Sometimes I see an icon online: “Secretly, women love to talk about their vaginas.” I think it’s wrong, because secretly, women actually love to talk about their periods. Few subjects in a woman’s life are discussed in such dichotomous terms other than her period. It’s discussed glowingly: it’s the start of her womanhood, a connection to the tides and moon, and something that gives her the ability to create a life. It’s also discussed with frustration and embarrassment: first periods, accidents, and the euphemisms used just to avoid saying “period”: Aunt Flow, my monthly friend, on the rag, shark week.

But we do talk about it.

Kelci and Renee both remember thinking they were dying during their first periods.

“No one seems to have…told anyone you bleed for so damn long!” Kelci laughs.

Along the same line, Renee says, “While I’d been told about periods, I had no idea they lasted a week.”

A little science break: what exactly is a period? Each month the lining of the uterus, the endometrium, fills with blood in case a fertilized egg (egg plus sperm) implants there. When that doesn’t happen, that lining is shed, you have a period and the process starts all over. If the egg is fertilized, you don’t bleed out, you miss your period and you have a pregnancy.

Orthodox Judaism custom goes so far as to use forbid a man from having sex with a menstruating woman, a website Judaism 101, even claims “women who have sexual intercourse during their menstrual period are more vulnerable to a variety of vaginal infections, as well as increased risk of cervical cancer.”

And yet, there is no evidence that sex between healthy adults during a woman’s period carries any risk to either partner.

For some women and men, no matter how comfortable they are with each other, sex during menstruation can be a deal breaker. But there is another option; the best kept secret is an Instead menstrual cup. Insteads are soft, disposable cups which catch blood for up to 12 hours.

Jenn says, “I personally love the Insteads. If I’m determined to have sex and am worried about spotting/mess, popping a new one in ensures that I don’t have to really worry about anything.”

Similar products are Diva Cups, Moon Cups and Keepers .

In the media there has been a lot of advertising and talk about birth control pills that claim to “eliminate” your periods. You’ve heard about Seasonale or Seasonique, pills which give you four periods a year. While this subject has gotten lots of air time, there’s more to this than meets the eye.

If you’re on hormonal birth control (the pill, Nuvaring, the patch), you’ve already eliminated your periods. It may seem like splitting hairs, but the only reason you bleed is because every 4 weeks you stop taking hormones for a week. Is your endometrium coming out? Yes. Are you not pregnant? Yes. Is it necessary? We don’t know.

Science has just always assumed it is. The reason the pill was created with a 21 day on, seven day off cycle was because contraception was controversial when it was invented, and its inventors felt that women would feel more comfortable with a product that didn’t seem to interfere with their natural menstrual cycle. They didn’t research any other options.

Now we have pills with 24 days on four days off cycles such as Yaz and Loestrin 24FE, pills with 84 days on seven days off cycles such as Seasonale and Seasonique, and Lybrel, taken continuously with no days off. But doctors have been prescribing women to take their pills this way for years. New marketing, old science. All the information we have currently says that these regimens are safe and healthy: all they may decrease your risk of certain cancers, and after discontinuing taking the pills, fertility returns normally.

No one can tell you how you should feel about your period. Learn to embrace it and yourself, and manage it. If you want to birth control it away, that’s a decision you should discuss with your doctor. But, love or hate, your period is going to be yours for a while.