Every so often we like to share a few of the love letters and rave reviews we get here at GladRags. Have your own story of how reusables changed your life? Let us know in the comments!

P.S. We love you too!

I am so glad my sister bought me my first set (and the set I still use) of GladRags about 4 years ago. They were the most useful gift I have ever received. Every time I use them, I feel so good about myself for keeping all those pads from going into the landfills. I live in China, so I was sharing with one of my Chinese friends how I don’t use disposables. She was shocked, and related to me that all women in the Chinese countryside used to use something similar to GladRags (and some still do), only until recent years. When I informed her of the impact on the planet and how this isn’t gross at all, she decided to get on board and have her mother make her some cloth pads too! Some people I talk to still think cloth pads are gross, but I hope to change their minds too. My Chinese friends have really taught me so much about reducing, reusing and recycling. I hope I can share some of this knowledge with them too. — Amanda

Thank you very much for your outstanding product! I just received my order this week and love my new pads. I cannot believe how comfortable they are and how fresh I feel! There is nothing like soft flannel against your skin! I wish I knew about these sooner. I bought my first few liners from Earthward in Amherst, NH and then contacted your company and placed a larger order. Thank you for the prompt shipping and awesome customer service! I will be telling all of my friends about your awesome company! I am doing a great thing for my body and the Earth as well! Thank you GladRags! — Kristine

I must have bought my first set of three purple pads in 1992, that was the year I moved to Portland. I bought a second set of three about a year later. Both sets are still with me and working fine. The second set of black envelopes (with orange patterned inserts) has gotten a bit threadbare, but honestly, I think I’ve had them 18 years and they’re still quite functional! The sewing around the edge hasn’t lost a stitch. One of the best investments I’ve ever made environmentally and financially! — Katrina

Yesterday we received a letter from a customer who wore her GladRags Pantyliner through a security scanner and was so traumatized by her resulting TSA genital search that she wanted to warn other women. (Read her letter below). Her past history of sexual assault made this experience a nightmare for her. At first we thought yes, we will warn people not to put themselves through this risk.

But on second thought, we want to ask every willing woman, menstruating or not, to put a GladRags in her pants and go through the scanner.  Let the TSA learn to recognize that a menstruating woman is probably not a terrorist! (And, yes, we know myriad jokes can be made be about that statement).

The fact of the matter is, everyone is subject to an invasive search. For some women and men it causes great stress and perceived violation. If you can handle the experience fairly stress free, help clear the way for our menstruating sisters for whom a genital search by a group of strangers is a truly traumatizing experience.

So get your GladRags on and get to grandma's house! Over the river and thru the scannners!  

"This email isn't going to be as polished as I would normally send, but I'm upset and I don't want what happened to me to happen to anyone else (if I can stop it). I recently traveled via air, and was subjected to that new scanning device. "No problem," I thought. I was wearing jeans and a linen tanktop, bra, panties, and one camoflauge pantyliner. I'm a rule follower, so I never have any problems at the airport. Not this time. I was stopped, and then held for 15 mintues while they tried to find a female supervisor. I couldn't get to my bag, my shawl or my shoes; just standing there while the TSA agents kept me in one place. Now, I don't want this to be about bad TSA agents; they were doing their job, they were as delicate as they could be, etc., etc. But what ultimately happened is that I was subjected to search so invasive that I was left crying and dealing with memories that I thought had been dealt with years ago of prior sexual assualts. Why? Because of my flannel panty-liner. These new scans are so horrible that if you are wearing something unusual (like a piece of cloth on your panties) then you will be subjected to a search where a woman repeatedly has to check your "groin" while another woman watches on (two in my case – they were training in a new girl – awesome). So please, please, tell the ladies not to wear their liners at the airport (I didn't even have an insert in). I'm a strong, confident woman; I'm an Army vet (which is why those camo liners crack me up), I work full-time and go to graduate school full-time, I have a wonderful husband, and I don't take any nonsense from anyone. I don't dramatize, and I don't exaggerate. I'm trying to give you a sense of who I am so you won't think that this is a plea for attention, or a jumping on the bandwagon about the recent TSA proposed boycott. I just don't want another woman to have to go through the "patting down" because she didn't know that her glad-rag would be a matter of national security."

Hello and welcome to the newest installment of Menstrual Mondays, wherein we review this week in menstrual news, blog entries, art, activism, and more!

•  The Chic Ecologist brings us an installment of the Environmental Impact of Everyday Things focused on the impact of menstrual products.  She goes into some interesting detail about what happens to the menstrual products that are thrown away and the history of green-washing such products. (image to the left is take from her article)
• Check out this week’s Do Good of the Week from GladRags Guerilla, Marta, who runs Be Good Do Good Yoga.  This week’s segment is all about natural birth control methods and why you should check them out.
• Girl w/ Pen has an impassioned editorial about the state of menstrual product advertising in Pop Goes Feminism: Does Your Period Make You Blue?
• Awesome blogger The Sexist has a hilarious article about the 5 Most Feminine Feminine Hygiene Products (note: they are not all menstrual products).
• Blog a la Cart shares a funny little story about her husband’s reaction to her excitement over first using the menstrual cup.

