Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To think periods are a terrible design flaw in the human race

207 replies

CrumpledCrumpet · 17/12/2021 14:28

Humans are quite remarkably cleverly designed creatures. Binocular vision, opposable thumbs, walking upright - we’ve got it all going on. But honestly, who came up with periods?

AIBU to think this is a massive design fault and someone needs to go back to the drawing board and come up with something better?

OP posts:
derxa · 17/12/2021 17:37

I think maybe the human race has interfered horribly with the breeding of sheep and given them all sorts of problems they might not have had in the wild as side-effects. Used they to have twins and triplets as a regular thing, back in the old days before they'd been bred to have wool that needed shearing instead of being moulted all year round, for instance, and two lambs was more profitable for the owners? (This not saying anything against your ewes. Just comparing ancient more-like-goats sheep and modern ones.)
There is a breed of sheep which is bred to shed its wool - Exlana I think. We've just scanned our ewes and we've got equal numbers of singles and twins plus 10% triplets. The ideal number of lambs is two because the ewe has two teats. Last year we had a huge number of triplets and even quads. We can't breed for this or control it. The birthing problems occur if the ewes are over fed and lambs grow too big in utero. Some breeds have been over bred to have large heads and very strong thick legs. Ours are Lleyns which are supposed to give birth without much assistance and are very motherly.

PuppyMonkey · 17/12/2021 17:38

When you think about it, who the hell came up with the whole concept of how the human race reproduces at all. I mean, sex is absolutely ridiculous.Grin

KittyBurrito · 17/12/2021 17:39

If you think periods are a design flaw, wait until you experience menopause...

scottishnames · 17/12/2021 17:39

Maireas
Well, Cleopatra was ceremonially married to two of her brothers. It's possible that their close biological relationship made a surviving child less likely. We don't know if they actually had sex. But then she had relationships with two Roman leaders. This led to four children. She died aged only 39.

Elizabeth I was famously a virgin.

Among Henry VIII's wives, the first had two surviving children and countless miscarriages. The second had one surviving child and at least one miscarriage during a very short married life. The third died of sepsis after childbirth, after an even shorter time as a wife. The fourth refused to have sex with Henry VI. The fifth was queen for just over a year, and was executed aged just 17. By the time Henry was already seriously ill. By the time he married the sixth, he was an invalid and probably not able to have sex. Agfter he died, she married again soon afterwards and died from sepsis after childbirth aged only 36.

And Queen Victoria genuinely loved her husband but hated pregnancy and childbirth. She had nine children, between 1840 and 1857.

In Europe, royal and upper class women had many MORE children than poor ones, because they did not breast-feed their babies. Instead, they handed them over to wet-nurses. This meant that they became fertile againmuch more quickly that poor women, who might breastfeed for maybe two years. They were also much better nourished than poor women, and so more likely to conceive and to have a successful pregnancy.

It was really, really tough to be an aristocratic bride. Many had a baby almost every year, and died young. One of the worst was poor Queen Anne. Over 25 years, she had seventeen pregnancies, of which only five were live births. None of her children survived to adulthood. She was married aged 18 and died aged 49.

Dreamstate · 17/12/2021 17:40

Its so badly designed i could even believe we live in a matrix! Grin

Thesechipsdontlie · 17/12/2021 17:44

Before my DC I thought pregnancy would be sweet relief from periods for 9 months....Turned out just to be a different kind of mither from Mother Nature (hello sickness, spd, sore boobs, heartburn, stretch marks etc etc)

Maireas · 17/12/2021 17:45

Elizabeth I was a virgin?
Maybe, maybe not.
It wouldn't necessarily stop her having periods. Therefore she almost certainly had periods for many years.

scottishnames · 17/12/2021 17:49

Should be - re poor Queen Anne - she had seventeen pregnancies over 20 years, not over 25. Even worse.

Aristocratic women also tended to marry much younger than ordiary women. From the 16th cent, the average age of marriage of ordinary women was mid-late 20s, whereas aristocratic women typically married in their teens.

Rosewaterblossom · 17/12/2021 17:50

Yes I agree, and what do men have to put up with? Sweet FA.. 🙄

Crazykatie · 17/12/2021 17:51

One day of course it will be possible to turn off or on the breeding cycle and do away with all the bother of periods until like all mammals we have to cope. At least some others are seasonal breeders which would make it easier, however it has been a very successful evolution, increasing the influence of the human species over other animals in fact the whole planet.

SickAndTiredAgain · 17/12/2021 17:53

@ginghamstarfish

I always think teeth, backs and not growing new limbs (and new teeth) as some animals do are a major giveaway that humans were not 'designed', and not sure how religious folks explain this, although I'm sure they do come with something.
Agreed! If the liver can regrow, I think it’s a poor effort for teeth not to be able to.
Atmywitsend29 · 17/12/2021 17:54

If modern medicine left us to our own devices in regards to childbirth, how many of us would have died in childbirth still? I'd have died at 20 years old because my baby was large, overdue, and back to back and I had to have an emcs.
My sister has had episiotomies with both of her babies and pre-emptive antibiotics. Probably would have died of sepsis way back when.
And our inefficient pelvises would cease to exist in the gene pool Grin

WilliamofBaskerville · 17/12/2021 17:56

Re aristocratic brides, poor Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry VII, had him aged just 13. She never had another child and it’s thought it was because she was so damaged by this. She was lucky to survive.

wonderstuff · 17/12/2021 17:56

I also object to the length of time we are fertile, 13-45ish? Seems very unnecessary in order to replace the species, there should be a switch or something. Loving the idea of owl pellets.

