Poppy

Brief Outline:

Poppy is 15. She had a difficult first period, because she had an imperforate hymen and needed to go to A and E and have an operation. They became very painful following this, and she was having to miss school, which made her feel anxious and worried about what she was missing. She reflects that this felt very unjust and unfair. She was able to talk to her mum and her nan, and was supported to see a GP. She found this a helpful experience, and was offered choices, like hormonal contraception or a medication to reduce the flow of blood. She decided she would prefer to take a medication for flow just during her period to start with, but would have been open to trying anything that could help. Happily, it has been really helpful and has reduced her period bleeding and also her pain. She worries that if people aren’t taught about periods and the reality of pain and bleeding, either in school or from being able to talk about them, then they might think it is normal or acceptable to have difficult pain or bleeding. She thinks that period product adverts that idealise menstruation and the lack of representation of menstruation in films and on TV adds to the normalisation of pain, because the reality isn’t represented. She thinks it is important for everyone with painful periods to feel able to go and ask for help and advice.

Poppy hates missing school because of her periods but has had to at times, and this causes her a lot of anxiety.

Yes, yeah.  I was... I’ve always been very studious, I hate to admit it, but I think it is just part of me, and I hate missing school; it causes a lot of anxiety for me.  I fear that, you know, ‘ooh, I’m... I’m not gonna do well,’ or I just don’t like missing school that much. So, when it’s... and it was happening quite frequently, you know, a good three... couple of days every month whilst I was having painful periods. And yeah, it just caused me a lot of anxiety, and I felt like it was unfair, and it was unjust, because I feel like it could have been avoided, you know, not everyone has painful periods. But yeah, it just caused a lot of anxiety, I think, mainly.

Poppy would be really ‘cheesed off’ if her period came during her school prom.

Sport anything like that?

Yeah. So, I think, yeah, swimming would probably be the main one. Because I have used a tampon since the... since I had to go to A&E, but I... again, it’s like quite anxious and I’m like, you know, I get quite worried about it. I’d say wearing certain outfits is the main issue. I’ve definitely had that a lot of times where I’ve wanted... I’ve been going somewhere and I wanted to wear a certain outfit, and then I couldn’t, because I wasn’t wearing the right pants, or I wasn’t... you know, it just... it... it looked wrong. So yeah, I definitely think that’s very irritating. I got the prom dates for next year for my Leavers’ Prom, and I’m so glad that it’s not when my period is because if I did, I’d be very, very cheesed off.

Poppy explains the cycle of emotions and emotional changes that happen with her period.

In fact, that's quite interesting. Do you get kinda emotional changes with your periods as well?

Oh, yes,100 percent, yeah. And my brother, he…it can be particularly annoying, and he probably doesn’t mean to, but I definitely get a lot more crotchety. I’d say I’m quite an emotional person anyway, so I do... like I cry at quite a lot of things, and I don’t think that’s a bad thing, but yeah, I definitely say when I’m on my period, it does definitely fluctuate, and, it, yeah, sort of going from angry, just really sad, and then sort of like numb, and then over again. Yeah, it seems to be a little bit of a... a cycle, and I think that should be taken into consideration as well. I feel like when you get your period, you know, so many things are changing and like it affects your whole body, not just your... you know, not just your pain, and yeah, I think it’s... and it really does affect everything.

Poppy thinks adverts that minimise periods and period pain or represent it in ways that don’t connect with the reality of them can be a bit irritating and weird.

I think anything that helps, and anything that works for you, is brilliant. You know, there are... whatever method, you know, you wanna do, or you wanna try something different, I just think that any... any help is brilliant to just stop it and just wipe it out, because it... It really is time consuming and that’s something that really irritated me, you know, you see all those stupid adverts on TV when they’re riding horses in white and it’s just incredibly impractical. And for a lot of people that’s not what it looks like.  And yeah, I just think, you know, it is... it’s a really horrible thing to have to go through and really quite depressing as well; it can make you really down. So yeah, I think any method and any way to prevent that or to stop it being really bad, is great, yeah.

