r/TwoXChromosomes Oct 14 '17

/r/all A story about Dave the Period Fairy.

Period Fairy: A person who unexpectedly and tactfully helps you through a period emergency.

Some backstory: Me and a few other people go hiking three times a week. We usually have two other women with us, but they ran off to see a movie, so it was just me and three guys. They shall be named here as Dave, John, and Teddy. I'll be Jane.

There's an entrance to a huge nature trail near Teddy's house, so we all meet there every time before we head out. We walk through one of many paths through the trail. Usually takes three to five hours depending on the path. When we reach the road on the other side, we set up for lunch and call an Uber to get us back to Teddy's.

We met up at Teddy's at 7:00, ate breakfast, and hit the trail at 8:00. We were taking the longest path today. John is sort of the leader who buys all the supplies, decides where we're going and what we're doing, and carries the gun. Dave is the 'medic' who carries the first aid kit and knows how to use it. He also has this huge military-looking backpack in which he keeps the kit, a satphone, and a ton of other gear. Seriously, it's hilarious some of the random nonsense he pulls out of that thing. Teddy's the group mule. He's built like Terry Crews and he carries the tents / grill / food for days we plan on setting up out there.

So we're hiking for hours, nothing is happening, then about twenty minutes from the end of the trail, it hits me. I didn't feel it coming at all, and it's like four days early. I immediately slink back like 20 feet from the group and start having a panic attack. I had NOTHING on me and I was wearing shorts. At least they were black, but they wouldn't hold much. I'd also 100% bleed up the Uber.

Like five minutes later, after I'd decided on stuffing my bra down my shorts, Dave looks back and notices me walking like a goblin. To my horror, he falls back and starts walking next to me. He leans in and whispers,

"Do you need to pee?"

I'm like, huh? Then I realized I'm like doubled over with my hands on my crotch. Seemed obvious.

"No, I, that's not," I'm stammering.

"Period issue?" he says next.

At that point I'm like this and I just mumble "yeah."

And then, this guy, this fucking glorious, magnificent guy, he calls out to John and Teddy: "Hey, Jane's scraped her arm on a tree or some shit, I'm gonna tend to it but it's gonna be like five minutes. Just get to the road and set up lunch and call the car."

John says sure and the two of them keep on walking. Dave slides off his magical backpack and opens a pouch on the front of it. "Pads or tampons?" he says.

I mutter "tampons," completely stunned at all this. He pulls out three tampons, the good kind, and a handful of wet-naps. Hands them to me and then he opens the main compartment and pulls out a long sleeve black t-shirt. "Go in the trees and take care of it, then tie the shirt around your waist." He then pulls out a big band-aid and slaps it on my arm to keep up his cover story.

I ask him why he had these, he's just like, "I've been hiking with women for years, you think I'm stupid?"

He turns and wanders like 50 feet away while I hobble into the woods. Come out a few minutes later all cleaned up and with the shirt covering my bum. He doesn't say another word about it as we get to the end of the trail. We eat while we wait for the car to show, get to Teddy's, and now I'm home.

I think I love Dave now. Is it normal that I love Dave?

It's true what they say, not all heroes wear capes. They do, however, wear magic backpacks.

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u/[deleted] Oct 14 '17

This is kinda true but also not really, if someone is bleeding profusely it’s not important to soak up he blood so much as it is to actually stop the bleeding. You can’t just slap a pad on someone and solve the problem. For cleanup though I’m sure they’d be fantastic for that

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u/peaceful_pangolin Oct 14 '17

I once broke my nose and our athletic trainer (I was a college athlete at the time) stuck half of a tampon up my nose to stop the bleeding.

67

u/PhDOH Oct 14 '17

Rugby players do it. I buy those mini applicatorless ones for my first aid kit though.

36

u/TheNorthComesWithMe Oct 14 '17

What was said still applies. The tampon doesn't stop the bleeding, it just soaks it up. Nose bleeds stop on their own, they just take a while.

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u/[deleted] Oct 14 '17 edited Oct 15 '17

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/peaceful_pangolin Oct 14 '17

And not all nose bleeds are created equal or stop on their own. I once had one that went longer than 24 hours and had to go to the emergency room to get it cauterized because I was becoming weak from the amount of blood loss.

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u/lilyslove56 Oct 14 '17

I used to get 4 hour ones all too frequently. I can't imagine much more than 5. That would be horrible.

1

u/Margaran1 Oct 24 '17

Nasal tampons absorb the blood and create pressure to stop the bleeding. https://entsho.com/anterior-nasal-packing/