Circles

Menstrual health is still treated as a private problem, something to be managed quietly, alone, and without burdening others. This reflects a broader system of shifting the responsibility for sturcutal inequity onto individuals, making it hard to see just how much we benefit from relational support. The systems menstruating people live in were not built with them in mind. Androcentric structures revolve around a 24-hour productivity cycle. It is for this reason that FLINTA* often experience invisible labour in managing their body every month, while being expected to perform as if nothing is happening.

Circles proposes a counter-individualised view on health, monthly cycles and menstruation. Tracking together means caring together and it keeps us from framing support as a favour so we can finally start treating it as a normal part of healthy relationships. We, as humans, are inherently relational beings, deeply embedded in friendships, partnerships, families and communities, and so are our experiences and our pain. Our wellbeing is affected by the actions of those close to us and our struggles are something shared, something normal. Although our pain may be personal, it shouldn’t have to be carried alone. When we share our experiences, we make them visible, and that is where support becomes possible. We should not be expected to carry all of it alone in a system that does not acknowledge our lived reality.

Circles follows a privacy-first approach. Menstrual health data is intimate and delicate and must thus be treated with respect and care.