Monthly Misery: Bellatrix is in the House

This is a picture of Laura Ingalls Wilder. She looks a lot like Aunt Rose. Except Laura looks younger and more pleasant.

When I was a girl my sister and I referred to our menstrual cycles as Aunt Rose. If I said, "Oh, I can't go swimming today because Aunt Rose is visiting," my sister knew exactly what I was talking about and left me alone. If one of us was behaving badly, the other might say, "Is Aunt Rose coming soon?" and if the answer was yes, we steered clear until it looked like Aunt Rose had skipped town again.

I always envisioned Rose as a thin older woman in a high-collared dress with dozens of tiny buttons down the back, her hair swept up in a tight bun, a few ringlets jiggling by her ears. She came regularly, usually in the middle of the night, carrying only a small carpet bag filled with cotton and chocolate. I would wake to the sound of her high-heeled boots clicking on the wooden floor as she crept to my room. And though I enjoyed surprise visitors, she was not exactly a welcome guest. She never waited for an invitation; she just showed up whenever she wanted to. Also, she had this way of hitting me in the lower abdomen in such a way as to necessitate hours spent in the supine position, a heating pad roasting my fallopian tubes until they were numb. And she was messy.

But I was taught to respect my elders, and Aunt Rose was no exception. She was proof, after all, that I had become a woman, that everything was in order to make a baby or two someday. She was like my practice run for labor and delivery, jabbing at my uterus and bruising my lower back until they throbbed with pain so deep and constant that I would involuntarily moan--or curse--in public. To cope with the discomfort, I developed the habit of standing with my back arched and my hands at my hips, massaging my lower back as if I'd been bent over in the fields for the last ten hours when in reality I'd been sitting in front of the television for the last two. 

There was a year when Aunt Rose became cruel and vindictive, barging into my life twice a month, which meant I had one week between visits to recoup. I told my gynecologist this as I lay on her examination table, and she took the opportunity to give Rose a stern talking to. Rose slunk off, probably offended by my doctor's tone of voice, and only came back at her appointed times. Then she disappeared altogether, leaving me wondering where she had gone off to. I suspected it had something to do with how much I was exercising and how much weight I had recently lost, but nothing was ever tested to tell me or Auntie so. Yet I was so afraid that she would suddenly appear, leaving her crimson mark in her wake, that I refused to wear white pants or skirts for years. But then I realized that Rose was giving me the silent treatment. For anyone else I would have written a note of apology: I am so sorry to have hurt your feelings. I know you were just doing your job. Please come back!" But I was having too much fun without her. Any woman can tell you that it's far easier to live without Rose than to live with her. You can travel without worry, for one. And you can save a small fortune not having to buy tampons every month. And then there's the pain, or lack thereof. So that's why, when my mother asked, "Aren't you worried you're not having a period?", I could honestly answer no. That's also why I started telling everyone I never wanted to have children. If delivering babies was anything like cramps, I wanted nothing to do with it. My factory was closed and Big Boss Rose had retired.  

Alas, eventually Aunt Rose returned. Again, I suspect it had something to do with all of the exercising I was not doing and all of the body changes that come along with pregnancies, but I have no proof, just my woman's intuition. One night Rose just walked up to my front porch and threw the door open in her fury. Didn't even knock or say, "Hello Deary, I'm back." Didn't write me a letter asking if she could come for a visit. No, Aunt Rose just whacked me in the back with a two-by-four and punched me in the gut. Then she unpacked her bag--which was much larger than I remembered--and camped out for a week and a half on our front room couch. She threw her clothes all over the floor, ate all our food, and always screamed "Leave me alone!" to anyone who tried to talk to her. She cried all the time, accused my husband of calling her fat, and made me run to the store every day to buy her salty and/or sweet snacks. When she finally left, it took a week to clean up the mess. And though we put new locks on the door, she still came back.  

