Sport is no period drama

As if being a teenager wasn’t hard enough, being on your period is never fun. Many of us are guilty of not talking openly enough with teen girls about puberty and experiencing periods. Girls as young as eight or nine can start with their first period but equally, some teenagers don’t get their first period until they are sixteen.

As women ourselves, we recognise and can relate to how painful periods can feel. Despite it being a bodily process that the majority of women and girls experience on a monthly basis during their lives, periods are still, unfathomably, considered a taboo. Exercise and sport can be great for boosting your health, wellbeing and confidence but for some people their period can be a real barrier to this. In fact, many teenage girls are choosing not to participate in PE lessons at school when they are on their period. So, why does period talk still feel like such a taboo topic?

The Impact of Periods on Girls and Sport

We know that everyone responds differently to their periods. Some girls and women sail through their monthly cycle with hardly any impact at all, whereas others can be wiped out with severe cramps and other uncomfortable symptoms. From teens to professional female athletes, period symptoms can have a real impact on how we feel and our sporting performance.

Research conducted by Betty for Schools — an initiative striving to open up the conversation around periods in schools — found that almost half of women said they had used their periods to skip a PE class.

Period-related pain, including cramps should not prevent girls from participating fully in school, in sports, in social life. If that’s happening on a regular basis, as parents, we need to evaluate what help and support they can receive from the medical profession.

Teachers and parents want to support girls to continue sport through puberty. According to research from Sport England published in June 2019, 40% of women, including girls, aren’t getting the recommended levels of daily exercise, and taboos and stigma around periods could be part of the reason. A campaign called Blood, Sweat and No Fears launched to tackle this unspoken barrier to participation in women’s sport.

Elite Sportswomen and Periods

Sam Quek, who stormed to a gold medal victory with the Team GB women’s hockey players in the 2016 Rio Olympics, is supporting Betty’s campaign to encourage teachers and parents to talk to children more about periods and exercise. Sam spoke to Elle magazine back in 2017: “For me, sport and exercise are a huge part of my life. I find it really sad that periods — something all women experience for a big part of our lives — are creating a barrier to sport for so many. We have to work to break down taboos around periods — this starts with elite sportswomen being more open and honest, with schools creating the environment where girls can talk about the changes their bodies are going through and education that empowers us all to know and understand our bodies better.”

And Sam’s request has become a reality! Recently Dina Asher-Smith, the British 200m sprint world champion spoke to Telegraph Sport about how her periods are incorporated into her training.

And also, Chelsea Women have become the first football club in the world to tailor their training programme around players’ menstrual cycles in an attempt to enhance performance and cut down on injuries. Chelsea Women coaching team has designed players’ individual plans around the phases of their menstrual cycle.

The initiative has been driven by manager Emma Hayes, who felt that for too long female footballers had been treated as physically the same as their male counterparts and that specific allowances needed to be made for the impact of menstruation on performance. Emma Hayes says, “The starting point is that we are women and, ultimately, we go through something very different to men on a monthly basis. And we have to have a better understanding of that because our education failed us at school; we didn’t get taught about our reproduction systems. It comes from a place of wanting to know more about ourselves and understanding how we can improve our performance.”

It is a ground-breaking initiative that — if adopted elsewhere — could revolutionise the way in which female athletes are managed and train.

The This Girl Can advert is another great example of bringing periods and sport to the public arena. One woman is featured clutching at a water bottle to deal with stomach cramp whilst with another woman you can see the tampon string hanging beneath her underwear. This has shocked some but been celebrated by others! Either way it shows that sport can continue through the monthly cycle and in fact, just might help ease the symptoms.

Jo, co-founder of We are Girls in Sport (L) with Gabby Logan

There is no right or wrong way to help prepare your child for puberty but, according to a survey from Boots, 40% of parents believe that the best way to start the conversation is to have a one-on-one chat with their teen, and 18% suggest that the best way is over a cup of tea on the sofa. If you want to sit down and talk to your daughter about periods and puberty, chances are, if she is eight or older, she’s already experiencing some physical changes to her body and may be curious. In 2017, Jo met with Gabby Logan as part of a #TeenTalk campaign supported by Boots, at which, they discussed some interesting statistics:

78% of teens find it tricky talking to their parents about puberty issues
68% of mums and dads find it awkward talking to their teens about puberty with periods being the most difficult discussion of all
19% of parents said they would put-off talking about puberty until “another time.”

The more we talk about this, the more we break down the taboo and help girls to receive the support they need to continue sport through their periods. We know that there’s no period drama, but do they?

There is no right or wrong way to help prepare your child for puberty but, according to a survey from Boots, 40% of parents believe that the best way to start the conversation is to have a one-on-one chat with their teen, and 18% suggest that the best way is over a cup of tea on the sofa. If you want to sit down and talk to your daughter about periods and puberty, chances are, if she is eight or older, she’s already experiencing some physical changes to her body and may be curious. In 2017, Jo met with Gabby Logan as part of a #TeenTalk campaign supported by Boots, at which, they discussed some interesting statistics:

78% of teens find it tricky talking to their parents about puberty issues
68% of mums and dads find it awkward talking to their teens about puberty with periods being the most difficult discussion of all
19% of parents said they would put-off talking about puberty until “another time.”

The more we talk about this, the more we break down the taboo and help girls to receive the support they need to continue sport through their periods. We know that there’s no period drama, but do they?