Period talk event...men invited and I feel weird about that

TulipsTulipsTulips I don't think women should be embarrassed about talking about periods. But bodily functions really are not everyone's cup of tea.

Sorry if I sounded many!

MinesaBottle great news.

I can't imagine any men taking over the conversation of periods! Yeh they might ask questions and join in conversations but all I hear is that men don't understand what we women go through and how nothing is equal so surely this is a good start? I wouldn't have an issue with it

Nice one OP, pleased it went well, and thank you for the update :)

Kudos to the women who went & discussed openly and also to lone respectful man for sitting quietly :)

While I accept that men need to learn more about the effects periods can have on women at work, I see no reason why they should be included in the discussion. They have nothing to discuss.

A separate talk with a Q&A aimed specifically at men would be better.

Wanting privacy is not the same as being ashamed or embarrassed.

*silly, not sill!

I was raised to think periods are embarrassing and I even felt the need tk hide them from my father and brother. I’m so proud of the younger generation of women who are promoting confidence about periods and encouraging women not to feel ashamed about them. I now realise that the way I felt about my period was sill, and I did not need to feel ashamed. I’d like to see more women feel confident about talking about this. By saying it’s sill, I didn’t mean to be dismissive of how others feel (but I can see it came across that way). What I was trying say is that we should not be made to feel that way. Being open about periods is really important because it will help remove the stigma that has stopped many women from getting the medical help they have needed in the past. It’s such an ordinary part of life I think it’s really positive to include men in these discussions. To me it showshow far we’ve come from the daya where periods could never be mentioned in front of men.

Moralitym1n

I've been a nurse working in urology - plenty of women think they wee out of their vagina. Lack of knowledge about female bodies isn't limited to men.

Anytime - who cares if it isn't inclusive to men? Seriously, WHO CARES? Why should we ever care about not including men on IWD?

Periods are private, it is not silly to want to keep aspects of your bodily functions private. Asking/demanding women to talk about their private situation publicly is not on. It should be only if they are comfortable and no one should be shamed or told off for not wanting to.

When are men expected to talk about their own bodily functions like this?

Really interested to hear how this went OP.

I hope it was ok for you.

TulipsTulipsTulips why is it silly for people to want to be private about their own bodies?

I'm pretty open about mine but I don't expect every woman to have to be.

Do you imagine there is anything stopping men finding out about periods if they really wanted to?

I would agree that lots of women would feel uncomfortable discussing their own periods in front of male colleagues (and Poss female ones too but to a lesser extent),.

A general discussion is fine of course but to expect individual women to discuss their own menstruation with male colleagues is a bit much. We aren't there - small steps and all that.

I wouldn't do it now tbh.

Also IME men in the workplace do tend to talk over women, dominate etc. Of course a lot of women don't notice as it is just the norm. We had a good one when the new women's network opened, it became all about the men almost immediately!

OP I disagree. It’s good that men are invited to attend. Periods are not precious or sacres or secret. Half of the world’s population has them! It’s silly to feel embarrassed about it. We should definitely make discussions abot periods more mainstream.

As to main topic - I imagine the organisers have thrown it open to men to be PC. I'd doubt many if any men would actually attend (unless they feel compelled to by their role).

In fact that's an insult to medieval peasants.

If they had medieval peasant knowledge of and attitudes to anything else, would it have been tolerated - would they have been unaware of it?

I'm still trying to get my head around this bizarre insanity - so he had vaginal sex with women believing that they pissed out if their vagina - and believed that she 'held it's while they were having sex? Given he presumably knew that having sex in a vagina can result in pregnancy, therefore the womb is attached to the vagina, what did he think happened during pregnancy? Holding pee for 9 months? Pee pours into vagina from some other opening separate from womb? I mean ....

I grew up with men around me wondering why I couldn’t “hold it in” they thought it was like peeing.. and I live with one who thought you peed from your vagina, he was genuinely baffled when I said you didn’t have to take a mooncup/tampon out to pee. Both of the men above are well educated and successful in their careers.

Sorry but there is no excuse for that. Even if school covered nothing, they could have picked up any book showing basic anatomy and seen that (as anyone with a brain would assume) women have a bladder and urethra too.

To me it's that they just never cared or were interested enough to find out basics but instead were happy to believe things in a ridiculously vague, ignorant way. Because it's women - and sure they're irrelevant and weird creatures anyway.

But I would go along and listen.

Sorry that sounds a bit voyeristic

Not meant to be - I mean I would be interested to hear the organisations views bit other peoples problems.

Hope the event went well OP ?

I wouldn't have a problem with male colleagues attending this and to be honest I wouldn't be discussing my periods / menopause issues with any male OR female colleague that I didn't know well.

But I would go along and listen.

The more such events are supported the more likely they will continue. If no one attends an IWD event in the workplace then I doubt that a workplace event would be repeated.

So OP - how did it go?

I’ve got to say, IWD or not I wouldn’t want to turn up to a work-based discussion about periods. It’s all a bit Are You There God, It’s Me Margaret. And I don’t think that either men have any need to understand periods better, or that work is the appropriate environment for them to do that in, unless it directly affects them because they work in healthcare or something. Men who are genuinely concerned and interested should ask their partners, or female friends or relatives, or Google it. Men who can’t or won’t do that, I would suggest, do not have genuine motives.

I’m also concerned that any men who attend will do the usual thing of taking over the discussion, making it about them

Maybe I’m just lucky but the men I know and work with never do this in any context