Shushma

I’m not sure why we don’t talk about periods when most women, trans, non-binary and intersex folks have them. I mention here not just women as I want society to be aware but, in my blog, I can only talk about what I as a woman have experienced having periods. Periods are nothing to be ashamed of as most of us have to go through this in order to have our own biological ‘children’. This is a beautiful thing as it’s bringing life into this world. However when you have a vice-principal, a lady herself saying to her students that :'Learning to deal with monthly inconvenience is all part of being a woman, I’m afraid … unfortunately taking that time off is not how society works.” Maybe that's why we feel we can't speak about what we go through each month in fear of being mocked or dismissed. I started at 11 years old and it was not pleasant as I fainted a few times that year in school due to heavy bleeding and ended up in hospital once, but the doctors didn’t take it seriously...

  Society doesn’t recognise comfort eating as an addiction or part of mental health. I believe it is the reason why I do it.     My negative relationship with food started when Arvind died. He died because he couldn’t eat physically, and due to medical negligence of not being fitted with a feeding PEG, he starved.     He loved his food too. I hated seeing food because it was the ‘killer’. I was so angry that what he loved so much killed him.   Initially I started to comfort-eat because I wanted to put on so much weight; I thought I could eat myself to death. (I had been slim most of my life up until that point.) When that failed it became a comfort to my grief. I felt good in that particular moment as I ate, but then worse afterwards when I finished eating that 150g Kettle crisps bag, as I felt so fat and low, so it’s a vicious circle!  But I couldn’t stop no matter how hard I tried.    Many times, I was told it’s willpower and to just s...