My menstruation story

I had lived apart from my mother for eight years before I turned thirteen because my parents already divorced when I was just four years old.

Fifteen children in a polygamous household didn't leave much room for menstrual hygiene information for girls entering puberty.

 Everyone just focused on surviving on sparse meals and making it to school daily to get a rusty education. 

On the day my period came, I was lying idly on my father's couch in our living room tugging  at a pair of ragged old panties.  It was one of those mindless things I often did whenever I was bored. 

Suddenly i felt a  wet stickiness that got me peering at my crimson red fingers and darting into the bathroom in flashing minutes.  

I locked myself in there for maybe thirty minutes or more trying to gather my splayed emotions together. 

 Finally I recorded some measure of composure as I descreetly discarded my soiled panties and made to get some tissue paper and a fresh pair of panties to contain my flow. 

My period lasted for seven days. Within those seven  I kept to myself and walked on egg shells. I didn't want anyone at home to discover that I had begun my journey into womanhood. 

Polygamy had taught me that my secrets were mine alone. 

I remember the first time my breasts began to bud and how my step-mom told me repeatedly that I was growing breasts at age twelve because I was promiscuous. Those jibes hit me hard and made me cry  myself to sleep at night. 

It was best to be quiet about my periods.   

The  months that followed, before my flow started I bought tissue rolls with money that I had saved up from my lunch money because I didn't want to ask anyone for money for tissue. 

My period was my best kept secret and it stated that way for a long time.