To ask who is spending £13 on sanitary products per month?

[avocuddl]

Just watching This Morning on period poverty. I appreciate this may be a real issue but I just can't work out the costs stated on the website under 'The Facts' www.freeperiods.org/mission
£18k over a lifetime which equals £13 per month.

The MP said she'd spent £25 on one period?

I buy the always £1 pack and they're fine! A pack of paracetamol is like 20p?

Sorry if this has been done before but aibu?

Does anyone else cringe at the posts saying they spend extra on chocolate?

@Mrscog

I’m not over egging it. My IUD fell out at a concert and I bled profusely I ended up in A&E (hence ruined jeans as was hours before I could tackle the stain and it had dried). It turned out I had 4 huge fibroids

I then had to wait a year for surgery. During this time I became severely anaemic and bled very suddenly and heavily without warning. I would get up as soon as I realised but often it was already on the sofa/bedding.

I started to try to find blood stain solutions and sometimes could get it all out but more often than not you get the main blood out but end up with a brown ‘ring’ type stain that will not budge. If you have been asleep for a few hours stains often dry, the heavier and larger the stain and dependent upon materials sometimes it won’t come out. I am fully single now but I always found it so embarrassing. It’s ok to say ‘it’s blood’ but sometimes it looks like a shit stain

@Catsandbootsandbootsandcats , could you look at making them yourself with materials you already have?

I have heavy periods too. Usually need to wear at least three pads at a time, so use about 15 pads per day. Period lasts at least 5 days so 75 pads which cost approx £10.

Don’t forget laxatives, sometimes I need laxatives because of the iron and the fact menstruation can cause constipation.

whilst some of us have horrendous diarrhoea with periods.🙈
So much fun to be a woman I tell you.

I'm lucky that I have quite light periods, I'm also lucky that I can afford to pay up front for a Mooncup and washable pads. If I had to buy disposable sanpro every month it would cost quite a bit as I am allergic to most of them so couldn't go for the cheapest, I used to find that the unbleached type from the health food shops were the ones that worked best for me (Natracare I think) which are generally more expensive than supermarket brands. So I can see how it can really add up for women with heavy periods.

Incidentally, washable pads are fantastic. I took ages to buy some because I found the thought a bit icky, but they're great and not difficult to deal with. I generally wear them with a Mooncup on heavy days and pads alone for the light days so I just put them in with the underwear wash because they don't have much blood on them. If I had them for heavy use I would run them through a cold express wash and then put them in with the underwear wash. They're so soft and comfortable compared to disposable pads.

Incidentally, he is not my Ex because of the flooding incident - he is my Ex because he is a cheating twat....

Does anyone else cringe at the posts saying they spend extra on chocolate?

Meh, it's probably the truth though isn't it. I do buy some sort of comfort food when I'm on my period. Although I wouldn't class that as part of my period costings

The medication to control my heavy periods and the associated pain is £18 a month alone, thankfully I have a pre-payment certificate but even so add on actual sanitary protection and I would spend over £13 every month. Endometriosis is not fun!

Every period I have 4 days (waking hours) where I need to change both pad and tampon hourly. I can’t use cardboard applicators because they just collapse sorry for the tmi. So that’s £2.25 for 16 tampons and I easily use 5 or 6 boxes per period. Plus pads which are £1 per pack and I use at least 4. Then prescription medication which is free because I’m on a low income but if paying for that too I’d be spending around £25 per period.
Extra washing would put that price up even more.
I’d love to be able to use cheap san pro but it just doesn’t hold up to how heavy my period is in the middle.

Thing is, even if the associated costs cannot really be taken into account, it doesn't hurt if people are aware of them.

Giving access to at least sanitary products to all girls
AND raising awareness in schools that it can be a lot worst than a bit of blood would be a major step.

All teachers go through safe guarding training. It wouldn't hurt to add one paragraph to remind them that some girls can have excruciating embarrassing leaks, heavy flow needing more toilet break and pain.
Sadly, some of the least understanding are female who think they know it all because they have periods themselves.

Much variation between women. I think a point can be made about period expense without inflating the average.

For me, a £25 mooncup, once. I keep a few of the 75p supermarket own brand towels around in case of emergency, but nothing else.

I didn’t realise taking painkillers was so commonplace, either :/ mine are uncomfortable but not what I’d call painkiller-level painful. Being female can be a bit shit sometimes.

Can't work it out myself either, I buy supermarket own brand for 50p (2 packs) and use tampons in addition on heavy days (£1 but last 2 months) I spend about £5 a month for the three of us including a couple of packets of pain killers (also used for headaches of course) I bought each of us 3 pairs of lined pants (annabel Croft designed them) for extra security, weren't cheap but have lasted 3 years so far.

