Are you one of those who are embarrassed to speak about menstruation?

Meet Aditi Gupta, founder of menstrupedia.com, who started out this website two years back with the purpose of educating people about menstruation, but more importantly, she wanted to remove the taboo and myths revolving around MENSTRUATION.

In this phone interview with Abhimanyu Acharya, Aditi talks about her journey of Menstrupedia, her thoughts on intimate health, and how the idea of comic book for menstruation struck her.

Excerpts from the Conversation :

A.A.  Hello Aditi. First of all, congratulations for being in FORBES list of 30 under 30. How do you feel?

A.G. Thank you. I am very honored for being in Forbes list. I never expected this. I feel very humbling.  And happy.

A.A. Tell me about the journey of menstrupedia. How it all started? What was your motivation for this?

A.G. At NID, when I and Tuhin (co-founder of menstrupedia, and Aditi’s Husband) got into a relationship, he came to know more about the pain and inconvenience that I faced every month. He would search on the internet for more information about menstruation to help me. But on Internet, we found very basic information. I had been having my periods for almost 15 years, and still I did not have the basic knowledge about menstruation, because the topic itself is so stigmatized. Teacher used to skip the chapter about menstruation in school. At home too, talking about menstruation was forbidden. There was no source for educating and making people aware about this. So, I took up one year project regarding this subject at NID. And later, we started menstrupedia.

A.A. What do you think about the issues of reproductive and sexual health in India?

A.G. People are not aware about it. Even now, the chapter regarding sexual health is skipped in some of the educational institutes. Why is that?  It is because of our attitude of stigmatizing certain words, that we face such issues. Irony is that people think that it is social work to educate people about sexual health and not something that really needs to be done.

A.A. What, according to you, could be the right approach to overcome these issues?

A.G. The right approach is to speak up about these issues. Unless and until we talk about it, it’s not going to help. We need to educate the younger generation in proper manner about this. But things have started changing slowly. Some NGOs are working in this direction. Our generation, the Youth, is alright with speaking about sexual health. The entire scenario may take some time to change, but it will change for sure.

A.A. How the idea of menstrupedia comic book did come to you?

A.G. The idea had been with us since the time we were at NID. We developed it. Something in such graphical form appeals more to  people, I have realized over time. The response to the comic book was very good. For comic, we researched a lot. We met lot of doctors for their perspectives. And after it was ready, I took it to many girls. The best part was that they were very comfortable reading about menstruation in comics. They were not ashamed. We are now planning to make the comic available in other languages too.

A.A. What’s your message to young girls and women?

A.G. I would tell them to remain comfortable in their own bodies. People will always talk about your looks, about being dark and fair, short and tall. Remaining indifferent to all these things and loving your body in spite of everything is what we all should learn.

A.A. Lastly, our readers would like to know your thoughts about OoWomaniya.

A.G. I think you guys are doing wonderful work. OoWomaniya is like a sister organization to menstrupedia. You guys have actually made my work easier of spreading awareness. Unlike menstrupedia, you people cover all the health issues regarding females. That is very inspiring to me. I would like to say a big THANK YOU to OoWomaniya.

Menstrupedia has raised funds through crowd funding to create a comic book on menstruation. This comic is ready for pre-orders and will be out on shelves by September! Wishing Aditi & Tuhin a great success in their mission of spreading awareness and yes, OoWomaniya will always be with you in this mission.

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