When I did have Instagram, that I can’t... I can never remember any adverts being actually about periods, but I recently deleted all social media.  I’ve never had TikTok, so I wouldn’t be able to comment, but I do have Pinterest, and I do see always adverts on there, and it’s just sort of someone lying in bed; I think they’re for night pads, or something.  But the ones on TV, I think are just the weirdest thing ever. And they purposely... I feel like it’s the... the opposite of what they’re doing, is what they’re trying to achieve, so a lot of them are just really quite weird and odd, and then that makes people think, ‘oh, that’s weird, that’s odd,’ and they associate that with periods, and it’s like: ‘oh, well, we’re back to... back to square one.’  Yeah, I just...

I mean, and I don’t know, because I sort of think, ‘well, what would you make a period advert about?’ and I don’t really... it’s a bit of a tricky one, but I certainly wouldn’t put, you know, someone dancing about in a white outfit as a... because it’s not true, it’s not accurate for a lot of people. I mean... and it per... perfectly might be for some people, you know, that’s what, you know, some people might not have heavy periods, you know, I’m luckily... lucky that I don’t now, but I feel like, yeah, for a lot of people, they are painful and don’t, you know, really want to be dancing and doing other activities.

Poppy had period pain on the day she saw the GP and so she found it quite easy to describe how she was feeling.

Did you... could you have any reflections on what it’s like to try and explain pain or explain the heaviness of bleeding and... and what that’s... how you found that?

Yeah. I think I found it quite easy ’cause I was actually on my period at the time and I was in a lot of pain. But yeah, it’s... it’s like a stabbing, sort of, it really is like you’re getting... like, there’s something, uhh, like, yeah,  yeah, in... in the stomach and, like, back as well ’cause it... that’s the worst when it’s both ways, so it’s actually like you can’t get around it and there’s... when there’s no position, like where... where you’re laying, or where you’re sat, where it’s comfortable and you can’t get away from it, it’s like, you know... I’ve... I’ve broken bones and it was having a heav... that... those heavy periods were... was worse than that.  Because with a broken bone you can sort of... you can find positions where it’s comfortable and... or whatever, but... and not those ones.  But yeah, with period pain you just... you cannot get away from it, whatever you do, when it’s really bad and it’s sort of hitting at all angles, yeah, it was like a stabbing sen... sensation, really achy back, headaches because of the, like, loss of blood, yeah, just sort of everything that comes with it, yeah.

Poppy discussed options with her GP and decided to try tranexamic acid. She liked that she could just take it with her period and has found that it has helped her period pain and bleeding. She felt lucky to have had such a good experience at the doctors.

And yeah, so it got really bad and my Mum said, “Right, well, we have to do something about this.” So, I... we booked a doctor’s appointment and they prescribed me with some tran... tranexamic acid, which really helped. Yeah, so that really helped. I still had to take that every time because I tried to not, but it was just awful, you know, when you wake up and you can’t do anything about it and it’s really painful. And then after a while it was like that, and they just stopped, and they went away, but it was incredibly awful and, yeah, it was not a good experience for me.

And is there anything that... that it would be helpful to reflect on about when you went to the doctor and what that was like?

Yeah. So, I went to the doctor’s and it was a female and she was very, very supportive and just said, “Yeah, you know, we can pres... prescribe you some of these, you know, they work in part, really strong pain relief and make the periods less heavy,” and yeah, I was very lucky to have a good experience at the doctor’s and it was very simple and straightforward. And I was happy that the first medication that they offered me worked as well because I know obviously some people, you know, there are... there are quite a few different methods and they don’t work as well for some people, yeah.

And did they offer you any other options if it didn’t work or did you have a kind of idea about what to do if they hadn’t helped?

