Stories Of Women Coping With Menstruation In The Holocaust Period

Concentration camp conditions (Photo: The Wiener Holocaust Library Collection)

JAKARTA - Menstruation is a life cycle for women, but sometimes for some groups, discussing this matter is taboo. This also happened during the Holocaust era in Europe in the mid-20th century.

At that time, menstruation was not really discussed because it was considered a shame. This is what made women who were at the Holocaustcast camp often late due to stress and stress.

However, on the other hand, menstrual problems can help them from abuse because menstruation is a disgusting thing at that time.

At that time, menstruation also became a relationship of friendship between women because they would help each other to handle this monthly cycle.

Launching historiatoday.com, Erna Rubinstein (17), a Polish Jew, told in her memoir, The Survivor in Us All: Four Young Sisters in the Holocaust (1986), when she entered the camp (Auschwitz, Germany), the prisoners ( women) were given shapeless clothes and had their heads shaved. They lose weight, including from the hips and breasts, two areas commonly associated with femininity.

"What is a woman without glory on her head, without hair? And, a woman who doesn't menstruate?" he said.

Meanwhile, Trude Levi (20), a Hungarian Jew who works as a nursing teacher, also recalled, "We don't have water to wash ourselves, we don't have underwear. We can't go anywhere. Everything sticks to us, and to me, it may be the most inhuman of all. At that time, many women had menstrual periods that were inhumane.

Another story comes from Julia Lentini (17), a Romani who spent time in the kitchen at a concentration camp in Auschwitz, telling about how she survived menstruation.

"You tear the slip of underwear that was given to you, then make a small washcloth, and you keep the cloth as if it were gold. You will wash it, put it under the mattress and dry it. You have to take care of it, otherwise it will be stolen," he said. .

In addition, there are often experiments that are injected into a woman's uterus, but if the woman is menstruating the doctor will cancel the experiment.

One day, a woman named Elizabeth Feldman, got a schedule to be an experimental material. He, who did not want to be an experimental material, then borrowed his sister's clothes that were menstrual marks and said that she was menstruating. This experimental experiment was canceled.

Another story comes from, Tania Kauppila, when she was 13 years old, she had her first menstrual period. She didn't know what happened and had tears in her eyes. He was afraid of death and didn't know what to do. Then, several other women at the camp taught about menstruation. The young girls are taught how to manage it and what they need to do to manage menstrual blood flow before they develop amenorrhoea, a condition in which women do not have periods or menstruation.