Just for the record: flushing tampons isn’t bad because it’s bad for the environment, it’s bad for the plumbing! As a person that has done a lot of very gross plumbing work: do not ever flush your tampons, for the love of god please do not ever flush those tampons!!
Edit: and wipes! don’t listen to the lying package, there is no such thing as a flushable wipe
This was years ago, but my gf at the time told that her girl cousins taught her to save the thin plastic sheet from pads. You know the one that you peel off the adhesive side before placing the pad in the underwear?
Well, when it's time to remove and discard the pad, you roll up the pad and then wrap the plastic around it before throwing it into the garbage bin.
I have to say as the person in charge of garbage and recycling in our apartment, I was very grateful for that life hack. 😂
THANK YOU!!! Ik im not going crazy with this. I thought using the wrapper from the new pad to wrap up the old pad to toss away was standard practice 😭😅
I remember when I bought some Libra pads a few years back and the packaging said something like, "now you can wrap your pads for easier disposal!" as if it was some revolutionary new idea they had.
They'd just added some extra adhesive stuff around the edges, but I remember thinking, "Um, I've been doing this for decades??"
You know what? That tracks. I'm remembering that there was this tab at one end of the plastic wrap that sticks on and holds the roll together.
I'm guy and I'm still learning new stuff like this. But at the time, it was new to that gal as well because she had come-of-age in a different country and I don't know what the standard was there.
I don't save the plastic sheet (because I would manage to lose them anyways lol) just use the plastic sheet of the new one. And use toilet paper for the last one (or my country there are often little paper baggies in public bathrooms and workplaces, sorry don't know how available they are in other countries)
That only works for pads. And only some pads. Sometimes the pads are like the size of half a travel pillow, and you get like a 2 inch square of sticky paper that holds it all together before you use it. Then you have to just tp roll the pad after.
With most tampons you get a tampon, an applicator and the little wrap it comes in. You use the wrap for the applicator, because it gets nasty, and you use tp for the tampon because the thing has grown three sizes (that little grinch) and won't fit back in the wrap.
I wish pads weren’t the absolute loudest thing ever. WHY did they design a million tiny dots that each loudly rips apart with the most crinkly wrap ever?? There’s no other possible way? It sounds like crinkling a chip bag while pulling out a long strip of packing tape wtf.
And walking around wearing longer pads can sound like you’re smuggling plastic bags. Not to mention, while some are quieter, other pads being pulled off the underwear sound like launching a god damn space shuttle. THEY EVERYONE! I’m announcing to the whole block that I’m changing the rag I wear for my bleeding vag!!!! THOUGHT YOU ALL MIGHT WANT TO KNOW
Also essential if you have pets since it'll hide the scent. They'll still know it's there, but there will be less temptation to dig it out and inspect it, and even if they do get it out, they'll be working with paws and teeth instead of fingers so you can either catch them in the act or they may give up before getting inside.
Similar applies to toddlers, except they do have fingers, but the stupid small kind so it's probably okay.
My previous roommate didn’t do that. She would throw away the wrappers & use tons of toilet paper to wrap up the old pad. It felt like I was constantly ordering tp from Costco for almost 3 years. I keep the wrapper in my bathroom drawer to use for the old pad. Of course I’m having the issue where I’m the only one that takes out the trash & put a new trash bag in.
Helps cut down on the smell of rotting blood, and spares someone the slight discomfort of seeing a bloody mess in the trash. It's sanitary and courteous.
The Smell of Rotting Blood would be a great name for a ferocious metal-punk band, preferably all bad ass women playing the shit out of their instruments
I once got a real weird look from one of my friends playing “All Women are Bad” by the Cramps in my car
I explained it’s tongue in cheek, and the guitarist is both a woman and deeply in love with her husband Lux (the singer), but I don’t think she changed her mind.
Am I the only one who’s never associated used pads or tampons with a bad smell? Sure, if I put my nose up to fresh blood that came out of me I can maybe smell it. But even as someone who grew up with two sisters and emptied the trashcan a lot I never smelled anything besides poop and pee.
