Issue date: 11/30/07 Section: Green

Media Credit: COURTESY OF KEEPER.COM Ten years worth of disposable sanitary products.

This is an article that men may want to steer clear of. It deals with the oh-so-delicate and hush-hush topic of periods. No, not that little dot at the end of this sentence. I'm talking about the female menstrual cycle.

Surprisingly enough, some women may decide this article is not for them either. There are no doubt many reasons for this, but I have a feeling one of them is that we live in a world where menstrual blood is blue liquid poured from a vial onto a bleached white sanitary pad on television. If your period is red, and the media tells you that it's supposed to be blue, where do you go from there?

You go green.

While the big sanitary products companies today, such as Playtex, Tampax, Always, and Kotex, might love you to think that your period is a dirty time of the month that should be dealt with only the whitest of white disposable pads and tampons, you do have other options for managing your period.

Menstrual cups are not a new thing, although not many people have heard of them. (No joke, I once had to tell a gynecologist what they are and how they worked). The first menstrual cup was called the Tassette, and was created in 1937 by actress Leona Chalmers. Sadly, Chalmers was a woman ahead of her time. The rubber shortages of World War II and the fact that women were even more afraid of their genitalia than they are today didn't help the Tassette catch on.

The Keeper, a more widely known menstrual cup, was created 50 years later. There are many women who still use the Keeper today. In fact, you can buy one at http://www.thekeeper.com. But before you do, you might want to check out their newer model, the Mooncup, or another menstrual cup, the Divacup, which are both made from medical grade silicone. The Keeper, which is made from latex-rubber, can cause women to develop a latex allergy over long-term use, and therefore it is less popular today. Silicone cups also have an advantage in that they can be boiled and sterilized.

If you're still wondering what the term menstrual cup even refers to, let me break it down for you. They are bell-shaped cups made out of silicone or rubber that are folded and inserted in the vagina. There, they create a seal and catch, rather than absorb, your period. Much like a tampon, once they are in, they can't be felt.

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