Correct me if I’m wrong, but as far as I’m aware, we are well and truly living in the 21st Century.
I mean, we’re somehow already 19 days into 2018.
And yet, somehow, ignorance still exists when it comes to women and their periods.
Periods are not fun. Pelvic cramps, lower back pain, sore boobs, food cravings, pimples, bloating, headaches, an overall lack of desire to get out of bed for an entire week every month…
Yeah, they suck. But you what’s a bigger issue to me than the symptoms I’m pretty much resigned to?
Sanitary bins.
Or rather, the lack of them.
Recently I started a new job in a male-dominated work place, and on my first day, naturally, I had to go to the bathroom.
There, I discovered, much to my dismay, that there was no bin in the single unisex bathroom.
So, while periods suck, you know what sucks more? When you go to the bathroom on your period, do what you've gotta do - and then find there is no sanitary bin provided. You look around in a panic only to discover there isn't even a regular bin.
So, on my first day in a new job, I'd found myself in rather an uncomfortable predicament.
I had to decide, do I:
a) Flush the sanitary item down the toilet, risking it floating back up/clogging the toilet/flooding the bathroom. (Importantly, option A goes against what my mum taught me.)
b) Sneak the used sanitary item out of the bathroom by slipping it up my sleeve and disposing of it at the next opportunity.
c) Speak to whoever is in charge and demand that every damn cubical contains a sanitary bin. (Who am I kidding? I’d never do that.)
A genius man is suggesting we glue our vaginas shut to solve the whole ‘period problem’. The Mamamia Out Loud team discuss.
I tossed up the three options and went with option A (sorry Mum).
To be fair, I don’t come across many bathrooms without a bin. Most places are actually pretty good and pop one in every female cubical. But unisex bathrooms need to lift their game. We’re living in a modern era, in an incredibly fortunate nation that supposedly considers men and women equal. There's no excuse.
All female and unisex bathrooms need to be equipped with a sanitary bin that is emptied regularly.
Is that really too much to ask? I don’t think so.
Top Comments
I’d imagine they simply hadn’t thought of putting the bins in if as you say it’s male dominated. Men don’t need them and don’t consider these things- this isn’t ignorance. And there’s no excuse to ever flush them down the toilet. How do you tell your boss that’s why the loo is blocked? Just be discreet, take your bag with you when you go (or a little makeup bag) with a plastic bag inside. Dispose of the sanitary item and bin it when possible afterwards. No big deal and no stuffed plumbing and more awkwardness but do talk to your boss about getting bins. it’s natural.
Yep been there numerous times. At one particularly unpleasant workplace, although there was another female employee, she was past menopause, so it wasn't considered a priority for just one person. To make it worse, I suffered terribly from fibroids, and that time of the month was an absolute nightmare for me in general, compounded by having to walk through the office to put my waste in the kitchen bin. In the end, I took to popping over the road to use the bathrooms at the local McDonalds several times a day when I had my period.
At my next workplace, I was the only female, and the response when I approached management about having one provided in the unisex bathroom, was that it was too expensive for one person to supply a proper sanitary disposal unit. I gave up and had a hysterectomy...