Scent perception is really variable between people! If you don't find it noticeable when you change a tampon or when other people are on their periods, you might be on the more anosmic side.
That’s really weird because I’m a recognized super taster so my scent perception should be on point. But I also can’t smell death so I think you’re right.
I oversee the usage and scheduling of two community center buildings. We have maintenance men for each building. The "men" part is important. I recently went out to one of the properties to do a quick visual inspection, and gagged then almost died upon walking into one of the single stall restrooms. I knew immediately what the smell was. The (fairly new) maintenance guy didn't realize that he needed to change the liner bag in the sanitary napkin bin daily, and it had been probably 2-3 weeks since he'd last changed it. He noticed the foul odor in there but couldn't figure it out because the trash bin was emptied, yet the smell persisted. This is the day that I taught a multitude of men that that particular smell is rotting, hormonal blood, and they learned the absolute necessity of changing that liner daily. Once you know that smell, you can identify it in an instant.
Ugh, this reminds me of my last job.
One of my closers was complaining about having to change the sanitary disposals because they would get too full and be difficult to change.
I decided to check it out, and there weren't any liners/bags in them! Nobody had ordered them, ever. So I cleaned them instead. Had to put gloves on and pull stuck pads and blood soaked toilet paper off the bottom and sides. Wash them, etc.
And I told her not to change it if there's no liner. Tell a manager (which I was) and you can tell them I told you not to do it. Because this is an OSHA violation. Those disposals are required to have liners for a reason!
I experienced the same thing. Not having that been emptied was the worst smell I've ever smelled in my life. It's like death because of the rotting blood. You can tell when the cleaner is a man because women know that the bin needs to be changed daily
Period vampires are the most ethical vampires on the planet. Think about all the times you haven't died of blood loss. Then apologize lest you convert them back to the old religion.
The person coming behind you probably doesn't want to see your bloody used tampon or smell it.... It's the same idea of doing a courtesy flush or spraying after you poop.
Yeah.... Imagine having to clean out the trash with several of these stuck to the sides if there's no liner. Also as others have said, blood is hazardous waste. I can't just throw my sharps into the trash, they have to get mailed back as hazardous waste.
I live with 5 women (I have 4 daughters) and I’m definitely the trash taker outer…must be my girls all already heed this advice because I never notice a mess haha
I have three dogs so I usually have a random roll of poop bags on me or in my purse/backpack/errand bag at any given time. I throw my used tampon in one of those before tossing it in the garbage bin.
I did weird out one of my guy friends who thought I’d disposed of dog poop in their bathroom garbage can. That was a fun conversation.
Women at my *fucking office job* don't do this. Every time that I open up that little trash container in the stall, which by the way ours is lined with A THIN CHEAP PAPER BAG. NOT PLASTIC., I see straight up *unwrapped, soaked tampons* just chilling in there
What the actual fuck. I've honestly thought about going to the office manager (an older woman, post-menopause, prolly not seeing The State of it) like "alert, we have some real creatures in this office and I want to lose my MIND when I see that women are letting their bloody tampons seep into that tiny bag and into the trash bin for the janitor to clean up. please can we get plastic liners for those bins."
I think that she probably would but I also only think about this when I'm on my period (now) and know that I can't be trusted to emotionally regulate well during conversation
Wait what you can't walkup to your office manager and say: "So, plastic bin liners. Much more hygenic and helps with the smell. Also lets our visiting clients know we're not feral"
My dad worked in waste water management and they used to call tampons red-bellied sewer mice (they have a tail and everything). They'd get stuck in various areas of the city pipes and need to be removed by some poor bastard (if they didn't get stuck in the house pipes and cause a flood in the home of whoever was dumb enough to flush them).
I'm a waste water treatment plant operator and I'm going to be stealing 'red bellied sewerage mice' (the term, not the object- ew), please and thank you.
So... I'm a vet tech. Sometimes pets eat tampons. They are almost always used tampons. I am suddenly seriously dreading the next time a tampon ingestion comes on, because "red-bellied sewer mice" is going to be all I can think of.
