The Period Plot
Feb. 22nd, 2008 04:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alexandraerinThis post is inspired by a recent comment on ToMU from a reader who took issue with my portrayal of the onset of Mackenzie's most recent menstrual period.
Amusingly, he or she (the way the poster seems to be speaking on behalf of women might imply female, but it's just as easy for a male to presume to speak for all women) posited the theory that I'm "secretly" not a "real woman", apparently unaware that I outed myself as transgendered seventy chapters ago, and was never really in the closet about it. I've always answered honestly when the subject came up; I simply didn't volunteer the information in a story-related venue before chapter 91 because I didn't want to give Steff's secret away with my own.
Anyway, the poster's guessing that I did the period storyline and blew it so out of proportion to try to compensate for not being a "real woman." Honestly, if anything I would have done the opposite... I could have glossed over the whole issue and few people would have noticed, because it's the sort of thing that's normally glossed over.
So why didn't I gloss?
Well, first, few people would have noticed, but some people would have... with the day-to-day focus in ToMU, it would have been odd if it never came up at all, and almost since the story began, some people have been counting the days and trying to guess when her period would start.
When I started noticing that theme cropping up in comments, I decided to make Mackenzie's first period of the school year EPIC so I could sort of get it out of the way early on. As the time approaches, Mackenzie is in denial for many reasons, but one of the big ones is that her monthly visitor is usually pretty well-behaved; her distaste for the experience is simply another permutation of the body shame her grandmother instilled in her.
However, with so much stress and assorted newness for her to adjust to (sex, human food, physical assaults, sex, disruption of her demonic feeding cycle, heavy use of magic, EATING A FINGER, sex), it's not really any wonder that her body's out of balance with itself.
So, she has the period from hell. The readers who were anxiously awaiting it get a show... but it was established from the beginning of the arc that this is not Mackenzie's usual experience. I dealt with it once. You get the mood swings, the pain, the bloated feelings, the "surprise!" visit... the whole shebang, in other words. Things can calm down after this, and except where somehow plot-important, deal with future periods in a much more matter-of-fact fashion.
In fact, not that I mean the whole thing to be some sort of PSA, but as Mackenzie is exposed to more enlightened attitudes and is now learning of the benefits of other than the Granny-Approved brand of hygiene products she's used to, she might even learn to take her cycle in stride a little.
Amusingly, he or she (the way the poster seems to be speaking on behalf of women might imply female, but it's just as easy for a male to presume to speak for all women) posited the theory that I'm "secretly" not a "real woman", apparently unaware that I outed myself as transgendered seventy chapters ago, and was never really in the closet about it. I've always answered honestly when the subject came up; I simply didn't volunteer the information in a story-related venue before chapter 91 because I didn't want to give Steff's secret away with my own.
Anyway, the poster's guessing that I did the period storyline and blew it so out of proportion to try to compensate for not being a "real woman." Honestly, if anything I would have done the opposite... I could have glossed over the whole issue and few people would have noticed, because it's the sort of thing that's normally glossed over.
So why didn't I gloss?
Well, first, few people would have noticed, but some people would have... with the day-to-day focus in ToMU, it would have been odd if it never came up at all, and almost since the story began, some people have been counting the days and trying to guess when her period would start.
When I started noticing that theme cropping up in comments, I decided to make Mackenzie's first period of the school year EPIC so I could sort of get it out of the way early on. As the time approaches, Mackenzie is in denial for many reasons, but one of the big ones is that her monthly visitor is usually pretty well-behaved; her distaste for the experience is simply another permutation of the body shame her grandmother instilled in her.
However, with so much stress and assorted newness for her to adjust to (sex, human food, physical assaults, sex, disruption of her demonic feeding cycle, heavy use of magic, EATING A FINGER, sex), it's not really any wonder that her body's out of balance with itself.
So, she has the period from hell. The readers who were anxiously awaiting it get a show... but it was established from the beginning of the arc that this is not Mackenzie's usual experience. I dealt with it once. You get the mood swings, the pain, the bloated feelings, the "surprise!" visit... the whole shebang, in other words. Things can calm down after this, and except where somehow plot-important, deal with future periods in a much more matter-of-fact fashion.
In fact, not that I mean the whole thing to be some sort of PSA, but as Mackenzie is exposed to more enlightened attitudes and is now learning of the benefits of other than the Granny-Approved brand of hygiene products she's used to, she might even learn to take her cycle in stride a little.