Lunapads

I’ve been using Lunapads and the Diva Cup for just under three years now. They’ve become an integral part of my life and while I appreciate their convenience, their comfort and their healthiness (for me and the planet) each month, I didn’t really think I had a story to tell; until today that is.

A little background about me: I live with my boyfriend of just over three years in a little apartment near West Virginia University (we’re both graduate students in physics). Between the grueling and hectic schedule of being a graduate student, as well as the long duration of many lecture classes (and lab sessions), I would be in for some real embarrassment about once every month on the first day of my cycle if I were still using disposable products. I remember some very unhappy moments (before I’d discovered Lunapads and the Diva Cup) as an undergrad where I had to choose between walking out of a lecture because I was leaking around my tampon and ill-situated (and very crinkly) pad, or waiting until class was over and then rushing to the restroom hoping that the bloodstains hadn’t gotten too far out of control. Thanks especially to my DivaCup, I have never had to worry about being “well prepared enough” to get through the first day of my cycle and keep up with my graduate requirements. And this is where my story really starts. I was fortunate enough to secure a summer research internship with a company in San Diego (a city which is, by the way, much more spread-out than I was aware of). I arrived Monday evening, moved into my sublet (with two generally quite, nearly-never-home male UCSD students), and started working Tuesday morning. Since I don’t have a car here, my supervisor arranged for me to borrow a bicycle, which I took possession of on Friday. I decided it would be an excellent idea for me to bike my chosen route to work to make sure I knew the way and that I could survive it (four miles by bicycle in San Diego is quite an undertaking for me, since I’m a little out of shape and haven’t been on a bicycle at all in over a year). Saturday was taken up with grocery shopping, laundry, and the like; which left Sunday (today) for my first long bike ride.Thanks to the Cycle Chart I have been keeping the past few months, I knew I would be starting last night or this morning and so I put in my DivaCup before going to bed to ensure there would be no rushing to the bathroom in the wee hours of the morning, trying to avoid stains on the carpet. Sure enough, my cycle started right on time and, between my DivaCup and Lunapanties, I had no qualms about spending the morning biking around and through the UCSD campus.I set out around 9:30 (breakfast and double-checking the route took a bit longer than I’d planned) and was on my way. I’m happy to say that I did survive the whole trek, going a bit farther than my minimum goal of four miles total (to make sure I’d be able to make it all the way to work tomorrow morning; I wasn’t quite ready for an eight-mile round-trip today) and arrived home in good spirits. To my extreme delight, there was not a hint of spotting in my Lunapanties and, since Lunapanties are all soft and fleecey, there was no insanely uncomfortable sweaty wetness like I remember from when I used disposable pads. I can’t even imagine how miserable I would have been had I attempted a 4+ mile, hot, sun-drenched bike ride with a disposable pad heavy enough to handle my first day. In fact, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have been riding a bike at all if I weren’t using my DivaCup, due to the very real possibility of bleeding through and the intense discomfort of trying to manage such an adventure with a wet, sweaty pad refusing to stay where I wanted it.

So, in the end, what I actually realized today was that my DivaCup (and Lunapads) literally makes it possible for me to live my life and do my job; my DivaCup makes science possible and I absolutely love it!

—Stephanie of Morgantown, WV
(currently in San Diego, CA)

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 3rd, 2008 at 11:15 am by Guest and is filed under Guest Bloggers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.