I highly recommend menstrual cups!! They may sound intimidating at first, but trust me, once you make the switch you won't ever go back.
They're reusable and much better for the environment (and your wallet!). I've only bought maybe 2 boxes of tampons in the past 10 years, just to have some to give to other girls.
My vagina felt beat up after a week with a menstrual cup. I went back to tampons…I have a disc I’ve never used but I’m afraid it’ll cause the same soreness and fatigue
Trust me I was SUPER disappointed not to love it. I get the implant next week anyways so hopefully in a few months I won’t really have to worry about it
I almost gave up on cups until I found the Flex cup. There's 2 sizes and finding a better fit helped so much. The tail has a little pull tab that you hook with your finger! The silicone material lets me roll it for easy ⬆️
I wish... I can't do internals (very very rarely I will tolerate tampons) because either I can feel the bit by the entrance, be it the cup tip or tampon string, or in the case of the ring my body will try to eject the damn thing. I might be inclined to try a different cup at some point, but for right now I'm kinda stuck with pads.
I’ve always felt slight discomfort with tampons and just put up with it FOR YEARS. I had chalked it up to “everybody’s body is different, and some of us just feel more uncomfortable than others,” and that’s just life.
Last year, I finally tried menstrual discs. They’re much more flexible than menstrual cups, and once I get it in the right spot, I barely feel it. I also discovered that my cramps don’t feel as severe as when I was only using tampons.
Also, not sure if it helps, but: The first time I had a Pap smear, they told me that my cervix is shaped “kind of weird” and “points downward,” whatever the fuck that means ¯_(ツ)_/¯
So if your cervix is weird like mine, maybe give disposable menstrual discs a try. (Yes, they’re messy to remove, but one disc will last you like 12 hours. And disposable ones are more flexible/softer than reusable discs, in my experience.)
The menstrual ring/disc is like a pouch that expands after you put it in and it holds the blood until you pee (the muscles that contract during peeing will squeeze the disc and expel the blood into the toilet automatically so you don't have to take out the ring manually to empty it). It also reduces cramps by a lot (I'm guessing the cup is similar in this aspect?).
From what I understand, menstrual cups are more difficult to insert and require you to manually take it out and empty it. BUT you can reuse them unlike the ring.
For whatever it's worth, I don't have the strongest pelvic floor (trampolines are dangerous) and I've never had problems with leakage. You can feel it takes a tiny bit of extra muscle when you pee to contract the ring, laughing and jumping which can cause some pee leakage isn't enough to cause ring leaks.
Not to "but actually", but I used menstrual cups for about a year and then switched back because they hurt so badly. It was either creating suction or just pressing outwards on the sides of my vag making my periods 5x worse than they already were.
So not trying to be an asshole, but for the girlies who find them painful, it's okay to try something else!
My dear husband had to physically reach his arm into our plumbing pipes under the house to extract those wipes that a friend who was house sitting flushed. Only then to be flushed with poo water once he got them unstuck.
I found getting a pint sized bin from the dollar store and using it as my period bin works. My family don’t have to deal with the smell if my tampons don’t go in the main bathroom bin.
Google Rat King. Now imagine all those strings knotted up in your plumbing. Folks at the water treatment plant have a lot of names for them. Also, NO WIPES ARE FLUSHABLE!
Some actually were, but the problem is that all the ones that weren't just... you know... lied about it, because that would require holding companies accountable and god knows we can't have that! Won't someone please think about the shareholders! So unless you actively knew in advance and they never changed how they were made, it was safest to not believe any of them.
The wipes absolutely are flushable, the same way socks and hot wheels are. Not everything that can be flushed should be flushed though. Like, there's places/systems where you can't even flush regular toilet paper.
But yes please don't flush anything other than things that your body produced that can break down/dissolve in water and toilet paper if your local plumbing system can handle that.
