My period started just over a week ago (on October 4th) and behaved very oddly; no cramps AT ALL (I might have had five seconds-worth of sensation that made me think I might get cramps), no big chunks, a very slow start . . . and a weird color. Instead of being purple-red or brown-red, it was orange-red. Almost like barbecue sauce smeared on my panties (normally a more plum colored or blackberry syrup color on the not-totally-RED-red days).
I've never seen anything like it.
The only thing I can attribute this to is that I started taking iodine supplements a few weeks ago because I suspect I have a sluggish thyroid. I've not had time to research it thoroughly, but haven't found anything anywhere describing orange period blood as a side effect of taking extra iodine.
I really feel the need/desire to start soliciting more flow photos just to create a library of what women's menstrual fluid REALLY LOOKS LIKE instead of still relying on vague, subjective descriptions for us all to try to figure out what is normal as though we live in fucking prehistoric times. Actually, I'll bet women knew more about what other women's periods looked like in prehistoric times. Now we do such a good job of hiding it we have no fucking clue. Of course, if I did this I'd have to make sure people know how to set the white balance on their cameras otherwise it would do no good color-wise (though would still be useful in documenting the amounts, consistency, etc.).
Labels: education, flow, in my experience, iodine, period, rants, stains, started, vitamins