Hello and welcome to this week’s edition of Menstrual Monday.  Enjoy!

•  Bianca I. Laureano, on RH Reality Check, writes a very in depth and highly critical review of Flow: The Cultural Story of Menstruation.  You can read it here.
• You can check out one woman’s journey from disposable menstrual products to cloth pads and menstrual cups here, on nora_charles livejournal blog.
• My Little Red Book is set to come out with second edition with new stories!  Learn about what made the author compile period stories from around the world from women of all ages in this story from the New Haven Resister (the author was a Yale woman).
• Blogger One Day at a Time has a great article on alternative menstrual products and why you should use them.
• One Craftster.org contributor has a great idea for what to do with those extra tampons lying around your house come Easter (see photo to the right).
• The Jezebel community provides us with a wealth of useful information in A Reader’s Treasury of Cures for your Cramps.  Note: there are some less than traditional (read illegal) cures in here.
• And last, but not least you can learn more about the Benefits of Menstrual Cups on Naturally Savvy.

• Super Green Girl wonders Does Green = Inconvenient? and what’s wrong (or right) about inconvenience?  This is a great article about things most of us try not to think about.
• This One’s for the Girls: Green Your Period from the Greenest Dollar presents some good reasons not to use disposable menstrual products along with multiple options.
• Fabulous website and post: The Zero Waste Home: Zero Waste Bathroom.  She thinks of everything!
• Learn how to crochet a (non-usable) Moon Cup (see photo) using this handy guide.  This website is slightly naughty, so don’t visit this link at work!
• We are featured in this month’s Mothering Magazine!  Pick up a copy today for a great article about reusables.
• Hilarious: Girl Welcomed to Womanhood with 4-page Pamphlet from The Onion.

Check out the View tomorrow (3/9) for more period talk with the authors of Flow:The Cultural History of Menstruation 11am EST.

Here at GladRags we are always trying to find new way to conserve and save.  Inspired by Simple Organic’s Green Goal Setting, we have decided to present you, our faithful readers, with a new Green Goal every week!  We will specifically be targeting goals that are within reach in a small time frame and a small budget.  Tracy (left) and I (right) are going to try them out right along with you and share our experiences in the comments.  We hope you will join us in our quest to reduce our footprint, one small step at a time!

First stop on the GladRags’ Green Goals train: cloth napkins and handkerchiefs!

Personally, I grew up in a household that used cloth napkins for all meals.  I was always weirded out going to friend’s houses whose families only used paper napkins or paper towels.  Cloth napkins feel so practical and comfortable to me!  They are softer and don’t fall apart in your hands like many paper napkins do after some use.  There may be a slightly higher upfront cost, but as you reuse the cloth napkins they will save you money and you’ll never run out!  Most of the napkins I have came as hand-me-downs from my parents or grandparents, but thrift stores are also a great place to pick some up.  Sewing cloth napkins is also a great way to go — even if you are a novice sewer (myself included), this project should be fairly simple.  For a great tutorial on making your own napkins check out Chez Beeper Bebe’s blog post (happy face napkins pictured are from her site).

Handkerchiefs are a whole different story.  Growing up, we always had a box of tissues.  Having had allergies and frequent colds, they have always been useful to me.  The tissues with lots of lotion in them were the best as they did not make my nose raw after many uses.  In college, I started to feel guilty for wasting all this paper and energy.  I started using toilet paper to save money and waste as the cheap toilet paper I use is thin and does not include lotion.  Lately, I have been trying to use handkerchiefs more often.  Handkerchiefs are also easy to make or cheap to buy at vintage stores.  GladRags offers some very soft organic handkerchiefs, too!

Some people have been using cloth napkins and handkerchiefs for years, so this goal is already second nature for them.  We challenge you to reduce your paper towel use even more by declining paper napkins with take-out food or carrying your own cloth for hand drying in public restrooms!

Tracy and I hope you will join us in finding fun, simple ways to make our lives even greener.  Leave a comment to let us know what you’re doing to conserve or share your own tips with us!

Here at GladRags we often listen to podcasts as we tirelessly work to provide you the best of service and support.  Some of our favorites come from the How Stuff Works family of podcasts.  They all have the impossible combination of expertise, wit, humor, and chemistry between the two podcasters.  A recent podcast on Stuff Mom Never Told You was titled “Is Menstruation the Last Taboo?”  Look them up on itunes or go to their website to listen. Needless to say, we found something missing from their podcast.  Because they always encourage feedback we sent them this letter:

Hi Cristen and Molly, First of all, we just want to say that we listen to your podcast all the time at work!  We love your fun and in-depth coverage of such a variety of topics — some of our favorites are “The Mysteries of Nancy Drew” and “Are Breast Implants Linked to Suicide.”

