What do you call sanitary towels?

We had a small shop selling everything . One customer used to come in and ask for piano dusters . She did not have a piano .

It's Sanitory Towels for me, but when I first saw them, I though they were hammocks for fairies!!

Mollygo Wonder what your DGD thinks of disposable nappies in relation to the environment. Tampons sutely aren't as bad as pads.I admit I do not know the material origins or production methods in any of the items.

At the age of 13 in the early 1950s, every girl in the class but One had started to menstruate

The annual swimming gala took place in an insanitory Victorian swimming pool which was demolished in the following year
35 girls sat grinning on the edge f the pool when our( POST-menopausal) unmarried class teacher was seen to be going through some sort of crisis at the end of the pool and then approached us
She steeled herself to say " Surely not everybody here is indisposed" " Oh yes we are, Miss G. it is most certainly not wise to swim"
The one remaining girl was required to swim as the games mistress had kept some sort of list of our starting our periods and Alex had no excuse
Three years later as we were all climbing the school stairs to a subject room a joyous cry rang out to the rest of the class. "I've started, I've started"

I call them pads and tampons.
Now you can get a lot of different "cups" that are fitted inside and emptied and washed. And yes it is a lot more environmentally friendly although not everyone can use them as some have periods too heavy, some have allergies etc. There is also special period pants for people with a light flow that are simply rinsed out and added to your normal wash.
I would take this opportunity to bring it up again with your DGD next time to discuss the different option and get her view on what products she prefers. TBH I would like to know if they are taught all the alternative options available now in school. I know there was a drive for free pads and tampons in school but it would be great to see alternatives being available as well.

At school in the 1950s we called them STs. It was a source of great mirth to us that the film star Spencer Tracy had the same initials. What sophisticated little humorists we were.

STs for me too. Periods at my boarding school were known as "Uncle George" (or just George) and we had to record them in the George Book.

When I started menstruating at age of thirteen (1936) my mother gave me squares of towelling and said it would happen every month and it was my body having a clear out. It wasn’t until I joined the WAAF that I had pads because they were issued as part of kit.
Unfortunately I now have to wear pads for a different reason.

Period pads

Decades back when used as such I called them Sanitary Towels like most people then. Still think of them as such.

Panty Liners

The first time I saw a sanitary towel it was the type with loops. My friend and I were in her big sister's bedroom. We didn't know what it was so my friend looped the loops over her ears and we decided it was for treating toothache.

Blondiescot the little shop that sold knitting wool etc in our village sold pads. Later on my Mum sent me to the chemist for some for her. It was self service and I saw them in the corner at the back of the shop. I picked up a pack of Dr Whites and took them to the counter. Where the assistant tutted at me, marched over to the corner, pulled a brown paper bag off the string attached to the shelf and safely covered the offending item so that the sole other customer couldn’t see what I was buying. The other customer was a woman by the way.

Pads.

sharon103

I'll probably get this taken off but years back and was at secondary school we used to call them jam rags.

Same!

Panty pads, same goes for Tena now.

Reusable cups are all the rage in my family.

I would have referred the young lady to the meaning of “sanitary” and used it as a good opportunity to enlighten her and possibly develop a conversation about the roots of words. (See my post upthread at 08.28)

Our generation did call them sanitary towels, although I remember an elderly aunt referring to sanitary napkins.

I would have told the uppish granddaughter that calling them sanitary towels was done because the makers of them regarded them as more sanitary than the home-knitted cotton towels that had to be washed, not because they or we found periods insanitary, just quite literally a bloody nusiance.

Yes, washable sanitary towels are better for the environment, even although they have to be both steeped, rinsed and washed at a hot temperature IF you make them yourself with no plastic, but the modern knitting patterns I have seen, tell girls to include a strip of plastic! Which is not good for the environment nor for the wearer!

A lot of European languages call them monthly cloths - which might offend the generation actually using them less than sanitary towels.

I don’t think I called them anything! We had a very prim but benevolent lady running the drapers shop in the village. Miss Fergie sold the towels and wrapped them beautifully in brown paper. It was the sort of shop that a man wouldn’t have gone near- wools and ladies underwear. My best friend even at 18 couldn’t bring herself to buy towels and I had to go in the shop for her. Weare both 78 this year so I hope she improved when I moved away. My mother called periods poorlies which I hated and my aunt said when I started that my country cousins were visiting. I also had the taboo on hair washing.

eddiecat78

When did the belt stop being necessary? I remember being issued with a list of requirements when I went into hospital to give birth 40 years ago which included 2 belts and several mega packs of towels. I dutifully obeyed but I was only there for 2 nights!

I started using them around 74 and remembered mum saying I should think myself lucky I didn't have to use one.
They were still around, but more modern brands had self adhesive straps that stuck (or didn't) into your pants.

When I was in high school we called them rags and if you has your period you were on the rag. Then they became pads.

Pads STs or tampons. By the time I started, aged 14 in 1979, the stick on pads had become widely available but they were still anything but discreet as they were so thick and bulky. From the age of fifteen, I used Lillets and they were so much better. Thanks to a successful endometrial ablation in 2014 l have not needed such things since, thank goodness.

My husband is a few years older than me. When he was a child in the sixties, Dr. Kildare was a very popular programme and he was playing at being the good doctor with his friends in the garden next door. His mother had the shock of her life at seeing her ST being used as a surgical mask.

One Christmas my brother bought my Mum a packet of Dr White's. He was so proud of himself - he knew she wanted new bathroom towels. He was 7.

'Ladies things' 🤣🤣