Those plastic applicators are all pinchy and slicy. Ouch.

I have just been diagnosed with fibroids and I am on week 12 of my period. I use a larger version of a moon cup as its easier to track my flow...the first 2 weeks I was losing 80-100ml a day ( 16 tampon minimum) but from week 3 to now it is down to 25-40ml a day 8-12 tampons). In tampons that would be horrifically expensive AND would have ruined not only a lot of my underwear but also bedding, towels and clothes. I have even had to pay a professional carpet cleaner to come in on week 2 after my fanny exploded on the stairs. So had I been using tampons this 12 weeks would have cost me around £120 all in. And there is no signs of it slowing down.

Cant wait for surgery!

lol at 40+ lady having lighter periods and further apart

mum and auntie had the same heavy periods from teenage years right up to the last one at 50 something.

interesting comments re TENA - I had wondered if they were better.

Its average isn't it, so some spend more, some spend less. Personally, I used to use half a box of tampax a month, now firmly in peri, I'm using two boxes of pads and a box of tampons a month.

Everyone is different, and before the mooncup brigade jump in, no I cant. my cervix and pelvic floor are all in the wrong place after twins and it's just not comfortable.

Always pads are too contoured - my vagina likes to trickle the blood all up the front and not at the back.
I improved this for me one day by accidentally in a sleep deprived haze sticking one on backwards (so had more pad up front). Wore them backwards from that day on!
Also, giant knickers and nappies for night bleeds which minimised a lot of issues caused by flooding.
YY to ultra tampons barely lasting 25 mins too. And also finding the one brand that doesn't tear your bits to pieces.

Sadly, some of the least understanding are female who think they know it all because they have periods themselves

Hell yeah

Apart from 'those' friends i also have a nursing friend who will only accept that a period is heavy if you are unable to get off the toilet

She sits there going ' now thats a heavy period' its bloody irritating especially as she doesnt have periods due to her contraceptive choice

Oh god yeah the ‘monthly evacuation’. You have my sympathies.

I must add actually, that there was one tome in my life, I couldn’t afford all the gubbins, I had to pick and choose and because free bleeding wasn’t really an option, it was the painkillers (simple paracetamol/ibuprofen never cuts it) that had to be put on hold. Those were terrible times actually. I’d just cry in pain for days, awake all night in pain. I was a late teen then.

Does anyone else cringe at the posts saying they spend extra on chocolate?

No, not really. Reading this thread, I'm realising how lucky I am when it comes to the bleeding, but the PMS part of my period is the horrible part for me. Can't sleep, feeling ill, mood's all over the place and I'm a bottomless pit as far as food goes. It's just another symptom.

For anyone suffering, I would strongly recommend acupuncture. It's not cheap, but it can have amazing results to help relieve the worst symptoms.

I would take my own daughter in a second if they start having bad periods. At the very least, you know it's safe!

The figures in the link in the OP aren't accurate - £13 a month doesn't add up to £18k over a lifetime. They're including much more in that figure.

www.channel4.com/news/factcheck/period-poverty-is-real-but-the-average-woman-isnt-spending-500-a-year-on-menstruation

£13 a month on pads/tampons sounds right for someone who has very heavy periods, but extremely high as an 'average' figure. I spend about £2.

The £18k lifetime figure is absurd and includes, per month:
£13 on pads/tampons
£4.50 on pain relief
£8 on new underwear
£8.50 on chocolate, sweets and crisps (seriously?)
£7 on other things - they list magazines, toiletries and DVDs as examples.

Some women and girls struggle to pay for sanitary supplies. This over-inflated figure hurts the campaign rather than helping it. When I was struggling to get by I certainly wasn't wasting money on expensive chocolate and magazines because I had my period.

Not everyone buys supermarket brands! I never did.

When going through the menopause, I easily spent this much a month. I got through at least 1 and sometimes 2 large packs of tampons every month, plus endless pads (changed every hour).

Just because you don't spend that much, doesn't mean others don't.

@MyNewtMyFrogMyLittleRedDog

I am sorry I laughed (a lot) at your exploding fanny on the stairs! Thank god that’s never happened to me!

Sometimes you can laugh about the horror of it - exploding carpet fannies, pinched vag walls and myself personally have left a few very sleepy giant bum shaped blood stains on the loo seat having got up at night - terrifying my DC in the morning.

When it was really bad I would have to get up at least twice in the night to sort it all out even if it wasn’t leaking my brain was constantly worrying about it.

What does heavy mean to some people? What does leaking mean? A few spots or more similar to childbirth? We are all different.