Yes. So, they did offer me the pill for my age. Right, I’m not sure... it’s not the one where you take it every... I think you have to take it every morning, and my Mum was quite reluctant to let me... to... for me to go on that just because she didn’t want... I think she was on it a while ago and she didn’t want it to be... she had a bad experience. Or not necessarily a bad experience, I just think she just thought that it wouldn’t be the best option for me, I’m not really sure. So, she... she just said, “Oh, you know, we’ll go with the tranexamic acid because that means you...” I... I wouldn’t have to take it every morning, that was it, yeah.

Poppy used a tampon during her first period, but had pain and difficulties removing it because of a congenital condition called an imperforate hymen. She went to A and E, and had a small surgical operation, though she is still a bit wary about tampons.

So, they started when I was about 13 and I... it didn’t even register to me that it had happened, and my Mum went to the toilet and she was like: “Oh,” well, this has happened. And I... and I... I knew... I knew what it was and we’ve had conversations about it. It was all very well and good. On the second day that I had my period, I had to go swimming, so my Mum taught me how to use a tampon, and I eventually struck up the courage to put one in and it was stuck, really severely. I had to go to A&E. Gas and air and they had to pull it out. It was a... it was quite a traumatic experience, so... And then that’s when we found out that I had a perforated hymen, so that was the issue. And yeah, I had an operation to sort all of that out. But on the second day of having your first period, when that happens, it was, yeah, quite a scare. And I did... it was... so it wasn’t too bad when I started having periods, but I’d say may... when I was 14, and I’m not sure why, I have no idea, but they did start to become really painful.

I can remember just clutching my stomach, just on the floor, just like screaming and crying in agony. It was so bad. Just in bed all day on one Christmas because it was just awful. I had to use some of my grandpa’s back medication. It’s really strong. Yeah, just really awful, really heavy. And I had quite a bad spell of those.

Missing days of school as well, which I... I think is incredibly inconvenient and it’s something I’m sure a lot of girls and women will relate to, missing whole days of school just because of periods, which I feel is really unfair.

No. I mean, I’m gonna say that sounds like an incredibly difficult first period.

Yes, yeah, yes.

Can you remember how that kinda felt at the time?

Yeah, I thought there was something severely wrong with me, like the world was... I just... I had no idea what was going on. My Mum had no idea what was going on, she’s like: “This doesn’t usually happen.” And I... well, I still don’t like using tampons because it’s always in the back of my head now. Yeah, it was incredibly stressful and it was quite late at night as well and I found it quite embarrassing because it was my first period and I didn’t really know how to deal with it yet. So yeah, yeah, it was quite... I’d... I’d say it was quite traumatic for me.

Yeah, and it sounds... it sounds really traumatic. I’m really sorry.

Yeah, no, it’s OK.

And did you need to have any kinda follow-up after that, or was it... did they kind of... that it... that was... you... did you have to get back for any follow-up appointments?

Yes, I did. So, I went to A&E just to... for them to remove it and then, yeah, so I was booked a follow-up appointment to find out what exactly was going on.

Yeah.

And yeah, they found that I had a perforated hymen. So yeah, I had to have an operation to get that sorted out. And that was, I’d say, I think it’s two years ago now that that happened. Yeah.

OK. And was that before your next period or did you have some more periods while you were waiting for that to happen?

I had some more, yeah, but I didn’t use tampons—

Tampons.

—and they weren’t... they weren’t particularly painful at that point. I think it was after the operation, a bit after, that they started getting really painful.

Poppy doesn’t want anyone to think it’s normal to have to deal with a lot of pain. She would encourage anyone with period pain to “go and get help”.

I just think that, you know, getting help is really important if you’re in a lot of pain, and I don’t want anyone to feel like, you know, that it’s... that they should just deal with it and that it’s just normal, because if you’re in a lot of pain, then it’s not normal. And obviously every period looks different for everyone, and it can fluctuate, and it can be heavier some months and lighter the next, but yeah, I just definitely, you know, would encourage people to... to go and get help if they’re in a lot of pain.