Menstrual Hygiene Day 2022: Not Just Women But It's Time For Men To Learn About Menstruation Too

"Do you bleed?" - a woman from rural Rajasthan asked Anurag Chauhan, founder of Humans For Humanity, a non-governmental organization that primarily focuses on menstrual hygiene. Taken aback by the question, he wondered if she actually thought men menstruate too. When he confirmed his doubt with her, she said, "I thought the way I hide it, men do too!"

That was the moment when Mr Chauhan came to the realisation that the lack of awareness of menstruation is so serious that people, even women, do not know what it is.

This word is often used in ads, in school, and inside households - but how many of us actually understand the meaning of it? Women have to educate themselves about this topic because changes happen in their bodies, but it's not only women who need to understand menstruation anymore - men do too!

Humans for Humanity

Learning About Menstruation - Beyond Gender

We can talk about a million reasons why making people aware of menstruation is important - but we always seem to exclude men from this conversation. Given the fact that we live in a primarily patriarchal society, Indian households, especially in rural regions, are mostly run by male members of the family. If the leader of the house is not aware of this important and natural phenomenon, how can we expect anyone else to have any sort of awareness at all?

What a woman eats, says, wears, and who she talks to, is unfortunately mostly controlled by the male members of the family, and if that remains the case, there will never be any growth if the man himself does not understand menstruation.

This is also a major contributing factor to the taboo that comes with menstruation - how women are considered impure and dirty when they are bleeding. It brings society a great deal of pain to know that women are banished from their own homes, and treated like unhygienic beings when they are on their period. If not, they simply hide till the bleeding stops and use whatever they can find to cover it up.

Mr Chauhan has witnessed rural women dying in menstrual huts, using ash, and other unsanitary ways to stop/soak their bleeding. He was shocked to know that women in the slums of Mumbai do not know what a sanitary napkin is.

All of this comes back to the same issue - the lack of awareness among both women, and men.

Humans for Humanity

Lack of Menstrual hygiene products

According to a 2020 study, the 5th biggest reason for women to die was the lack of access to menstrual products. While the urban world is on its way to using menstrual cups, women in the rural areas have never even seen a menstrual sanitary napkin, commonly known as a 'pad'.

Humans for Humanity aims to educate the rural population of the country on all aspects of menstruation, starting from the basics of it to helping them access menstrual products.

Humans for Humanity

The organisation's team of volunteers, equipped with qualified doctors such as psychologists, psychiatrists, and gynaecologists work on the field in Indian villages to address the most important things when it comes to menstruation:

Awareness

The team's aim is to ensure that the rural population is aware of the fact that menstruation is not a disease, but a completely natural phenomenon for women. They want to educate both men and women on what a sanitary napkin is, and how to use one.

Nutrition

14 per cent of the rural population is malnourished, Mr Chauhan told us. There is a dearth of proper food supply in villages due to poverty. Mr Chauhan also noticed that there is a serious gender bias in the villages - sons are provided with more nutrition and food as compared to daughters. He was shocked to see that a mother herself would serve less food to her daughter in order to ensure that her son gets the most nutrients.

The organisation wants to focus on accessibility, affordability, and availability based on several factors such as geography, socio-economic backgrounds, etc.

Trauma

Imagine not knowing a thing about menstruation and suddenly bleeding with no one to go to. That kind of trauma is extremely difficult to live with, and the lack of education and sanitary products. Humans for Humanity wants to give these people access to a team of doctors who are qualified to help them get over this trauma so that their future generations do not face the same.

The NGO also provides these women with three sanitary napkins each and teaches them how to make their own pads. There are two kinds of pads they have to offer to these women -a reusable cloth pads that cost the NGO about Rs 370 per piece. However, a cloth napkin requires a lot of water to clean, and most of these villages live with a dearth of water resources.

The second pad is made of bamboo, banana, and sugarcane pulp. It is completely bio-degradable and takes about 6 months to fully decompose. It costs about Rs 60/70 per piece.

Humans for Humanity

As Mr Chauhan rightly put it earlier when he began his initiative - "If we don't deal with this problem now, it will become as big as polio," and his organisation's findings believe that the problem has become significantly big now.

What can you do to help?

Take it upon yourself to educate people - teach the meaning and importance of menstruation to your domestic workers, drivers, gardeners, and anyone who belongs to a different socioeconomic background. Talk about menstruation without making it sound like a taboo because it is anything but that.

Humans for Humanity

You can check out Humans for Humanity's website here.

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