Laxmi Basnet
Feeling scared with trembling voice and lowered gaze my friend gathered the courage to ask the shopkeeper to give her “that thing ’’. Without a word, the shopkeeper handed her that thing wrapped in double-layered paper and plastic. No, she wasn’t buying anything illicit, just something that every girl needs; a sanitary pad. Yet, it was wrapped in years of societal shame and stigma.
Mensuration is still hushed in society. While the silence may not cause physical harm it wounds more quietly and deeply, slowly wearing down the girl’s sense of self and forcing her to conceal her essential needs in the layers of shame and secrecy. I still remember how uneasy I felt when I asked the shopkeeper not to cover it in paper. Their confused expression, followed by an awkward pause, said more than words ever could. All I wanted was a pad, not the extra layers of judgment that came with it. But in the end, even without wrapping, it still came cloaked in an invisible layer of judgment. At that moment, it didn’t feel like I was buying a pad but rather confronting a society that had taught us to shrink, to whisper, and to hide.
The silence or shame doesn’t end at the shop or pharmacy it follows us into our homes, classrooms, and even among friends. The pad is quietly hidden inside the sleeves so that boys in the school won’t see it. Asking for a pad feels like a secretive exchange, almost like an illegal drug deal done with a lowered voice and cautious glances. When school girls express the discomfort or pain from menstrual cramps they are brushed off as being dramatic. Worst of all they called it “a Learned Behavior”, suggesting that pain isn’t real, but rather something girls have been socially conditioned to believe or exaggerate.
Throughout the year, as we wrapped each pad, in paper and plastic, it became a symbol of the unspoken norms surrounding menstruation. What should have been treated as natural and normal turned into something very secretive and hidden. It’s high time to unwrap the silence and stigma that’s been folded over generations.