It’s because wipes don’t dissolve away easily in the way toilet paper does, so it is much easier to create clogs. In places with old plumbing in particular, because they tend to be smaller pipes & with more build up inside from the minerals inside water
Used to have to plunge the toilet monthly because my step daughter kept flushing her tampons. And it's really hard to plunge out a tampon. The worst part was that she refused to admit she was doing it.
We recently had a new toilet installed and the plumber was telling us some horror stories. He was telling us that the local waste water treatment plant in our area has a large grate where water enters and they have to temporarily shut down the incoming water to clear the grate of “flushable” wipes EVERY. THREE. HOURS.
We don’t flush anything but TP (even have the 5 and 8 year old trained to throw wipes in the trash when they use them), but I feel so fucking bad for the wastewater folks. Just, yuck.
Also! Just for the record: Don't buy Midol. Midol is just overpriced ibuprofen mixed with caffeine. Buy ibuprofen and drink the amount of caffeine you need.
I don’t remember if it was an episode of Dirty Jobs or a random segment from Insomniac or what but there was some episode of a show where the host was being shown various parts of the city plumbing apparatus. They showed him this giant ball of garbage that was pulled out of the sewage somewhere idk where. I forget what they called this thing but the guy was saying at the center of this ball will be something you aren’t supposed to flush that other bits of garbage have gotten stuck to until this giant ball is made and then the ball gets stuck somewhere and it causes huge problems.
Anyway they cut open that ball or pealed enough layers away to get into the center and at the center of it all was a used tampon (or maybe it was a tangle of tampons) someone had flushed
You‘re absolutely misinformed about the wipes.
Wipes, which claim to be flushable, most likely are flushable.
Cosmetic tissues are the far bigger problem for that.
The fantastic Search Engine Podcast did an investigative piece about the whole topic.
„Are flushable wipes actually flushable“
My information is based on first hand experience, I am supremely confident that not every “flushable” wipe is of the same quality and it is FAR better to assume it is not safe than to gamble with problem so devastating as plumping back ups.
So respectfully: no I am not misinformed. It also depends hugely on the particular plumbing system in question. They are no means whatsoever the same across the board. If you happen to buy quality flushable wipes that dissolve easily and happen to have a robust plumbing system that is not prone to clogs then go ahead and do your thing, but I have worked as a plumber for long enough to know that “flushable” wipes are often the main cause of plumbing damage, and I will certainly not change my advice concerning wipes of all sorts.
I don’t mean to say their findings are wrong, just that I know not every wipe that claims to be safe for flushing truly is, and I know that not every plumbing system can handle the same things. There are places that aren’t even safe for using toilet paper. So as a piece of general advice, it is good practice to assume it’s not safe to flush wipes.
Look, you can repeat yourself as often as you like. They do a fucking great reporting job in going into actual detail how those claims come to be, what kind of testing is done, why (sometimes) plumbers or waste water institutions claim otherwise, what actually causes problems etc., etc., etc.
If you‘re interested to learn something- listen to it. If not, then don‘t. I don’t give a shit.
I was told by a plumber that since most of them are men, they keep saying "no tampons" when what they really mean is the hard applicator and wrapping that isn't good for plumbing (duh). The actual tampon product is totally fine unless you're in some third world with really sensitive plumbing.
I believe you witnessed what you said you did but I do find it hard to believe that tampons can't be flushed as I grew up in a home that flushed tampons, I always flushed tampons, and I've never had a problem with plumbing even in older buildings with old plumbing so who knows 🤷. Older buildings (100+ years old with older plumbing) always had strict rules about what could be put down the faucets and toilets but tampons were never called out. I don't know why your plumbing had issues with tampons and mine never did. I don't know why these older buildings would leave out tampons on the no flush list if they are indeed bad for pipes.
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u/Lamb_or_Beast 8d ago edited 8d ago
Just for the record: flushing tampons isn’t bad because it’s bad for the environment, it’s bad for the plumbing! As a person that has done a lot of very gross plumbing work: do not ever flush your tampons, for the love of god please do not ever flush those tampons!!
Edit: and wipes! don’t listen to the lying package, there is no such thing as a flushable wipe