I question whether condoms are really greener than the pill, because on my pill I only have four periods/year, which seriously cuts down on pad/tampon usage (which is very wasteful). I wonder why Lantern didn't factor that in? Knowing when your period is coming results in fewer just-in-case pads being worn; and the pill causes lighter periods which cuts down tampon use drastically.

Of course, cotton pads you can thrown in with your regular wash or a silicone cup would mean zero disposable pads and tampons...

Then there's that pesky hot water that you have to use when you wash them separately from the rest of your clothes, not to mention the bleach, the power taken to use the dryer (because let's face it, anyone who puts air-dried cotton between their legs probably has a cast-iron twat), the fact that you have to wash more often because decomposing blood STINKS, destroyed clothing because cotton leaks (plastic panties, anyone?), not exercising because, let's face it, grown women don't wear diapers and those cotton things are diaper-like at the best of times.....where was I?

Oh, yeah...then you have to change during the day if you have a heavy flow, so you have to carry manky cotton around with you all day (diaper bag?).

Hmmm. Sounds like what my great-grandmother had to do....then again, on a farm, she just made sure not to go anywhere during her period, which wasn't a big strain, since at the turn of the 20th century, she wasn't allowed to hold a job, or vote, or go swimming in public..... You know, the reasons tampons and pads were invented in the first place.

Better and healthier in the long term to not have the periods in the first place.

@MessyONE: All of those problems are avoided by using the Keeper or other silicone cups that catch menstrual blood. I have friends who swear by it.

And I have friends who have gotten horrendous infections because the cups can't be properly sterilized (and they REQUIRE sterilization), scarring because they're irritating to all that delicate tissue whether you can actually feel them or not, and one young moron who re-infected herself with yeast every month for a full year because the con artist who sold her the thing SWORE that couldn't happen.

Of course, physical activity during your period is out with that method, too, because those cups can and do move and tip over inside your body, dumping the contents and making a hell of a mess. Hmmm - now THAT'S the way to impress that cute guy (or girl) in yoga class! They'll be the ones calling 911 because you'll look like an accident victim.

If you doubt me, go and ask a gynecologist - a real physician, not some dolt sales clerk - and ask just how smart it is to hold rotting pool of blood and tissue inside your body for hours at a time every day for a week or so every month. Sound gross? It is gross. It's also the truth.

Bottom line, your body is self-cleaning. It's beautifully designed for that. So let it do it's job.

choirgirl3377:

I question whether condoms are really greener than the pill, because on my pill I only have four periods/year, which seriously cuts down on pad/tampon usage (which is very wasteful). I wonder why Lantern didn't factor that in? Knowing when your period is coming results in fewer just-in-case pads being worn; and the pill causes lighter periods which cuts down tampon use drastically.

Well, the person writing The Green Lantern is a guy, so of course he wouldn't think about that. ;)

Whoa, someone seems to have a lot of friends and a whole bag of issues with ecologically friendly period management.

I've been using the diva cup for about a year and half and while it can be obnoxious at times I have never experienced the horror show you seem to think is inherent in the product. The tissue in my vaginal canal has suffered more from vigorous thrusting than either my diva cup or my diaphragm. I've exercised and worked long hard days at a cafe with no problems. I also don't understand why it's gross to keep the menstrual blood in a silicone cup for a period of time, but not gross if it's absorbed into cotton?

Finally your claim that you should let your body do what it's designed to do (be self-cleaning, whatever you mean by that) seems to go against your original claim that it's a geener option to introduce artificial hormones in order to have less periods.

Other than the propaganda that comes from people who are trying to sell you things, that is.

Not having periods is actually more normal that bleeding every month for decades. It is only since the mid-1950s that having so many periods has come to be seen as "normal" at all. Between pregnancy and nursing, not to mention periodic droughts and the accompanying bouts of malnutrition, previous generations had very few periods compared to today.

I do have one question for you, though. Why have you chosen to ignore the documented health benefits of being on the birth control pill? Or do you think it's all right that women who want to have children later in their lives would be forced to have hysterectomies in their early 20s because of fibroids or endometriosis? You think that would be "natural", do you?

You are either extremely young and naive or have been completely sucked in by the greenwashing industry. Either way, you have nothing of substance to say.

haikualu:

Finally your claim that you should let your body do what it's designed to do (be self-cleaning, whatever you mean by that) seems to go against your original claim that it's a geener option to introduce artificial hormones in order to have less periods.

Menstruating every month from the age of 13 to 50, with a few breaks for pregnancy along the way, is far from what "your body is designed to do". Given better nutrition, a movement away from breast feeding (as well as reduced duration), and overall better health, a modern woman will have significantly less menstrual cycles than her historic counterpart.