I have found cbd coated tampons are really effective at reducing period pain, not as much fun as smoking cannabis but they do allow you to get on with stuff.

PlanktonsComputerWife · 17/12/2021 17:58

I don't know.

I think about how much I hate staying in to wait for a parcel.

Then I imagine having to sit on a nest of eggs and not being able to leave them for nine months.😱

JCWildWest · 17/12/2021 17:59

My DD said this to me the other day. And I couldn't give her a good or solid answer, it does seem like a design flaw. DD is really suffering with heavy periods and cramps and can't understand why her reproductive system is designed to cripple her, which seems quite reasonable.

JCWildWest · 17/12/2021 18:01

Also echo other posts on mortality of childbirth. I'd of defo died having my DD and her too if it wasn't for modern medicine. It's like we aren't designed to reproduce very effectively

LoveMySituation · 17/12/2021 18:04

I bumbled along reasonably happily with periods, I just did what was needed and carried on as before. It was having boobs I absolutely loathed(and still do) It was perimenopause that made me think if there's a god it's a) male and b) misogynistic. And realise that I'd got off very lightly with periods for the last thirty years. Who the hell connects oestrogen to bone mass, puts receptors for it in every part of the body? Someone who seemingly hates women and doesn't want us to be healthy after we've done what we're supposed to do

MadCattery · 17/12/2021 18:07

Speaking of design flaws, most (if not all) other mammals have breasts that enlarge for nursing and then recede. It would certainly be more convenient...

Mufasa1118 · 17/12/2021 18:23

I enjoy my period.

scottishnames · 17/12/2021 18:23

Maireas She was certainly abused - inappropriate touching - by Somerset, as a teenager. And there were certainly rumours about her and Leicester and Essex and others. She may well have had emotional and - to a certain degree physical - affairs (so far as we know, she almost certainly did) , but I think she was far, far too canny to have risked pregnancy out of wedlock.

Politically, she made great and very effective use of her claims to virginity for political purposes. And on her deathbed, she declared that she was a virgin. This was at a time when people genuinely believed that sinners were puished in hell. So far as I - and others - can tell, she was not personally devout, and was very, very pragmatic when it came to religion. But telling an open lie on your deathbed would have been an absolutely enormous and shattering thing to do for anyone at that time.

We don't really know much about her gynaecology. There were hostile rumours that she was physically not capable of sex; on the other hand, spies for one potential foreign husband quizzed her washerwoman (!!) who reported that things were normal - though of course we don't know what precisely the washerwoman meant by that.

You are correct, in that she might have had periods for a long while. But she was extraordinary - a complete and utter exception.

Having said all that, not all women married in Tudor times, and, as I said above, poor ordinary women did not usually marry until their mid 20s. However, there is some evidence to say that poor nourishment and tough physical work (in the fields etc) meant - compared with today -that periods started later, around mid- late teens. And might sometimes have been delayed/non-existent.

And, of course, the Church taught that periods were part of Eve's punishment; they were expected to be troublesome. If you'd been brought up with this outlook - and had no other possible explanations presented to you - then you'd expect pain, discomfort etc etc etc.

HowDareYouStealThatCar · 17/12/2021 18:26

@WilliamofBaskerville

Re aristocratic brides, poor Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry VII, had him aged just 13. She never had another child and it’s thought it was because she was so damaged by this. She was lucky to survive.
Apparently this was actually frowned upon at the time. Whilst aristocrats often married young, they weren't expected to start trying for babies until the bride was older (I suppose more late teens than early teens).

Also re the poster who said that the average life expectancy was 30 - this is due to a high infant mortality rate. Putting it simply, if 50% of the population die aged 60 and 50% die before their first birthday, then the average life expectancy is 30. It doesn't mean that everyone died before menopause. There's actually archaeological evidence to suggest that children who grew up in close proximity to their maternal grandmothers had better survival rates, so clearly we do have some evolutionary purpose post-childbearing age!

Sorry for the long post - I'm a bit of an evolutionary biology/history enthusiast Blush

Knackeredmommy · 17/12/2021 18:27

Agree, why every month and for decades?

TheOrigRights · 17/12/2021 18:32

@Knackeredmommy

Agree, why every month and for decades?
You can rectify that by having more (and more) children and breastfeeding in between. Grin
TheOrigRights · 17/12/2021 18:34

@Mufasa1118

I enjoy my period.
Mine have mostly not bothered me, but now I'm perimenopausal they (and the associated symptoms) are more disruptive.

When they're easily managed they are a good indication of health.