alternative menstrual products

[Guest guest]

Hey all you girls out there.

Each of us uses about 10,000 disposable tampons or

pads in our lives - some more if flow is heavy or

longer than average...

 

Lots of these products contain tree pulp, and have

been bleached, not to mention the plastic wrapping,

lining, applicators etc.

 

chlorine bleach reacts with lignin in tree pulp and

creates dioxin, which is a highly toxic, carcinogenic

chemical.

 

one thing you can do is use all-cotton (organic)

peroxide bleached or unbleached disposables. they're

also usually made with less plastic. but they can be

hard to find (try the organics aisle or a specialty

shop), and expensive.

 

you can also try one or more of: DivaCups/Keepers,

sea sponge tampons, or cloth pads. The cups are

internally worn and made of silicon or latex.

 

various brands of cloth pads exist. i know some

people who've made their own. but if you don't sew

(like me), you can get the premade ones. My favourite

are lunapads - http://www.lunapads.com - which

incidentally is also a canadian company. their

website also has information about 'why to switch' and

the money saving, and healthy benefits. a websearch

for 'alternative menstrual products' will also return

many results.