We are writing today in regards to your podcast titled “Is Menstruation the Last Taboo?”

We thought it was great and covered a lot of territory, but we were disappointed that you never mentioned alternative menstrual products in your discussion of becoming more comfortable with our menstrual cycles. Alternative menstrual products include things like menstrual cups (DivaCup, Keeper Cup, Moon Cup, etc), cloth pads, and sea sponge tampons. We work at GladRags (http://www.gladrags.com), a company which sells these types of products, so promoting positive attitudes toward menstruation is a subject near and dear to our hearts! Not many women know that there are alternatives to disposable products, but we believe that every woman should have all the information available so that she can make the best choice for her body.  The health benefits notwithstanding — reusables don’t contain bleach or other harmful chemicals and have never been linked to toxic shock syndrome — we find that most women gain a greater understanding of their bodies and a sense of comfort with their menstrual cycle.  In addition, the average woman uses 16,800 pads or tampons in her lifetime — imagine the environmental impact of all that waste! You mentioned that a lot of your fans are interested in hearing about the history of the tampon.  We hope that you will include reusable menstrual products in your podcast, as the tampon as we know it is a relatively recent invention compared to cloth pads and menstrual cups! We plan on sharing your podcast with our customers on our Facebook and blog (http://www.gladrags.com/blog).  Thanks for keeping us informed and entertained while we work! -Alex and Tracy, the girls from GladRags.com

Hopefully they will mention alternative menstrual products on the next podcast they record.  Even if they don’t, you should listen, because they are great!  Did you listen to this podcast?  What did you think?  What podcasts do you subscribe to?  We are always looking for more!

Breastfeeding is a subject close to my heart. I loved nursing my daughter. While pregnancy was an amazing experience, it was sort of an invisible process. Sure, I got as big as a house growing my 9 pounder but I couldn't see her change from day to day – only my rounding body was visible. However, once she was out,  I watched her grow, change, and thrive before my very eyes while nourished on nothing but the milk from my breasts. The invisible magic became visible. Some of the most wonderful memories in my mind are her adoring eyes looking up at me while she was nourished and comforted.

Lucky for me, I had some strong role models in friends, family, and Mothering Magazine to tell me I was doing the right thing. But many women not only don't have that support, they are in fact discouraged from nursing, given outdated advice by medical professionals, undermined by free samples of formula, and stigmatized by a society that continues to consider the breast a sex symbol instead of an infant's best source of food delivery. (Don't forget the ongoing Hey Facebook, Breastfeeding is not Obscene campaign.)

It riles me that more women and babies don't get to experience the pleasure and good benefits of breastfeeding, because it is good for both – mothers also have lasting health benefits from nursing. And it is the rare instance where nursing doesn't really work. It is more often a choice arrived at by poor information, or economic and social situations that don't support children and mothers.  The first week of August was World Breastfeeding Week and the organization of the same name has lots of great info. There are breastmilk banks (this link is about the one in Portland)  where moms with extra milk (yes, most women do have extra) can donate to babies in need. And the La Leche League is a great support organization for women who are having difficulties with the process. I got some great advice from them when my daughter began to try out her sharp little teeth. The photo above is my baby about 18 years ago. Oh, how time does fly!

After helping set up the pads to Sri Lanka donation, I was thinking of donating pads to Sri Lanka in my mother’s name for Mother’s Day, but decided a card would be cheaper.  Then, yesterday a friend posted a note on facebook.  She is from Sri Lanka.  She posted an upsetting message about the recent bloody strife in Sri Lanka and feeling like there was nothing she could do.  Her brother is living there as an activist and blogger.  He wrote an equally heartbreaking post about the recent tragedy that you can read here.  My friend’s pain inspired me to actually do something about it and donate.  There are many ways you can protest, but the best way to help the people suffering now is to donate money.  Menstrual products are an often forgotten form of aid, but once you put yourself in the shoes of a woman who has been displaced from her home it is hard to imagine living without them.

If you would like to donate pads please visit our site here.  We have only until the 20th of May to get all our donations in, because ECS World is sending a shipment out on the 23rd.  So please order soon.

Visit ECS World or Sarvodaya if you would like to donate money.

I love a good hug from friend to get me through the day, and have even felt it appropriate in many situations to hug someone when meeting for the first time, even if our connection has only been virtual.  That's why this recent story brings up a very interesting issue–is it okay to hug the Queen of England?  I'd like to think it's a (good) sign of the times that this happened, and that people are discussing it.  Here's to a changing of the guard on the no-touchy policy between nations!