The Girl Playbook · Vol. 5 · Periods
Remember when your period was light enough to forget about, and you never had to check the chair as you stood up?
Vol. 5 · Printed book · by the Girl Playbook Research Team
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You used to throw a bag in the car and take off for the weekend without counting back to your last period.
The duffel came down off the closet shelf with a pinch of last summer’s sand still in the bottom corner, and no zippered pouch of tampons waiting down there beside it.
You scooped things off the dresser and the chair back with one arm, and they landed in the bag in whatever order they landed.
Your sister called while you were packing, and you put her on speaker to hear about her new neighbor’s beagle while a hairbrush went in on top.
The bag held a swimsuit, 2 tops, white shorts and a pair of sandals, and the zipper closed on the first pull.
By the time the kettle clicked off, you were standing in the hall with the bag on your shoulder and your sunglasses pushed up in your hair, with no last trip to the bathroom to check before you left.
Remember when your period came right when you expected it, one tampon got you through the morning, and you never once turned around to check the chair behind you?
When the Monday meeting ran 40 minutes long on day 2, you stood up, pushed your chair in until its edge touched the table, and went after the leftover bagels in the hall.
At your friend’s house you dropped onto her cream couch with too many pillows, put your feet up, and her cat settled into the crook of your elbow, with no towel folded underneath you.
In the hotel room you flopped across the crisp white duvet in your clothes and fell asleep right there in the stripe of sunlight, with nothing spread under you first.
You never had to say “Give me a minute” when you meant you needed to change your tampon, or tuck a spare up your sleeve first.
Back then, your work tote held a laptop, a lunch container and a paperback, and it swung against your leg all the way to the elevator with no tampons thumping around in the bottom.
No cardigan hung on the back of your office chair, and its back was only a back for your shoulder blades to lean on, never a screen to hide behind.
Remember when you knew when your period was coming, and one pad or tampon was enough, with no doubling up just in case?
You used to say YES…
Yes - to the white jeans, on day 2 as easily as day 12…
Yes - to staying over at a friend’s house, with nothing folded under you on her guest bed…
Yes - to the window seat on the long flight, without counting the hours to the next change…
Yes - to the pool party on a Saturday, with no excuse about cramps ready on your tongue…
Yes - to the cream-colored sofa, and your feet up on it…
Yes - to the wedding on the 3rd Saturday of the month, without turning a page to check the date…
It used to be…
You could leave the house in 5 minutes.
You could feel completely spontaneous.
You could feel completely confident.
You could feel like yourself… light… easy… out the door in pale pants with your head up.
You didn’t have to pack spare pants before leaving the house… or set an alarm to change in the middle of the night.
Sleeping straight through didn’t feel like tempting fate…
…it was just sleep.
You didn’t have to take a dark cushion to work and say it made the chair more comfortable.
You didn’t have to spot the black plastic chair in the meeting room and work out how to get that one without making it obvious.
You never had to check the chair as you stood up and wonder how you’d get through the next meeting.
On the bus you took the perfectly good seat right there…
…and you sat down without a second thought.
A trip didn’t go through the calendar first, and going to bed didn’t mean thinking about the sheets.
Your bag, your sheets, and your office chair were just your bag, your sheets, and your office chair.
You didn’t have to tie a sweater around your waist on the way out of the restaurant.
You didn’t have to wonder whether this was simply how your periods would be from now on.
And these days all you ever hear is, “Change more often.”
It sounds easy until you’re arranging the workday around it…
So the protection gets bigger, the planning gets more complicated, and you leak in the same places anyway.
And the label on the box doesn’t know how your day goes.
But what exactly changed when you doubled up?
And what stayed the same?
Inside Period, Handled, there’s a detail in the research that makes “But I bought the heavy-flow ones!” a very reasonable question…
…and the Period Scorecard gives the timing, the changes and the interruptions somewhere to go before your next appointment.
If you’ve ever stood on the train with a perfectly good seat right there, then this new book is a MUST read before your next heavy day…
Before you set another alarm to change at 3am…
Before you roll up spare pants for the school run…
Before you choose the black plastic chair in the next meeting and hope it isn’t obvious…
Remember when a heavy day was just a Tuesday…
You wore the stone-colored pants with the little cuff because they matched the green blouse, and that was the only reason.
A coworker said “Nice pants” by the coffee urn at 8:30am, and you told her, “Thrift store, 12 dollars,” and never thought about the back of them once.
Back then nothing was holding you back…
…no spare underwear folded in the corner of your bag…
…and you were in the group photo, front row, laughing, in your white jeans, so you never felt left out of the best part of the night…
In those days you never had to scout the restaurant for a restroom before you agreed to dinner.
Never had to count the hours on a long flight.
Never had to kneel at the bathtub at midnight with cold water running and a bar of soap in your fist.
You could reach across the sheets for your partner in the dark with nothing laid down first, and the sheets were the last thing on either of your minds.
A printed educational guide, not personal medical advice. Use its explanations and worksheets to prepare informed questions for a qualified health professional.
