave goodbye to worrying about soaked sheets and red stains on mattress toppers. Its waterproof technology sewn into the blanket traps blood and other liquids and prevents them from seeping through. The moon blood blanket™ also gives you a really comfortable and delicious bleeding, because it is super soft to lie on and is nice for the buttocks, thighs and vulva.