no boys allowed in the room!!!!

Also do not have to buy replacements while in foreign country away from major suppliers.

Growing my nails have made tampons so much more dangerous (I live on the edge - tuck the string in because I cannot deal with that feeling.)

Quincie I believe I complained about the same thing on another thread! Why are they so insistent on making everyone use more plastic?

do they sell non-applicator tampons in the US at all? i am one of those smug cup-using hippies, but back when i bought tampons on the regular p much all uk non-tampax options were applicator-free.

i had the hardest time finding non-app tampons when i moved here - in nz it's the opposite case. i think there is only like ONE brand of non-app here.

OB is strictly non-applicator now. I think there is at least one other brand that makes a non-app variant

Ob was always non app weren't they? Keep it simple and set yourself free from the extras that you really don't need. Just try OB and you'll see.

OB
it's the way it should be

They were non-applicator when I was in high school so they've been non-app since the 80s at least.

i love OB

I wish OB weren't so small. I have to change them all the time the first few days so I rarely buy them.

My period is so out of hand that tampons are a pointless endeavor for me anyway. I can't even use a cup for the first two or three days, so I mostly just use pads. And usually cloth ones, although recently my period has been even more out of hand than usual and I got really tired of all that extra laundry so I've been killing the earth with disposable pads. :(

Yeah I get ob, but in nz there are a million kinds, including ones that come in little plain-packaged multi packs so you can just throw a little pack of 6 or so in your bag. And also super-duper sized, which I'm a fan of the first day. Gotta admit, I'm kinda excited about menopause.

Ha, totally. I was one of those "I love my cycle!!! I am one with the earth!!!" people until my mid-30s and since then I've been like, That's plenty of menstruating for one lifetime. Can we stop this now, please?

mine was worse in high school, it's p manageable now. but i feel like the premenstrual craziness and cramping has gotten way worse. I had to go out and buy fucking Pamprin last time :(

My period used to be problematic because I got really bad cramps, nausea, and hot flashes! Pill fixed that. Now my period is not too bad, but because I have developed a bunch (6 at last count) of FIBROIDS I don't want to risk getting off the pill even though I otherwise would. Apparently it is the only thing keeping me from whoa levels of bleeding and between-period spotting.

Kinda of just want to go ahead and get a hysterectomy already.

A friend of mine actually did that. She had terrible fibroids and when she was in her 30s was like fuck it, take it out. She totally mocks me when I complain about my period, too.

I don't like being on the pill for huge lengths of time...I think it's just a mental thing where I want to know what my period is like without it from time to time, just to make sure nothing is weird.

idk, I'm weird

No, you're not. I am pretty anti hormonal birth control for myself for similar reasons. It's one of the main reasons I had a copper IUD for so many years. That said, I'm really lucky in that my periods aren't really bad and more often than not a couple of Advil alleviates any pain.

I'm gonna try a low-dose (mini) pill when I'm back in the states; my gyn and I agreed we didn't want to experiment while I was out of the country (and with minimal health insurance) for several months! My blood pressure has been on the high ("prehypertensive") side for a couple of years now; all the more reason to get off the pill. But there is no way I can go back to the agony of the off-the-pill periods of my early 20s!

The minipill isn't necessarily low does but it is a progestin-only birth control pill and doesn't contain estrogen. It's often recommended for use in women who are at risk for certain health issues including high blood pressure.

iirc the only drawbacks is that it really has to be taken at the exact same time every day in order to be effective and it may make periods irregular and/or cause spotting.

I feel like I'm the only person who has no bad side-effects of the pill. Well, I have a small patch of discolouration (melasma) on my cheek that could be caused by it.

I never had any side-effects, I just don't take a lot of medication in general, so it kinda weirds me out taking it for long periods of time.

But that being said, I tooooottttally get having to do it, especially with heavy/painful periods and all the other stuff that goes along with it, solidarity for life etc

My only problems on the pill was the Crying for No Reason Whatsoever while on a trial of Yasmin. Otherwise, it does wonders for my irregular, painful periods and my acne! Also: no babby, which is also the point. Spouse is happy to get vasectomified for the no babby bit, but I am nervous about what my crazy uterus will get up to on its own devices :(

the pill helped w/my period pains but it made me super emo all the time. plus i couldn't remember to take it. plus i just could not except that this little teeny pill would stop me getting pregnant.

