a love letter to my beloved period pants

‘‘BuT AreN’t YoU JusT SiTtiNg In YoUr OwN PeRiOd AlL DaY’’ the crowds roar.

Well, yes, technically. But it’s not like that.

Wait this isn’t how a love letter should start.

Why am I already defensive. I think I can feel through the screen that your head is tilted slightly, one of your brows up higher than the other one, and you’re questioning a) why I’m writing this b) why you’re reading it. I’ve decided I’ve overthought this whole substack situation too much, and I was trying to be something I’m not. I’m not here to teach you how to ‘unrot your brain’ or ~how to be whimsical again~. I’m here to talk about period pants, make some horrifyingly bad grammatical errors & click that big SHARE button then fuck off back to picking my nose watching the bake off.

The reason I’m writing about this, this week admittedly isn’t very interesting, I’m just on my period.

I’ve realised no matter how many periods I’ve experienced in my life - I imagine it’s about 196 - I *still* haven’t quite got the hang of it. There’s never a smooth sailing one, one without a wardrobe fatality or a monumental meltdown of sorts.

Firstly, I’m never entirely sure when it’s going to arrive. I have to play hard to get with it, like it’s one of the many boys in Clapham I tried to get to fancy me pre 2019. I’ve resorted to willing it with temptation to embarrass me. Wearing a pair of pants I really like, going to the gym in a tiny primark thong, and bright, light coloured shorts, white jeans to a team lunch in London. It normally works, I end up initially fist the air cheering ‘HA! I knew I’d make you come’, but then also oh shit. I’m now stuck in the grim gym toilets, wrapping toilet paper round my four fingers making *the most* uncomfortable and impractical make-shift pad, that will spend the rest of the workout either rustling as loud as it can, or travelling down my leg.

Sorry I’ve gone off track there - back to my beloved period pants. I feel like loving period pants is like loving H from steps, he was the underdog, but he was arguably also the best.

Period pants to me feel like a big fuck off to one of the many shit situations we find ourselves in as women. If it’s not dire enough that we spend more-or-less half of the month feeling like an over-emotional stubbed big toe due to a miserable hormone coctail, we then have to spend a week either poking and prodding various utensils up our ho-har’s or awkwardly getting up from our desk at work and subtly checking if our seat has become the blood bath we’ve told ourselves it will be.

ANYWAY. AS I WAS SAYING. PLEASE HOLLY LET US GET TO THE POINT. When it comes to period utensils, I’ve tried it all.

Pads - I remember at school the THOUGHT of someone hearing the velcro sound of me peeling one off of my pants - or worse unwrapping a new pad - was TOO MUCH for me to bare, so I’d wear 3 pairs of pants, each with a pad on, and hope for the best it would last me the day. The fact that i went to an all girls school - so more or less literally everyone also had periods - makes the thought of me justifying this performance to myself even more confusing to current me. Like imagine when I sat down in one of my classroom’s. Surely all that padding made me almost look like I’d almost doubled in height. The air releasing as I place my bottom down must of sounded like a bouncy castle deflating after a long

shift for a child’s 8th birthday.

Tampons - I waited until I’d had my first boyfriend - and was sure I did infact have a vagina - before I braved one of these. I can distinctly remember sitting in my bathroom, box of tampax infront of me, instruction manual in both hands, like I was my dad reading the Sunday Times newspaper. I studied that diagram and read those instructions like I was performing brain surgery. I gave myself a countdown, shoved it up there, thought, ‘this is incredibly uncomfortable but ok’, and went on with my evening. As the evening drew to a close and we were dropping matey home, I went in the bathroom and to my horror there was a bright red patch up the crotch of my brand new hollister low rise jeans. I was mortified. After that I forced myself into regiment tampon training camp. I graduated a couple of weeks later.

Moon cup - this was a toxic relationship. When it was good it was SO GOOD. When it was bad, it was awful. Nothing will prepare you for the first time it spills everywhere, the time you drop it down a public shopping centre toilet. It was also quite funny sometimes too, actually. Nothing quite like Rory’s housemate coming over to see what storm I was cooking up in the communal kitchen, just to see my moon cup boiling away.

Now I’ve listed all of that I don’t think I need to go into detail about why I tried out period pants, but I was just SICK of it being such a chore. I was either worry-free and uncomfortable, or full of worry and comfortable. Period pants came along and said, ‘Babe. Don’t you worry. We’ve got you.’

I dunno what they put in them, but they genuinely work. I can wear a pair all day on day 3 (wtf) and be absolutely ok. I imagine i could on day 2, too. I’ve even worn a THONG period pant and it’s worked. The opportunities are endless.

And the sleeper shorts. Oh my god. The joy of not having to get up at 3am to change a pad. LIFE CHANGING.

It’s an investment for sure, every few months I’d add a few more to my collection, some people collect pokemon cards, I collect period pants. Carrie Bradshaw to shoes, is Holly Morris to period pants.

Give them a go. Go on.

What you’ll find in my designated period pants draw (ohhhhhh yeah):

The mega sleeper shorts

Everyday pants (vpl o'clock tho)

more subtle pants

More subtle pants that can fit diff sizes

Seam free thong (also good for stopping camel toe in gym shorts lol)

Pants bag (gamechanger - means you can change them throughout day) *

*pants bag is an amazon affilliate link so I make a bit of ££ if you use it, the period pants I have no link for and are just what I’ve previously ordered. I’ve not worked with either of the brands I’ve linked either! Hoping as you get to follow me for longer you’ll know I’ll never try and hide if something’s an ‘ad’, or if I’m making money from it.

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An ode to ye period pants

Period pants, I love you so.

You give me comfort,

Whether I’m meeting friend or foe.

You go in the washing machine,

And take quite a long time to dry,

But mean I don’t have to wear an XXL MONSTER MEGA pad,

And still feel something trickling down my thigh.

Lots of love,

Holly xxx

P.S. i’d love to know what you think of this format pls !!!! feels an easy thing for me to keep up with :)

P.P.S i’d also *really* appreciate if you enjoyed, if you could subscribe pls !! means I’ll come straight to your inbox :D

P.P.S. what period items would you write a letter too??? Or do you have any mega period pants I should try?? Or if any of you have tried that period disk? I can’t work out how putting the equivalent to a frying pan right up there works????