Period, Handled
Vol. 5 · Printed book · by the Girl Playbook Research Team
Price: $12.95
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It’s strange how a life can get smaller without anyone meaning for it to.
And perhaps the saddest part is how easily you can get used to it.
You make your adjustments.
You find your excuses.
You tell yourself it’s only a few days a month.
But it does matter.
The sleepover matters.
The window seat matters.
The afternoons you spend doing something just because it makes you happy matter.
And somewhere along the way, perhaps you’ve forgotten that you matter just as much.
Think back to your favorite pair of jeans, the pale ones.
They had faint whiskering at the hips and a patch of worn denim on the back pocket, and they hung on the 3rd hanger from the left, where your hand found them in the dark.
You’d bought them at the end of a long afternoon at the mall with your sister, when you were both too tired to argue.
They came out of the dryer on a Tuesday in January, warm in your arms, and the button caught on the first try.
You did a quick two-step across the bedroom to see how they moved while the snow came down in big lazy flakes outside.
By 4pm there was a coffee drip on the knee, and you rubbed it once with your thumb and left it, the only stain of the day.
Do you miss saying yes to a sleepover the same day you were asked?
Her text said, “Come over Friday, I’m making lasagna,” and you wrote back, “Bringing wine,” on the walk to the parking lot.
Your overnight bag was a toothbrush, a T-shirt and a phone charger, rolled up the way you’d learned at camp.
At 11:30pm she brought out a bowl of popcorn and a bag of the good chocolate, and you told the story about the goose at your cousin’s picnic until she cried laughing.
In the morning she flipped pancakes in her robe, and the first one came out lopsided and got eaten standing up.
By 11am you were still on the stool with your feet hooked on the rung and syrup on your plate.
Remember when a long flight was just a long flight?
You went to bed at 10pm with the alarm set for 4:45am, and you got through security in 12 minutes with a coffee and a pack of gum.
Row 22, seat C, said the pass, and you slid your bag under the seat in front with one kick and sat down with a little bounce.
The woman in the window seat wore a cardigan the color of lemon sherbet, and she said, “First time to Portugal?” and you said, “Third.”
She had 5 grandchildren and a photo of each one in a different Halloween costume, and you studied all 5 and asked to see more.
For 3 hours you never once glanced at the clock, and when the seatbelt sign dinged, you stood and followed the line up the aisle.
Period, Handled
Vol. 5 · Printed book · by the Girl Playbook Research Team
Price: $12.95
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There was a time when a pool party invitation got 3 exclamation points.
The text was from your cousin, who had a pool, a grill and a standing invitation, and it said, “Come at 2, bring a hat and a swimsuit.”
Your thumbs flew, and the exclamation points came out in a row before you’d thought of any words to put with them.
You dug the swimsuit out of the bottom drawer from under a pile of winter pajamas, and it smelled faintly of last August and sunscreen.
You used to go to bed and sleep straight through until morning.
You brushed your teeth with the minty kind from the blue tube, clicked the lamp off, and the pillow was cool on both sides.
The quilt was the patchwork one your grandmother made, its squares gone soft with age, and you tugged it over your shoulder and tucked your knees in.
Your phone lay face down on the dresser beside a dish of earrings, and you hadn’t set a single alarm.
You read 3 pages of a slow historical novel, and your eyes began to droop at the 2nd paragraph.
The light came through the blinds in thin gold stripes, and the clock on the nightstand said 7:50am.
Picture the school run on day 2, with nothing extra in your bag.
The kitchen clock said 7:42am, school started at 8, and that left plenty of room.
One of the kids had on 2 different socks, and you let it go because the shoes covered them.
Your bag was a small canvas one with a coffee stain on the strap, and it held a pack of tissues, a lip balm and a dented tin of mints.
The crossing guard in the orange vest blew her whistle at a boy who’d stepped off the curb too early, and your arm went up high over your head to wave.
One tampon covered the school run from the first bell to the last, and you never counted the hours.
Period, Handled
Vol. 5 · Printed book · by the Girl Playbook Research Team
Price: $12.95
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When was the last time you gave a presentation and only thought about the back row?
The conference room had a long table and a screen that took 3 tries to wake up, and you stood there waiting, completely at ease.
You wore the green dress and the silver necklace your sister had given you, and you’d picked both without a thought for the date.
A man in the back row nodded at your 2nd point, and you nodded back.
At the end someone asked a good question, and you said, “Great question,” and answered it with a long, relaxed story.
It used to be that a weekend of camping took a duffel, a mallet and a bag of marshmallows.
You left on a Friday after work with your hair still smelling like the office, and the tent poles poked the dash every time the road curved.
The duffel held 2 sweatshirts, a flashlight and the giant marshmallows, and nothing else needed the room.
The first stake went in by the creek with 3 good whacks, and your friend said you hit like a chipmunk.
You ate 6 marshmallows gone black on the outside and molten in the middle, and licked your fingers.
You fell asleep in your sleeping bag with campfire smoke in your hair, and an owl asked its question twice from the dark.
Wouldn’t it be nice to pull the white shorts out of the drawer on a hot July morning?
The drawer stuck a little at the halfway point, and you gave it a hip bump the way you had for years.
