How many reusable sanitary pads?

[LumpyandBumps]

This is not an AIBU but understand I am more likely to get opinions here.

I am making reusable sanitary pads to send abroad. I am past needing to use them, and only have experience of disposable ones.

How many is a sensible, workable number to have?

There are around 50 women/girls in the village, so I won’t be able to supply them all, but would like a number to work towards.

The village is in Africa and I don’t know how quickly they could wash, dry and reuse. They use rags at present but again I don’t know quantity.

Thanks in advance

Ah, looks like I didn’t post in AIBU anyway, but hope someone can help!

www.cheekywipes.com/help-i-need-advice-about-what-i-need-to-switch-to-reusable-period-protection.html

Cheeky wipes have a questionnaire to help people decide what they might need, maybe that would help you work out roughly what might be enough for one person?

Can you make as many as you can and then the women and girls can distribute them among themselves?

A variety of sizes is good from small up to larger more absorbent maternity pads.

Bags to keep them in are useful.

My dd has perhaps an average flow and uses modi bodi period pants rather than pads. These pants go up the back so are great for nights etc and take up to 15 ml. As pads don’t go up the back in the same way, I imagine pants can be worn longer than pads.

The pants themselves take a day and a half to dry indoors in winter in a very warm utility room of 21C and the best part of a very warm day on the line in the summer. Pads, however, will take less time as they can be flattened.

Dd uses 3 pairs in 24 hours in heavier times but twice daily would be sufficient due to the absorbency. One pair could easily last days in light times but obviously that isn’t hygienic.

Your best bet is perhaps to start with trying to ascertain how much blood your pads will take. I had rather heavy periods as I got older and I cannot imagine 3 reusable pads every 24 hours would have worked for me. I wore always ultra nights with wings day and night, 2 at a time to make them longer during heavy times / overnight and was changing every couple of hours at peak flow.

All this to say there is no easy answer. One woman could perhaps cope with 4 pads, another would need 10 and this presuming they can wash them as soon as they change. Therefore you would also would need to ascertain how often women in the village are able / allowed to wash the products and where they can dry them, what about in times of heavy rain.

Perhaps you could email action aid about how often women are able to care for their sanitary ware?

www.actionaid.org.uk/about-us/contact-us?o=f

How long is a piece of string?

Depends on how heavy the flow.
Depends on how often you feel comfortable changing them.
Depends how quickly you can wash and dry them.

I have 5 and that's fine for me.
My daughter probably has more like 10 in regular use.

Thank you for these replies. I used the link which suggests around 10 person. The pads I have made so far have are different thicknesses so the idea of sending in bulk and letting the women distribute them is a good one.
Thank you Mummyoflittledragonnfor your very detailed response. This is a very small scale initiative, just me and the person who visits the village occasionally, and we talked about pants as I questioned whether they actually had underwear to use with the pads. I did try to make a few different ones but they ended up very bulky, and not very user friendly. They also took me very much longer, and I only have until she next visits to complete them.
She has a small cash budget so has decided to bulk buy some underwear if necessary.

I use 9 small (pantyliner size) pads which works for me, they dry within 12-24 hours depending on the weather. Used to get by with 6 but 9 is better.

I have an average length period,.but a medium heavy flow.
I have at least 5 pairs of period pants plus five pads. They are all on the line and I have run out on day five.
So at least ten would be my answer.

Would you be able to send materials & instructions for making more pads? If you’re machine-sewing them there are various hand-sewing instructions available online - for example ActionAid’s & World Vision’s (the latter are meant for children). Being able to make pads themselves would make an enormous difference.

I use period pants and have a moderate to light period now I've got older. I have 6 pairs but will do a wash mid-way through, so 10 would be a good estimate.
If you have to make do with far fewer, I'd say you could comfortably get by with 4 per person when you can wash every day and the weather is conducive to drying.

I have a suggestion for the pants issue - sanitary belts. You can’t buy these any longer. But if you so chose, you could attach a loop to each end of the pad.

A belt looked like this picture of a 1950s one for sale on Etsy. Adjustable and made out of elastic.

Pic of what it looked like on the woman wearing black jeans.

Instead of the hook on the belt, you could attach a lightweight toggle.

Not terribly elegant and I don’t like the toggle idea. But a possible solution vs pants, which will need changing regularly.

A neater solution would be to use buttons on the sanitary and make the pads much longer adding a button hole at each end.