Archive for the 'personal care' Category

Diva and cloth

June 17th, 2008 -- Posted in personal care | 3 Comments »

Well, I’ve just given up trying to practice my cello tonight, as it was sounding like some strange dying animal, and have decided to talk about something I am quite excited about.

Now, guys, don’t switch off - you probably have a wife/girlfriend/housemate/workmate etc. whom you could send this to if they don’t know already… but I’m about to discuss periods.

Now, as women, the one ‘essential’ we can’t do without is some way to comfortably, cleanly and conveniently deal with our periods. But the amount of money most women spend on menstrual products, not to mention the waste, is quite ridiculous.

This was a topic I first gave thought to a few years ago, when I bought my first washable cloth pad. It was great - but bulky - so I only used it at night, and relied on disposables during the day. After a while, it was something I just ‘forgot’ about, as you do, until recently when I happened on Crunchy Chicken’s blog and read about DivaCups.

I was amazed! Why had I never heard of such things before?? Why were these products not known and used far and wide? For those of you who are ignorant, like I was, a DivaCup is a menstrul cup - a hygienic, reusable silicone or rubber contraption that we can use instead of a tampon.

Here’s a photo of mine when I got it recently:

Divacup on holder

And just to give it a sense of scale - here it is in my hand. Now, I have kinda big hands for a girl, but you get the idea :)

Diva cup in my hand to give scale.

Also, I ordered a couple of small re-usable cloth pads, which are small enough to wear comfortably during the day - and they are really, really comfortable! No more plastic!!

Lunapads and DivaCup

So. I am yet to try out the DivaCup, but I am determined that the money I spent on it is going to be worthwhile (not that it’s expensive - about 30 bucks from memory?). But in the long run, this one little purchase is going to save a lot of money and a lot of landfill. If you’re interested, check them out at Lunapads.com. It took about a week and a half for my order to get to Oz.

I’d urge all women to seriously consider moving to some form of re-usable menstrual product like these - and help make a difference in this one way that only a woman can!