Is a Menstrual Cup Right for You?
Let me start by explaining myself: I care SO MUCH about womxn and their health, education, the environment and helping others. So if all of my passions could be rolled into one thing, it’d be the menstrual cup.
What’s a menstrual cup, you ask?
It is a small cup made of 100% medical grade silicone, which comes in varying sizes depending on a womxn’s vaginal canal before or after giving birth or trauma. It is sanitary with proper use of clean water and soap, and is reusable for up to several years.
Maybe you’ve never heard of the cup. Or maybe it seems a bit daunting, unfamiliar and scary. But I promise, making the switch from pads and tampons to a cup was one of the best decisions that I’ve ever made.
Here are my personal TOP 3 reasons for making the switch and being PRO cup!
IT’S SAFE AND CONVENIENT!
There’s no leaking, no odor, and no chance of Toxic Shock Syndrome because there are no chemicals, non-organic fibers from tampons, or GOOD vaginal secretions/good flora that get striped when using tampons. The cup collects for up to 12 hours, you drop the contents in a toilet (or give that iron back to Mother Earth), clean the cup with clean hands and water and can reinsert until your period is over. You don’t have to worry about making pitstops at the bathroom every 3-4 hours! Time saverrrr. Check out my IGTV for how to insert and remove your cup if you need some support.
IT SAVES YOU MONEY.
Every womxn throughout her life has around 400 periods (thanks Hormonal for that drop of knowledge). When you buy a standard box of tampons (let’s say a mixed box of Tampax pearls-my preferred choice before I made the switch), it costs around $15. If you need one box per period, that adds up to $6000 to cover all of your periods. SIX THOUSAND DOLLARS. And that’s not even counting the pantyliners, the ruined underwear, sheets that can never be bleached enough, or your favorite white pants that are gone forever.
A cup is what I see as the most affordable and sustainable solution for menstruators these days. They are affordable, ranging from $30-40 per cup. So say you bought one cup every 5 years. That would mean for the ~35 years that you were in a fertile phase and having regular periods (12 yrs old to 47 yrs old-ish), you’d be paying for 7 cups. That’s $280. Versus $6000. Kind of a no-brainer, when you’ve only factored in the money involved.
IT’S ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY.
When you think about all those pads, pantyliners, tampons, and the individual wrapping that goes around those single use products, where do you think they end up? Landfills for hundreds of years. Or clogging up our infrastructure, but hopefully it’s common knowledge that flushing anything down other than your waste can clog up the pipes!! Our impact is felt and left on the earth for over hundreds of years after we’re gone. We don’t want that. This kind of waste keeps adding up in huge piles, and we as period people (at least half of the population) can do our part by making this switch by using the reusable cup.
