I remember sitting in sex ed class in 1990 as my 7th grade teacher (of course, a guy) played a film strip about menstruation. It was way outdated—from the early ‘70s at best— and it showed us girls in the class how to hook a pad into the metal belt you supposedly had to wear during your period. Only, those metal belts had gone the way of the dinosaur at least 15 years before. I knew this because I’d already started my period and had never once seen one of these terrifying belts. It was embarrassing, but I raised my hand and decided to tell the class how pads really worked—that you simply stick them into your underwear. I remember thinking if 20 years before my time women had to wear a metal belt to greet Aunt Flow, what was it like having your period, say, 100 years ago?

Authors Elissa Stein and Susan Kim must have wondered this too, because they’ve written a whole book—in bookstores today—on the subject. It’s called FLOW: The Cultural Story Of Menstruation and it details all the ludicrous beliefs about women’s periods from ancient times through the present. I asked Elissa and Susan to tell us the ten strangest facts they learned researching this book. Did you know that Lysol was originally a douche? Or that in Biblical times, women had to do an animal sacrifice after their period? Read on for more fascinating period beliefs.

If I weren’t majorly PMSing today, I would be totally in love with this charticle of my menstrual cycle journey. Created by the chick behind I Heart Guts!, the colorful chart takes you from Day 1 (Bloody Mess!) through Day 15 (Luteal Lunacy!) all the way through the day the Egg Breaks (Day 25) and your period makes its appearance. I am pretty sure I am around Day 24. Better go buy tampons.

Check out the I Heart Guts! site, where you can buy adorable organ plushy toys, posters, T-shirts, and baby gifts. The chick managed to make menstruating adorable, so it’s worth a visit. [via Jezebel]

The first time I got my period, my mother (after crying and then running to tell my father even though I had just asked her not to) got into bed with me and brought a rich, dark chocolate mousse with her. She explained to me that women eat chocolate during their periods because it makes them feel calm and happy. This I found to be true, but when Aunt Flo started visiting with more intensity, mom didn’t coddle, and instead handed me a huge dose of Advil. “Are you crazy?” I shouted. “This will kill me!” “No,” she said, “What’s on the bottle is a safe dose, but they use far more in hospitals when people are in pain. You’re in lots of pain.” And so for years I’ve been shoving Ibuprofen down my throat (usually eight or so a day during ladytime).

If Tyra Banks can share with everyone on “The Tyra Show” when she got her first period—during 11th grade, at her dad’s house—so can The Frisky editors. I’ll start!

Mine came the summer after 7th grade on the second morning of sailing lessons at the local country club. (Shut up, I’m a WASP.) One the first day of obnoxiously preppy sailing class, the students had to tread water in the pool for a few minutes to prove that we wouldn’t drown if the boats capsized. But my Blair Waldorf-ian self woke up the morning of the second class with blood in my underwear! Because I’m my mom’s baby, she majorly teared-up over me getting my period—so embarrassing! So I just snatched the pads from her and hissed that I didn’t want to talk about it. Mom had no chance to teach me about tampons and I didn’t ask!

But I spent the next several days of sailing class terrified we’d have to go in the pool again, or my boat would capsize and I’d get wet, and everybody would know I was wearing a big, soggy pad. To this day, that’s pretty much all I remember about sailing lessons! I didn’t use a tampon for the first time until I was 16 (during a performance of “The Vagina Monologues” of all places). Alas, by then, my sailing days were over.

I’m not the only Frisk-ette with a slightly tragic first period story. Our tales of tampons and trauma, after the jump.

I can think of lots of momentous events I wouldn’t want human pit bull/Baby Phat designer Kimora Lee Simmons around for—and inserting a tampon in my coochie for the very first time is one of them. But on “The Tyra Show”‘s first-ever program all about periods, Tyra Banks shared how, at the ripe-old age of 26, Miss Fabulosity coached (bullied?) her on how to insert a tampon. An applicator-less tampon. There’s some mental imagery for you!

But Tyra’s period show wasn’t all about famous women pushing Tampax up their lady flowers: Tyra invited three doctors on the show to explain why Aunt Flo comes to visit.  It’s a ghastly state of affairs for sex ed if grown women are learning why they get their periods on “The Tyra Show.” Still, I learned lotsa stuff about my monthlies thanks to Ty-Ty ... like, you can still get laid if you go to bed wearing an adult diaper on your heavy flow nights. Proof of THAT above!

I love my body and I’m in touch with my beautiful lady-flower and all that. But the few days of the month that I’ve got PMS are hellacious. Yep, it really blows. I turn into a complete stereotype and it’s just embarrassing: chocolate cravings, tears, not fitting into my skinny jeans, the whole nine yards.

We all know the menfolk in our lives generally can’t relate to this drama. Lucky for me, my dad raised four daughters, so he knew to pick up chocolate ice cream and tampons at the grocery store and then disappear into the TV room until the storm blew over. But if the guy in your life is clueless, it’s time to read him your PMS Bill Of Rights—before he eats the last Haagen-Dazs bar and you read him the riot act instead.

As a lady, you know that every month there will be blood. But designer Andy Kurovets wants Aunt Flo to move in with you permanently. Soak in his Hygienic Sanitary Pad Layers Table. If only we could really shelve our periods ... but these will at least help you organize your bloody mess. Perhaps there is no more fitting furniture to store your chick-rock CD collection. Those Sarah McLachlan, Indigo Girls, Ani DiFranco, and Joni Mitchell records would look quite at home lined up on these sanitary napkins.  Now, you gotta see what Andy did with with a tampon, after the jump! [WOW Report via Yanko Design]

I’ve never thought of my cramps as particularly debilitating, but even I have had moments when I need something stronger than Midol. (One vacation where I was unable to get out of bed comes to mind.) But there’s a new treatment out there—Allay, a pulsed electromagnetic field therapy device—that could nix period pain forevs. This treatment was originally used for sports injuries—even on racehorses. It works by emitting a low level electromagnetic current to the cells down there, restoring the electrical balance that’s messed up during menstruation. Place the cloth circle on your abdomen behind the elastic of your undies, turn on the switch, and let the currents do their work. Some say Allay works as a placebo, but five cramp-free days is enough motivation to try it. [Daily Mail]

If you’re a little wary of anything used to treat horses, here are some other unconventional remedies that might work for you.

