The last beach whistle

This post is brought to you with the help of some of the excellent ladies in my life. Their waste-free journeys are already well underwear. Sorry – well underway. If you're unsure about which sustainable sanitary product is for you, this should give you some pointers. Thank you to these trailblazers for sharing their experiences, loves, pros and cons.

In this post we have a couple of mooncups, reusable pads and some period pants. I think you'll agree it's a bloody marvellous selection. Give it a go. Tell your friends. Save the world.

Mooncup

by Al Ways 

I started using a Mooncup about four years ago after finding out about them from a friend. I was a bit sceptical, but not having to pay for tampons every month (damn the period tax!) and not creating mountains of waste over my lifetime was more than enough to win me over. Granted, I was slightly scared by the size and shape of this weird silicone contraption, but after spending a bit of time experimenting with how to fold it, I’ve never looked back!

Getting it out again was also a lot more straightforward than I thought. It requires you to get a bit more up close and personal with yourself than using a tampon, but yet again, once you get the hang of manoeuvring it around, it takes seconds. And the fact that you only have to change it every twelve hours (depending on how heavy your period is) means you can probably get away with a full day at work without having to deal with it at all.

When I’ve spoken to friends about the Mooncup, they’ve asked in horror how you clean it in a public bathroom. After all, you can’t just leave the cubicle to go and wash it out in the communal sink! While it does seem a shame not to flaunt your eco-friendly period products to the world, taking a small bottle of water into the loo with you should be enough to clean it until you can do it properly at home.

The only issue I have with my Mooncup is that I can’t really use it at night, although a quick Google of the issue suggests I’m in the minority. Maybe I need to try a different brand – they come in different shapes, sizes and hardness of silicone. I find mine moves at night and has caused a few near disasters. I do move around a lot, so I could well be the problem and not the cup.

Oh, and before I forget, since I’ve been using the Mooncup, my cramps are nowhere near as bad as they used to be. I’m not sure if this is scientifically proven, but it does seem to be commonly reported among Mooncup users. If you get bad cramps, it could be worth a try!

Cheeky Wipes Reusable Pads AKA warm fuzzy vagina hugs 

by Sanna Tree

I started to reduce my plastic in earnest around two years ago. Every time I throw away the last of something, or empty the last drop out of a bottle, I try to find a reduced or plastic-free alternative. Sanitary products are one of the biggest (and easiest!) changes I have made. 

I've always been firmly on team sanitary towel (yeah, you didn't know there were teams, did you?!) so I went straight for the reusable pads. After a bit of online research I decided to purchase from Cheeky Wipes. Their washable sanitary pads are made from bamboo (that wonderful sustainable product!) and super soft minky in a range of patterns. I bought a multipack with different sizes and they came in a very cute zip pouch.

Using the minky pads is like a warm, fuzzy hug for your vagina. And that's just what you want when you're on your period, right? 

Unlike the honest goddess in Mean Girls, I do not have a very heavy flow. If I did, the washable pads might not be the best solution for the whole of the period, but I find a couple of changes throughout the day keeps everything fresh. The used pads can then be rinsed and wrung out (if needed) and put in the washing machine. I wash mine with towels etc on a hotter setting than my usual wash and then air dry. I've been using the same set for two years and they're still going strong. 

I keep the pads at home and I usually have a disposable pad in my bag just in case (I am slowly working through my last packet!).

I'd love to also try the period pants but have found them a little cost prohibitive… so in the meantime I'm happy to stay with my cheeky, cosy pads.

Pros

• Fuzzy hug for your vagina
• Plastic-free
• Cute designs
• Reusable 
• Range of sizes, for each period of your period 
• Great if you're team sanitary towel
• Made from sustainable materials
• Affordable (and will save you money)

Cons

• Bulky to carry around
• Not likely to have one in your bag 'in an emergency'
• Need to machine wash
• Might not want to rinse in a public bathroom

Thinx Period Pants

by Nic Urs

So I decided to buy two pairs of the Thinx sport period pants just before a holiday in Italy. It was a bit of an experiment because no-one else I knew had any pants like these, but we'd all chatted about them, and I had been bombarded by adverts on Instagram! My theory was... if I take them on holiday then I'll have time to test them out, plus, I could get them washed and dried in no time, ready for the next day (genius!).

I used them during the day and found they worked really well. My flow is normally heavy for the first day, but then it's quite light for the rest of my period (nice bit of detail for you!). I didn't try them on the heavy day but they were fab for the other days. I've since used them back at home and can wear one pair comfortably for a day at work, then change into a new pair for the evening. 

The ones I bought have an outer layer, which is like bikini fabric... so on holiday I did spend about an hour chilling in the sunshine in them pretending I was wearing a bikini... no-one noticed!! 

They're super easy to wash. I just pop them in a normal dark wash at 30 degrees and they come out perfectly. They are expensive though, so it's worth buying a few pairs every couple of months to build up your collection. I would also say the sport style is made of relatively thick material, so maybe for summer it would be good to try the air bikini or cheeky styles, as they look like slightly thinner, more breathable material. 

I need to continue to build up my collection of period pants but I love that I use fewer pantyliners now, and I almost get excited about my period so that I can wear them (... almost). Clearly the novelty hasn't worn off yet!!

Hidden within this attractive pouch is a Mooncup! Mysterious.

Mooncup + Period Pants = Joy 

by Tammy Pon

I first became aware of the Mooncup as a teenager, looking at a fading sticker on the back of a loo door. I was quite frankly baffled at how the blue rubber cup was meant to fit up there.

Fast-forward 15 years and one climate change protest later, and I'm ordering one from Instagram, which takes weeks to reach me from China. Ironic, I know, but hopefully my good intentions went some of the way towards offsetting the carbon footprint of that journey. And the next day I discovered you can buy them in Boots for just £21! Which means the Mooncup has definitely gone mainstream. There are several different types, and the website Put a Cup In It has a handy quiz on which cup might be best for you.

So how does it work? You very simply fold the thing in half and pop it in. There's a little bit of plastic that sticks out, so that you can pull it out easily. On mine, you cut it to size, and then you can't feel you Mooncup at all. I wear mine all day and wash it when I get home. A Mooncup can hold three times as much liquid as a tampon can – mine has never been full yet. There's absolutely no leakage and I would feel comfortable wearing it anywhere, including the swimming pool and through the night.

Full disclosure: the hardest part for me is getting the thing out again. But give it a squeeze, fold it in half, and then do some calming yoga breathing while giving it a bit of a tug, and it gets easier each month!

That leads me onto my sustainable panties. I bought mine from Cheeky Wipes in a pre-Christmas sale but they're usually £10. I went for a PRETTY pair, as opposed to the SASSY, COMFY or SPORTY options. It's like a Spice Girls reunion up in here.

And these pants are so comfy! I find them perfect for a medium day or night. I wash them at 30 degrees, along with everything else. And as they're black, there is barely any sign of what lies within. So neat. So tidy. So PRETTY.

Swapping to these sustainable sanitary products will save me approximately four night pads, five mini panty liners and up to eight tampons per month. That's around 204 bits of plastic that will not end up in landfill in 2020. If ten other people make similar changes this year, that's around 2,000 fewer sanitary items that will never make it to the ocean. It soon adds up.

Apparently, in Australia, tampon applicators wash onto the shore so often that they're known as beach whistles. So choose which one of the Spice Girls you want to be on your period day and let's leave those beach whistles behind!