The supposed cleanliness issues of the female anatomy has been debunked for a very, very long time.

Not to speak for Messy, but I think what she was getting at is that retaining a bunch of backed-up menstrual blood probably increases your risk of infection.

Or, "better out than in", as Gramma always put it.

Toxic shock syndrome was a big deal some years back because the menstrual blood retained in super-absorbant tampons acts essentially like culture medium, allowing toxin-producing bacteria to take over. Not as much of a problem anymore if one changes frequently. Would using a cup entail a similar risk? It seems logical that it might, but I'd have to Pubmed it to see if any such thing has been reported.

Just noticed a typo in my initial post. A modern woman will have significantly MORE menstrual cycles... not sure what I was thinking :-)

Those silicone cups are the equivalent to Petri dishes and then some. Not only is there a risk of infection initially, silicone in that form is porous. It holds decomposing tissue ( because that's what menstrual blood is) in those tiny pores no matter how much the cup is washed. The only way to deal with this and to stop doing things like re-infecting yourself with something like yeast (like that idiot of my acquaintance) is to either boil the thing for a rather long time - using fuel - or soaking it in a heavy bleach solution - which will break down the silicone over time and who wants bleach up your nether regions anyway?

The other and more obvious risk is that these things are so messy and nasty to change or clean out that women resist doing it in public washrooms or at work where someone might interrupt them. This means that they are changed FAR less often than tampons or pads and pose a far more serious risk of infection than either of them.

Take the pill and minimize your period if you can and use tampons or pads when you do have periods and take care of your fertility, ladies. Do you really want to find out that the PID that you got because you thought you were being "green" in your 20s to prevent you from having children permanently?

It's actually not messy or nasty or germy.

If you do your research and buy a cup made of non-porous silicone, there's nowhere for the tissue and germs to catch.

You wash your hands thoroughly with soap and hot water (like we should all be doing anyway to avoid getting sick), reach in, dump the cup, slide it back in, wipe, wash your hands again. No mess. No fiddling with the nasty public restroom tampon trash bins. No tearing the hell out of your insides with dry cotton (silicone is smooth).

At the end of your period, you boil any remaining germs to death (yes, using fuel, but not likely any more than would have been used to make and transport your tampons).

I have had tampons leak many, many times in the decade I used them. My cup has not leaked once.

I am the world's biggest silicone cup cheerleader, but the greenness never really occurred to me. I use it because it's cleaner, less messy, less disgusting, less smelly, and more comfortable than tampons. That said, it may be a bad choice if you're prone to yeast infections (I've never had one) or are an idiot of MessyONE's acquaintence.

(You mentioned not wanting to bleach up your nether regions. I assume you know that tampons are bleached in chlorine bleach?)

In that application, anyway. (Besides, you can't please everyone anyway. I can't, for example, believe that anyone would dash about rinsing rags every month. Blech.)

This may seem like a non sequitor, but here you go. Slaughterhouses that process poultry need to rapidly cool the birds before packaging to prevent the buildup of bacteria. The most common way to do this is by soaking them in ice baths. These tanks are filled with water at the beginning of the day and not changed for 12 to 24 hours. This means that in a large facility, thousands of birds go through the same water.

Naturally, the water gets filthy. It's full of particulates and becomes a nasty opaque soup before half the day is gone. To avoid the otherwise inevitable buildup of bacteria, they spike that water with chlorine bleach. Lots of chlorine bleach. Enough bleach that not only can you smell it, it can be overwhelming. Think swimming pool times 20.

The only way to avoid this is to buy only air cooled chicken. Good luck finding it. So far I've been getting it at Whole Paycheck and specialty butchers. It costs more because the chillers required take up more space than the fetid pool. I can't speak for energy usage on either side, but I don't care. I refuse to eat bleachy birds. Guess I'll have to keep buying lamb.

KB01:

haikualu:

Finally your claim that you should let your body do what it's designed to do (be self-cleaning, whatever you mean by that) seems to go against your original claim that it's a geener option to introduce artificial hormones in order to have less periods.

Menstruating every month from the age of 13 to 50, with a few breaks for pregnancy along the way, is far from what "your body is designed to do". Given better nutrition, a movement away from breast feeding (as well as reduced duration), and overall better health, a modern woman will have significantly less menstrual cycles than her historic counterpart.

The supposed cleanliness issues of the female anatomy has been debunked for a very, very long time.

I realize you meant "more" menstrual cycles, but think about it - the reason the earlier women were NOT having menstrual cycles is that they were either 1. effectively too starved to have a period or 2. were pregnant or post pregnant.

Neither of which is health producing in a pre-antibiotic society.

OTOH, for those women wealthy enough to eat consistently and had wet nurses for their kids, they wouldn't have less menses than women today.