Well...in this particular instance I'm certainly not talking about my arse as such, but certainly my nether regions, so look away now if you're vaguely squeamish about personal matters.

I'm talking about periods. My periods in particular. Tell me, what kind of intelligent designer decided that a sign of a woman's fecundity can last way past her time limit for suitable breeding? Not only that, this designer decided that just to make matters more interesting, that towards the time when a woman reaches the end of her time as a prolific useful breeder she becomes a prolific useless bleeder. What for? What is the bleeding purpose of bleeding?
Bloody periods!
I've managed to saturate my sheets and my quilts and my quilt covers and more annoyingly I've managed to stain and ruin a rather dapper inflatable bed that we paid a small fortune for just last month.
For what? To show any potential mate how fertile and productive my womb might be? Well...to be honest any 'potential mate' who decides that a fat fifty year old is potential breeding material actually deserves to be childless.
I voluntarily gave up my breeding potential exactly 19 years ago, 6 months after I'd had my fourth child. I went and had my fallopian tubes clamped and lasered to stop any stray semen from entering into the amazing world of an egg-shedding womb. You'd think that this intelligent designer would've factored in 20th century medicine and a life span greater than 3 score year and ten if he was that bleeding intelligent. But obviously, it was a bloke who decided that having your guts spilling out of your knickers every 28 days so that you have to check the seat you've just left for little tell-tale splodges as a way of defining your femininity. Why didn't this intelligent designer design a fully functioning body that stopped producing eggs and the ability to breed once a woman's tits had sagged to a certain foppish angle? And why couldn't this intelligent designer have deduced that if a body is unable to carry out this function then periods stop. PERIOD.

I've been hoping and hoping every month since I was about 45 that it would be last month that I would have to suffer the indignity of chafed labia, stained undergarments and keeping my eye out for BOGOF bargain in the sanitary towel department. No such bleeding luck! I've going to be 53 at my next birthday and I still curse that lunar cycle for dragging the lining of my womb down my vagina, through the breathable wadding and the glue strips of the very latest cotton soft pad, through my pants, through my jeans or just for a laugh, my cream linen trousers to soak in nicely on whatever cushion, mattress or railway station waiting room bench I happen to park my backside on.

Thank you god!

- Annie