Recently, I've come to realize that Aunt Rose is not an appropriate name for this woman who invades my home and my body on a monthly basis. Aunt Rose is not to be trusted. She might even be considered a psychopath. That's why, when we saw the last Harry Potter movie with a character named Bellatrix that I decided to rename Rose. Bellatrix is a nasty witch with a cackle that makes you want to hide in the closet. She likes to cast spells on unsuspecting victims, probably because she dislikes her chosen career and feels jealous of other people's happiness. Also, she doesn't care much about keeping her house tidy and her hair combed. And definitely, she is not the motherly type. She's like the Grinch Who Stole Christmas, except without the change of heart at the end. Bellatrix doesn't have a heart.

So I told Aunt Rose to scram. Or rather, Bellatrix did. I think my husband appreciates this new name that fully expresses the extent of my monthly transformation. It helps to have the movie to refer to, especially the scene where Bellatrix breaks out of prison during an especially violent storm that signals the revival of an evil wizard by the name of Voldemort. As the walls crumble and the waves smash against the structure, Bellatrix licks a tattoo on her arm and laughs like a maniac, revealing small, blackened teeth that look like they haven't had a professional cleaning in centuries. With eyes black and wild,hair shooting from her head like she's been electrocuted, wearing a tattered black and white striped gown--the "fat clothes" she keeps for just such occasions--she looks skyward. Her cackle goes on and on, becoming more shrill by the second until her image shrinks to a small photograph in a newspaper. "That's what it's like to have PMS," I tell my husband. "It's like something's trying to break out of me. And then my period comes and it's like I'm possessed." My husband readily agrees. And for some reason this makes me want to punch him. But perhaps that's Bellatrix talking and not me.  

As for my kids, they are slowly catching on that I no longer have a relative by the name of Rose. Rather, I have a chronic ailment that turns me into a witch. One night during Bellatrix's last visit, I was tucking my middle child in bed. It had been a long day of hard cramps and annoyances, two things I do not hide well when Bellatrix is in the house. As I pulled my son's blanket to his chin, I sighed. "What's wrong?" my son asked. 

"Just mommy owies," I told him. 

"Oh," he said, which is what all of my boys say in response to mommy owies, right before they visibly draw themselves in and make a quick exit--as if it were a contagious disease. 

I kissed my son's cheek and gave him a hug. "Don't worry," I said. "It'll pass in five to seven days." 

"That long?" my son asked incredulously, a hint of fear in his voice. I nodded. Then I clutched the seams of my tattered pajamas and cackled like a woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

Bellatrix Lestrange, my friend the witch, otherwise known as me during five to seven days each month.

 

Comments

[Hillary]

This was so funny. I always had my psycho days every month until I discovered the IUD. It seemed to mellow me out and the visits were much more tollerable for everyone.

[MaryB]

I totally agree with Julie~~don't miss it! With three teenage girls at home though, I still feel the pain--just not in my gut!
I'm sorry to laugh at your pain...but this was funny!
~~Love ya!~~

[Julie]

Aahhh, I do not miss my uterus one bit. But every once in a while I get PMS like symptoms and I wonder how that can be when all that "stuff" is gone that triggers it. I guess it's me and my crazy self.

[shelby]

You crack me up! I've never heard of Aunt Rose, she's always been Aunt Flo...but I am really beginning to like the new name Bellatrix. Much more fitting.

[Kaylynne]

There's a cartoon that Becca and Mikey used to like to watch called The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy. There was one episode where a character was turning into a werewolf and as he grew hair and claws he yelled, "AH! Its....PUBERTY!" And sometimes I wonder if "Monthly Visits from aunt Flo" are in fact the true origin of the werewolf myth.

Ellisa, Becca, and I don't really have an "Aunt" that comes to visit but we do warn each other with a line from Ocean's 12, "The basement is flooded and the pilot light is out" which is what Julia Robert's says to George Clooney when the bad guys arrive - which is fitting because between cramps and back pains it truly does feel like you've been beaten up by a group of mobsters. :P