The shorts sat folded on top of the T-shirts, bright as a clean envelope, and you shook them out with one snap of your wrists.
The flip-flops slapped the tile on your way to the fridge for the orange juice, and the oldies station was halfway through a song about summer.
You sang the chorus into a wooden spoon and went out the door with the car windows already rolled down.
You dropped into the driver’s seat as easily as you’d sit on a couch, with your elbow out the window.
Period, Handled
Vol. 5 · Printed book · by the Girl Playbook Research Team
Price: $12.95
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Back then, the beach bag was a towel, a book and a bottle of water.
The bag was woven straw with a frayed handle, and it had been to this beach a dozen summers running.
The paperback was a mystery with a cracked spine, and you were on page 140.
You did the little hot-sand dance on your toes and planted the chair near a striped umbrella with a wiggle.
You gave the waves a look and, light suit and all, walked straight in.
You dove under the 3rd one and came up shaking your hair like a dog, laughing in a voice that carried.
Think of the summer party, and the pale yellow dress with tiny buttons.
The party was at a house with a long yard and a string of paper lanterns hung between 2 oaks.
You sat in the grass with your legs tucked to one side and a paper plate on your knee, and the pickle rolled off twice.
Somebody’s grandmother held out her hand for a dance, about 84 and wearing a straw hat tilted just so.
“Come on, honey,” she said, “don’t let the song go to waste,” and you set the plate on the cooler lid and took her hand.
At the last chord she dipped you a little, pale dress and all, and you laughed and nearly lost a sandal.
Remember when you stood at your job from 8am until closing and the hours flew?
At 10am a customer came in with a long story about a lost umbrella, and you listened to every word of it.
Lunch was a sandwich on the back step, with the sun on your face and a book open on your knee, and the mustard was the only stain you worried about.
On the afternoon break you called your mother and asked what she was cooking.
At closing you flipped the sign to Closed and stretched your arms over your head until your back popped.
Do you miss hosting the sleepover on a Friday night?
The invitation had gone out 2 weeks before on bright yellow paper with a drawing of a moon.
At 6pm the doorbell rang 5 times in a row, and the hall filled up with backpacks and shoes.
The list on the counter said pizza and movie and flashlight tag in your loopiest handwriting.
You laughed along from the cream armchair with your feet up while the girl in the tiara knew every line of the movie with the talking fish.
At midnight you called “lights out” a couple of times and sat on the stairs with a cup of tea while the giggling carried on without you.
Period, Handled
Vol. 5 · Printed book · by the Girl Playbook Research Team
Price: $12.95
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- Please allow 7–10 business days for delivery.
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Imagine being able to wake up to clean sheets on day 2.
The sheets had the same crisp, cool smell they’d had when you put them on the bed on Friday.
Downstairs your partner ran the faucet, and the coffeemaker began to gurgle.
You pointed your toes down to the foot of the bed and reached your fingers up to the headboard in one long stretch.
The laundry basket was towels and T-shirts and the usual socks, and the dial on the washer stayed on warm.
You pinned your favorite pink cotton pair with the lace edge to the end of the clothesline in the sun.
Think back to the holiday dinner at your aunt’s, in your pale wool dress.
You came in through the kitchen door with a cold nose from the November air and hugged your way across the room.
You carried the green bean casserole in wearing oven mitts shaped like lobsters and said “hot, hot, hot” in a cheerful singsong.
You took the folding chair with the cream cushion between your cousin and an uncle, and the story about the boat was already underway.
You asked for a 2nd slice of pecan pie and got the corner piece, with the most crust and the darkest caramel.
Can you still see yourself at the park with your daughter on your hip?
You’d chosen the pale blue shorts at the dresser in about 4 seconds, and the diaper bag swung from one shoulder.
She rode on your hip from 1pm until the sun had moved across the swings, pointing at every dog and calling each one “doggie.”
When your son took off across the grass, you set her down by the slide and took off after him.
His shirt had a dinosaur on it that bounced as he ran, and you caught him by the back of his hoodie, and he shrieked.
Behind you a mother called “Have fun!” in a tone of fond envy, and you waved without turning around.
Period, Handled
Vol. 5 · Printed book · by the Girl Playbook Research Team
Price: $12.95
- Free shipping
- Please allow 7–10 business days for delivery.
30-day, no-questions-asked money-back guarantee
You used to come in from work and wrap your arms around your partner at the stove.
It was 6pm, and the kitchen smelled of cumin and onion, and your partner was stirring a pot of chili and singing under their breath.
An arm came around you with the wooden spoon still in hand, and you laughed against their shirt.
“Good day?” they asked, and you said, “Ask me in a minute,” and neither of you hurried.
Your toddler held up both arms from the kitchen floor in her yellow overalls, and you swept her up in one motion and spun once.
She shrieked at the spin and asked for “more” with both hands in the air, so you lifted her again.
Period, Handled
Vol. 5 · Printed book · by the Girl Playbook Research Team
Price: $12.95
- Free shipping
- Please allow 7–10 business days for delivery.
30-day, no-questions-asked money-back guarantee