I don’t get lady times once a month. In fact, I don’t get it ever. Due to babymaker problems that you’d prefer not to think about (trust me), I’ve been on a constant stream of birth control for six months so as to avoid more surgery. In short, my reproductive system doesn’t function. The factory has been shut down.

But because a few icky lady parts problems and surgeries just aren’t enough to deal with, I’ve also reacted badly to six different forms of hormones, becoming a bloated, mean, or moody mess after a few weeks on each. So last week, once the inexplicable crying had set in, my chest had inflated to monstrous proportions, and I felt the urge to kick small children, my doctor decided it was time to try my seventh variety of hormone. But rather than switching directly from the patch to the new pill, she told me to take a week off, complete a cycle and then get back to being The Amazing Period-Less Girl.

With all the advances in technology and medical research, it’s about damned time someone discovered a way to minimize or eliminate that inconvenient monthly scourge we ladies call our period. Or so drugs like Seasonale and Lybrel, which advertise their ability to reduce or annihilate a monthly period (respectively) would have you believe. As anyone who watches E! or SoapNet (what? You don’t watch “Being Erica”?) can attest, there’s been an explosion in the marketing of birth control pills that help you manage your flow, but the technology allowing a woman to do this has been around since the advent of the Pill in 1960. In fact, the Pill’s creators allowed specifically for a week-long sabbatical from the hormones that stopped you from ovulating with the specific intention of mimicking the body’s natural cycle, worried that women would balk at the notion of not having her trusty monthly visitor. But the fact is, if you’re on the Pill, there’s no reason to bleed. And yet some women still find the idea of not having a period exceedingly unnatural. So the question is: when you’re on the Pill, is your period really necessary? Two women weigh in, after the jump…

Yesterday, as I was flipping through People, I came across an advertisement that scared me to death. What was it marketing? Feminine hygiene products, of course. Because, I mean, what could be scarier than a period?! The Always Infinity ad features a dangerous tornado-like whirlpool swirling ominously into a gigantic maxi pad. A pad that, apparently, has the power to absorb ten times its weight— “so your heavy days won’t spin you out of control.” (If you care to see the full, 3-D, moving visual, check it out here.)

Every woman’s got ‘em: the panties ruined by Nature’s special, beautiful, magical gift to your ladyparts.  You might be thrilled that Bingo’s tadpoles didn’t penetrate the love glove, but that still doesn’t mean you aren’t pissed your white, lacy Victoria’s Secret thong looks like a Jackson Pollack painting.

Typically, girls wear sexy underwear at all times because, even if we know no one is going to see them, we just feel better about ourselves when we know we look pretty underneath.  But the three to seven days of the month when all we do is cry and eat Cherry Garcia is an exception!  Whether they were formerly-cute panties sneak attacked by Aunt Flo or nasty knickers you bought just to stain, here’s the five types of period panties every woman’s got: 

If you’re trying to be good about keeping a budget, the week before you get your period you might want to stay away from Madewell, or J.Crew, or Gilt Groupe, or whatever store makes you want to pull out your credit card. According to a study by professor Karen Pine of the University of Hertfordshire in England, women were more likely to make impulse buys or overspend during the later stages of their menstrual cycle. Pine told the BBC that women use shopping as way of regulating their intense emotions. Besides all of the hormonal changes in our brains, it’s possible that we spend more at this particular point in our cycle because we want to dress to impress when we’re fertile. Pine’s research found that most of the purchases made were for adornment, i.e., jewelry, makeup, and high heels. This explains why I absolutely had to buy a new nail polish after work on Friday. Yes, it was an impulse buy, but it was a damn good one. Essie E-Nuff is E-Nuff is the perfect color for now: a coral-y red that is nearly fluorescent (the product photo really doesn’t do it justice). [BBC]

Groundbreaking researchers, at Utrecht University in the Netherlands, have found that premature ejaculation is all thanks to DNA. Previously thought of as a psychological problem or the result of effective lingerie, these doctors discovered it simply has to do with the gene that controls serotonin. The good is that it’s nobody’s fault that the sexy party is over before it really began. The bad news is that a third of men have this gene. So, what is a girl to do?  Here are our Sexy Solutions For Setbacks In The Sack…

We’ve been curious for awhile about what dudes think about having sex when a woman is on her period. I don’t like it, but not because it grosses me out—I’m just a clean freak and don’t like messes of any sort. But what about dudes? I got a wide mix of responses when I asked the guys on my IM. Check out what they had to say, after the jump!

Hold up! Scientists have recently discovered that the cells that are shed from the womb lining during a woman’s period contain a new type of stem cell that may be used in the treatment of damaged and/or old tissue. The company, Cryo-Cell, has sponsored a blood bank for women to store their own menstrual blood for future use in the treatment of cancer and other diseases. Um, yeah. So while it’s cool that such a huge advancement in science has been made, especially given all the controversy over stem cell research and fetal tissue, some doctors think a blood bank like this preys on womens’ fears. On the other hand, being so in charge of your future health is empowering. But can we please pay a gofer to collect our period blood for us, thanks? It’s kind of icky. [Science Daily, BBC News]