ball, dropped

Speaking of periods ie let's talk about practicalities and not not being pregnant (what?)

I started using sponges a while back and I give the two thumbs up.

Now you can all shut up because I'm not THAT much of a hippie that I LOVED shoving dead sea creatures up my clacker, because I didn't like the whole OkaySoWhatIfItBreaksOnExit? anticipatory anxiety I was getting the whole time I was using them, even though a) they're actually not that fragile, and b) if they break, you just scoop around up with there and swoosh any bits out.

ANYWAY

That never happened to me, but the information is there, should you ever need it.

Do you guys have the Manicare brand over there? I bought one of their round foundation sponges, sterilised it in a vinegar solution and cut it in half so they look nothing like the Cut To Shape instructions the seas sponge people had on their web sites, and I don't need to tell you what I did with them, suffice to say it was NOT applying foundation.

My periods are really light, which is why I went with smaller sponge pieces, but if you've got a heavier flow, you could probably use a whole sponge, or shove two sponges up there. Or half a cow. Or I don't know. Something.

They do need to be VERY slightly damp to Not Apply Foundation, and you've got to squeeze out as much water as you can because if you don't, your pelvic floor will do it for you when you sneeze, cough, laugh, blink, breathe, THINK, fgs. Not that it'd be a tragedy ie it not like you've just repeated the whole Wet Pants Incident Of Second Grade (not starring me, thank god. I'm using someone else's misfortune here) so no one will be standing around wondering why there's a waterfall going on under your office chair or anything, but it IS a little confrontational to squeeze excess water out of a sponge with YOUR COOCH while you're buying stamps at the post office.

Warning: If you have a latex allergy, you might also want to check what make up sponges are made of. Or just stick with the dead sea creatures or fur balls or whatefver in hell the REAL hippies are doing these days.

You take them out them every few hours, depending on your needs, which is REALLY easy to do. You DO have to poke around a little to find the edge, but not much AT ALL as they get heavier as they absorb your flow and will drop (especially if you fake Squeeze A Poo Out a little when checking) so it's not like you've got to reach up to your thyroid gland every time you need to do change it.

Then you rinse it under the tap and put it back in. Repeat.

If you're not home and rinsing in a public bathroom sink doesn't appeal, keep a few small zip lock bags on hand and go out with as many sponges you think you'll need in a day. Put the used ones in one bag (OBV) and keep the fresh ones in another (OBVx2)

If you clean them as you go, they rinse really clean. If they do stain - and sea sponges do - just soak in weak hydrogen peroxide solution. This doesn't make them cleaner (or germ free etc) than soaking in a vinegar solution or boiling lightly for five minutes will, but it will make them more asthetically appealing.

Pros: You can have sex while wearing them (BONUS!!) and I REALLY like that they do NOT feel like you're wearing anything AT ALL, even if you ARE having sex. In that instance, the first time, it did get pushed further up that I was comfortable with (emotionally. Physically my bits were still all "what sponge?) ie there was NO WAY I could find the damn thing OHMAHGOD, but it didn't end up in my circulatory system via my uterus, and it DID drop and if I'd waited rather than panicked that first time (because OMGWHERE?) I wouldn't even HAVE a story about that one time when I thought I'd lost a sponge up my vag. And they don't give me cramps like tampons ALWAYS do.

Cons: none. NONE.

So go try this out, because it really is SO MUCH better than your store bought sanitary products because maybe I have the potential for reading Braille with my girl parts, but I can ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS feel tampons, and wearing pads isn't always practical.

There really is no neato way of ending this so....