Women bleed: let's honour this threshold moment into womanhood

A call for reverence and ritual

My periods were brutal from day one. A painful experience for me emotionally and thereafter, physically, to the point that my family doctor administered morphine for the pain on at least two occasions during my early teens.

And yet - somehow plugging into my ancestral memories of times long past, when we celebrated this threshold moment, honoured and ritualised its profound meaning - I had looked forward to starting my periods as a day of celebration, a coming of age, my entry into womanhood.

Alas, that was not to be. The emotional trauma born from my mother’s reaction to an event that I had looked forward to with both trepidation and real excitement was horribly wounding. Instead of kind, loving support, guidance and practical help, what I got was a barrage of negativity, an abandonment of any empathy or motherly care, with a terse and exasperated “I haven’t got anything for you to use, you will just have to tear up a sheet and use that”.

My mother promptly went back to her Valium haloed bed and retreated under the covers. I was left bereft, confused and deflated. I no longer blame my mother (thank you, Grandmother Ayahuasca); she had her own demons she was desperately trying to numb, lacking the ability to respond in any other way.

The wounding around my life experience with periods probably resulted in an escalating trend towards physical pain and embarrassment around my monthly “curse”, as it became known to me. Although I regret it now, a full hysterectomy in my early forties, due to various complications, seemed the sensible thing to do and a relief. The aftereffects, though, have left me feeling a gaping raw hole where my womb and uterus used to live - it is as though my very womanhood has been torn from me. And in a real physical sense, that is true, a part of me has been. I sometimes wonder how things would have turned out if I had started my emotional healing journey before this monumental decision, a journey which may, possibly, have negated the need for such drastic surgery.

Then, recently, something unexpected happened while scrolling YouTube Shorts. A very young man (I’m guessing around seventeen, possibly younger) cosplaying a woman suffering from period pain sparked a volcanic rage in me. A rage I would go on to express through the cathartic painting below, entitled “Real Women Bleed”.

So why talk about this publicly and risk an avalanche of slurs and cancellation by simply stating a biological fact? Because, having reached elderhood, I no longer feel held back from being able to express and speak out about my art and the deep places from which it emerges. It is my truth, it comes from my actual lived experience, and I refuse to be silenced by those who would seek to hijack my battle-worn womanhood.

Crucially, this painting speaks to the importance of something we have lost in modern culture to our detriment. For it is my firm belief that by honouring and ritualising the profound event of menarche in young women’s lives, we can prevent unnecessary embarrassment and possible trauma, helping them to enjoy a healthy connection with their natural bodies. I feel that the loss of ritual continues to have a deeply negative effect on our lives, and it’s something I am increasingly passionate about resurrecting.

One has to wonder at how emotionally healthier our children and society at large would be if we were to better honour life’s natural milestones with reverence and ritual. Is it not time to do so?

Cathartic painting: Real Women Bleed by Linda