The Ditsy Dachshund: Diva Cup, where have you been all my life?

It’s time to talk about lady things. I spend soooo much time with high school cheerleaders that I’m pretty much immune to all things TMI. If you don’t spend lots and lots of time listening to teenage girls talk about vagina's and tampons and the like, you might not want to read this. Just sayin'.

So I decided that I needed to try the Diva Cup. My one and only experience with a menstrual cup was when I was like 12, in the drugstore (Bartel's on the West side where World Market is now…cuz that’s how good my memory is folks) looking at tampons with my mom for the first time. I saw the box of Instead softcups above the rows and rows of scary tampons and remember thinking “how stupid is that, you strap that on and how do they expect you to wear pants or sit down?” Ha because the thought of sticking a CUP inside of me DOWN THERE was insane. Also I don’t really think at that point in my young life I was convinced you could actually pee while wearing a tampon…. ANYWAY, I recently saw a picture of a Diva Cup on Michelle Money’s Instagram page and decided that if someone as fabulous as Michelle Money was raving about this, I probably needed to try it and be fabulous too.

I ordered mine on Amazon for around $30. I didn't get the special “wash” they make to wash out your cup, but if you’re like me and don’t own any unscented soaps and your husband is like mine and doesn't really love going to the grocery store to buy special soap for your lady products, you might want to get that too. Hubs picked up Ivory hand soap and it seems to work just fine. The package included, the cup (obvi), a little pink and purple carrying sachet, and a pin. Yep, a pin. Like the kind you can proudly wear on the lapel of your jacket proclaiming to all that yes, in fact, I do use a menstrual cup and am now saving the environment one period at a time. Isn't that funny? I’m so going to wear that pin.

I have to admit, I have never been more excited for my period to start in my whole life. (ok that’s a lie but my mom might read this so I will omit the details of my wild oat sewing days….) I seriously spent several days just looking at the cup, showing my husband the cup, watching YouTube videos of other women talking about the cup. Once it came time to actually use the cup, I almost got too scared. It’s big and it has this creepy looking stem thing on the end. And it's springy. Like you have it all folded and ready to go, if you’re not careful, it might just bounce open and fly across the room leaving you to wonder how you’re going to make it from the toilet to where the cup landed and back without making a mess…. But I sucked it up (buttercup), folded it the way I wanted, and shoved it right in. There, that’s not so bad. Walk, walk, wiggle, wiggle, squat down to make sure it won’t fall out. SUCCESS! I know why they call it a “diva” cup now people, because I was feeling pretty fancy for figuring it out on try one.

Day one was good. No leakage, nothing weird. I could feel that little tab thing at the end, but I’d read that you could cut that off so I figured that would fix it. You’re supposed to be able to leave the cup in for 12 hours at a time but curiosity got the best of me and I took it out in the shower before it was time just to see what was really in there. And ya know what? There wasn't half as much as I was imagining. Why didn't I try this in high school? It would have saved me so many frantic trips to the bathroom on games days when I was wearing my white cheerleading uniform scared to death that my tampon would leak.

The whole removal process was weird. They tell you to “bear down” like you’re giving birth- which is stupid because the model 1 cup is for people who have never given birth. So I did my best mimicking labor, complete with facial expressions and grunts for dramatic effect. It wasn't bad. It was weird, but not bad. Actually a few nights in to the cup using experiment, I even had a dream that I was giving birth to twins and the nurse was so impressed with how well I was doing. I told her it was because I used the Diva Cup. Not. Even. Joking. After the initial giving birth in the shower removal, I just took it out over the toilet, no big deal. My sink is close to the toilet so I would just toss it in the sink, finish my business, wash it out and pop it back in. Literally it kind of "pops" when it's situated correctly up in there.

So all in all, the Diva Cup experience was generally pretty pleasant. It wasn't life changing like a lot of YouTubers claimed. Though like I said, had I tried this in HS, I could see where it would be. I do think it's much better than tampons and will most likely keep using it. And of course proudly wearing the Diva pin.

Here are some tips I found over the course of the week:

· Cutting the stem just made the end sharp and poky so if you try one and the stem bugs you, just flip the cup inside out. It still works just the same.
· Also, be prepared to spend some time figuring out what fold works best for you. There are a million ways you can fold it so just test it out.
· If it flings across the room, its ok, the bathroom door is closed (hopefully) and nobody will know. Unless you’re me and you tell the world via the internet….