I know that we generally try to keep in inclusive here at The Graduate Wife, and that a lot of our content is just as applicable to graduate husbands as it is to graduate wives. This particular Food for Thought, however, is for those of us who are biologically women, and I hope that if you are a male checking out this particular post, you will consider yourself warned!
Some time ago, a friend of mine let me know about a handy thing called a DivaCup. I can say that after having used it for nearly five years, my period is much cleaner, easier, cheaper, and overall more pleasurable to manage. Because of my unique cycle, I also find it helpful to supplement with GladRags, another great little product which helps cut down on waste of all kinds, and saves money as well.
I know not everyone is up for these options, but before you write them off completely, consider these facts from the GladRags website:
If you menstruate 340 times in your lifetime, using 20 disposables per period, that amounts to 6800 pads or tampons thrown away. Now consider all the women using disposables in the world. If 500 million women use disposables throughout their lifetime, that’s 3.4 trillion pads or tampons thrown away! Not only is landfill space taken up, but these materials cannot be reused and are no longer part of the resources available to us. Then, of course, there’s all that packaging, (wrappers, boxes, applicators) that are also thrown away, all the garbage bags used, all the diesel fuel used to truck those products to the stores week in and week out. Using GladRags for even a portion of your cycle makes a difference!
the graduate wife 