Power In The Period

I’d never really thought that much about the actual process of “becoming a woman.” I was more excited to leave behind elementary school and enter middle school, to be considered someone who was growing older, more intelligent, and more mature. That was a big thing for me: maturity and being seen as mature in the eyes of my mother.

I knew about periods. Knew that one day it would happen to me and then magically my breasts would start to grow. I’d seen it happen to my older sister, whose breasts weren’t very big – neither were my mothers – but instead pretty average, so it didn’t really bother me. I didn’t know when it would happen, and I didn’t really wait on bated breath.

Cut to the beginning of sixth grade when I befriended this insanely beautiful, “popular” girl and her posse. Why she chose to be my friend, I have no clue. I was a geeky, awkward, skinny girl clueless about what to wear and how to interact with boys, and it never bothered me until I started realizing these features in myself by hanging out with them. I started getting the feeling she befriended me because she saw me as this charity project for her to take on and transform into something she deemed beautiful, that maybe she felt a sense of power in trying to control me as if I were her Barbie doll. With the countless sleepovers where she and our group would make me over with eyeliner and mascara, telling me “Charlotte, you look sooooooo beautiful with makeup on!” and always telling me what clothes I needed to wear – Lacoste and Abercrombie, I mean really? – I started to get the hint that I was a follower, not a leader. I didn’t have any power or say.

But I had found my way in. T’ana, our “fearless” leader, hadn’t gotten her period yet. She was becoming concerned because she really wanted to develop her breasts – I mean, the girl had an image to uphold for the sake of her popularity. She would confide in me a lot about this, and after a while, it soon became a game between us of who would get their period first (and in our case, whose boobs would begin to grow first). Suddenly, the hope for my period to arrive became intense, a suspenseful competition, and I would come home everyday hoping to see a red stain on my underwear. We both agreed that whoever got their period first would call the other as a way to say “congratulations” when really it was a way to express bragging rights, and I bet she thought it would be her. Another way for her to express her power over me, just because she reached her femininity first. Well, on December 5, 2005 – yes, I still remember the date – when I was eleven years old, I came home from school and upon going into the bathroom and sitting on the toilet, I looked down into my underwear and shrieked with joy. I feel very odd admitting that now, especially how right afterwards I paraded around my house screaming to my family that I had reached this momentous occasion, but I finally felt like I had won at something against those girls, especially T'ana. I finally had some sort of power over her that she couldn't take away.

And you bet your ass the next thing I did was grab the telephone to dial her number.