I hate those plastic applicators for many reasons including:

1. yay more petrochemical waste!
2. do they recycle? I do not know! but our recycling supposedly gets hand-sorted at the depot so basically no, that would not be cool
3. this might just be me but I cannot even work the things and usually end up just peeling the plastic off
4. makes the whole product giant and harder to hide discreetly in a small bag pocket
5. also 1+2 make you feel more guilty when you find an elderly one stashed as in 4 and throw it out unused because it's been hanging around so long

etc etc tmi

whenever i am walking around or jogging and see a plastic tampon applicator on the ground (because apparently people are always throwing these out car windows or dropping them, or rats are carrying them out of dumpsters maybe) i think "whoa those exist???" because they are so absurd imo!

*i still use them*

sry

I never used to, i always used the ob ones

...tmi blah blah I had some difficulties a while back,the plastic applicator was kinda necessary and then I never switched back to the regular ones

but I don't throw them out in the street

srsly who does that

it wasn't a judgment they're just weird to me!

lol it's okay I just have a guilty conscience

yeah, I don't mind other people using them (though the ones I've seen do seem a bit bulky and wasteful but that's the manufacturer's fault and def. not yours) but they are not for me.

I usually just removed the old-style card applicator tubes too, so I am not really target market, but at least I could get them to slide out when wanted and not when not wanted, and they seemed less wasteful and less annoying to dispose of somehow.

my mum was too cheap to buy the app ones when i was a teen (they are way more expensive in nz), so non-app is basically all i've known. the few times i've used app ones, i've found it... awkward. TMI ALERT!!!!--> with app ones i'm never sure if it's in properly? and man there is nothing more uncomfortable than walking round with a tampon that is not in all the way.

otm

yeah it's a horrible feeling

I can't get the non-apps to feel like they are in the right place!

Hmm maybe this is a fingers too short or vagina too long problem?

I have very short fingers and don't have that problem so that seems...unlikely, but what do I know, I've only ever had the one vagina so

I have pretty long finger so idk maybe I will have to experiment further. But this is one reason why I am diva cup shy--how will I get it in the right place?

occasionally it takes multiple tries but if you fold it correctly it just opens in the right place and sits there

i had depression-related probs on every form of hormonal birth control except the nuva ring, which is probably because it's such a low dose. not "mood swings", but like complete personality/interest-in-life loss, lethargy, etc.

my periods are agony for a couple of hours before they start, and this has def gotten worse over the years. i used to have 0 problems and only a couple day long period. now its a couple hours of seriously crippling cramps/back pain, and like a three day period. my sis has endometriosis and i think that is genetic(?) and i pray i and my other sisters don't have/develop it. she's had terrible problems as a result

endometriosis is awful. one of my friends in high school had juvenile rheumatoid arthritis and was on a lot of cortisone and painkillers through her teens and early 20's...later on she found out she had endometriosis and the crazy thing is that as painful as endometriosis is, she had had no idea she even had it because of all the painkillers she'd been taking.

I went off hormonal bc in an effort to stop having migraines and 1) it worked, so yay, but 2) I think the process of weaning myself off the hormones sent me into a weird emotional storm that I'm just now crawling my way out of. Super weird, not easy, but ultimately glad I stopped. Maybe I'm attributing more powers to hormones than they deserve, but I feel better in p much every way now, finally. That's my $0.02 about hormonal bc for women.

Oh and now that I'm off, cramps wake me up at night but at least I feel alive.

never been on the pill, cramps are pretty minor, in that it just feels like a mild hangover, so getting my period is often a complete surprise. it makes me feel like i fail at being female. i also use applicators, because it's like a tool, and tools are cool.

I saw a blue plastic tampon applicator on the ground at the bus stop this morning and thought of you, harbl.

I wrote, "harbl was here" on a post-it note and stuck it on the applicator.

:D

since itt we discuss tampons and applicators
http://www.nytimes.com/packages/html/magazine/2013/innovations-issue/#/?part=tampon

my favorite part: "digital tampons"

FASCINATING! Update: someone I know really believes that tampons can uh harm? your "virginity" and has never used them in her life (despite having given birth!) and won't allow her teenaged daughter to have them in the house. I am so weirded out. This just came up like 2 weeks ago and I don't know where to go with it. I think at a minimum I'm going to let the daughter know that I am at least open to talking about it if she has any questions?

Oh dear. That is too bad.