I’d started menstruating on my twelfth birthday. I remember because the cramping in my thighs and stomach was so excruciating, I’d literally begged God not to let me die. I didn’t know any other way to deal with it—topics of a sexual nature, as a cultural rule, weren’t discussed outside the home without drawing shame, and so there was no woman in town I could go to for help. All I could do was wait for Jember to get home, foolishly sticking a glass bottle neck inside myself to catch the blood so I wouldn’t ruin every piece of fabric in the cellar.
