When I was around 8, before I ever had "The Talk", my Aunt was expecting. We were at a picnic and she had a mis-carriage, but it looked like her period to me. Everyone wa stalking about her having a mis-carriage and losing her baby. When I had my first one, I screamed for my mother and told her I had a mis-carriage. She laughed so hard she fell down, and finally explained it to me. I was 13 before I finally learned the truth.

(Not mine)
My friends' mother use to call having her period "When the river runs red". My friend lived next to a small stream, and use to watch it everyday to see when she'd have hers.

Anon.

When my younger sister first got her period, she thought that once she got it, she would always have it, and the bleeding wouldn't stop until she got pregnant

Candice

when i was little i thought a period would consist of a very small droplet of blood.. looking like a punctuation mark. i wanted to be more 'grown up' so i would take a red marker and make a dot on my panties .. assuming that my mother would see it and realize i had started getting my period. she never said a word, and i'm sure she probably never even noticed it was there.
if only i'd been right

Anon

When I was in grade 5 a friend of mine had overheard the boys discussing what colour girls period blood was. They concluded that it was black since boys sprem was white and of course boys and girls are opposites!

Courtney

When i was younger- thanks to the tampax and tampon commercials on the media, being television, i was always under the impression that women discharged a blue liquid during their periods.

Ajax

When I was 7, I thought maxis were used for any type of bleeding. We lived on the east coast, so when Hurricane Hugo came around I made "Emergency Hurricane Kits" for myself and my two younger cousins. The next time they came over, I proudly presented them with their kits in front of my entire family. Everyone thought it was really cute and sweet, and oohed and ahhed over the mini flashlights and children's Tylenol I'd put into the kits... Until the boys pulled out the 5 maxis I'd stuck in each.

Girls Are Always Prepared For An Emergency

At age 9
Mom said: Do you know what a period is?
Me said: *looking very proud* A dot at the end of a sentance!

Usagi Ohkami

once when i was about 9 or 10 i found my moms pads i went to her and asked why are there napkins in her drawer and she said they were for a special occassion. so on my dads birthday my mom made this huge dinner and she told me to set the table. and of course, i went and got the pads and used them for napkins! they all laughed and finally told me what they really were...lol

Anon

when i was about 4 or 5 my mum had a new boyfriend over. i was playing around in he washroom for some unknown reason and found her maxi pads. i walked out with it stuck to my chin like a beard "what is this mum?" i asked. needless to say her new boyfriend didn't last :)

Owen Ramone

I used to believe (until my teens) that older women couldn't control their bladders. Thus, pads and such absorded all the pee they leaked. I never understood why it was such a good thing to start your period.

Matt

When I first got my period, I thought it happened because I drank too much black coffee the day before and it leaked out of my body *to me the color looked black*!

Anon

When I was in 3rd grade my friend (also in 3rd grade) Valerie told me that you could'nt were the "Stick" kind of tampons things until you had a baby, so there would be a hole for the thing. Then I went to my cousins house she's was 16 and I was looking for hand soap and I found a box of "The Stick" kind with my cousins name written on it I thought she was STUPID and had sex before she was married and then hid the baby in her room so then I went and turned her whole room upside down then she walked in and said "What the heck are you doing?" "Looking for your baby" I responded. She was SOOO confused.

Kandi

When I saw the commercial for pads&tampons, I used to think that when you got older(30+) that you went to the bathroom in your underwear because you couldn't make it to a toilet. Especially since they say "No leaks"

Sailorlove90

my friend's sister believed that menstrual blood was blue - because that is how it is portrayed on commercials for pads. when she had her first period, she screamed and freaked out because it was BLOOD!

AK

After the horrifying conversation and book-readings that explained getting your period, I became paranoid until I started at age 12. When I started, I was staying with my father for the weekend, and had to call my mom on the phone to tell her. She then instructed my father to go buy me some pads. Dad, not knowing any better, bought pantyliners (those lil' flimsy things), which did okay on the first occasion, as I didn't bleed much. Problem was, pads and tampons had been explained to me, but nobody had explained that you could STOP using them after you were done for the months. So I wore the stupid pantyliners for a month solid! I then informed my mother that I needed more. At which point, she told me that I didn't need to wear them for eternity, just when I needed them. (Big Relief!) However, having only seen the panyliners (mom used tampons, no pads), I was HORRIFIED when she bought me the real deal pads and they were, naturally, much larger.

Amy

when i was really young, i used to believe that rhubarb came from women's periods.

(i was really young and remember hearing only whispered comments about women's periods and bleeding; therefore, when my great grandma would disappear outside and come back in w/a long, blood red thing and told us to eat it, i was horrified, thinking she had pulled it out of her vagina.)

i never did try rhubarb.

leesuh

One time I was at a Target with my friend. When we got back I saw my little brother with a tampn stuck up his nose! my mom stuck it up there because he got a bloody nose, and now he thinks that tampons are for bloody noses!

Shocked Sister

When I was little, all I wanted to do was be like my mom. One day we were at CVS and my 20 year-old cousin was working at the counter. My mom told her " I got my end of the sentence today." I thought this was the greatest thing ever! We were learning about what comes at the end of a sentence in school. A period! So about a week later I went in to CVS and while my mom was picking up medicine, I went over to a person working at the counter(not my cousin)and proudly told him that I got my period today. Remember, I was about 6.

Kristin

When I was younger in primary school, we walked into the classroom and saw a tampon, only it had been pulled out. A friend screamed "IT'S A MOUSE! GET IT OUT!!" Our teacher stormed into the classroom and demanded to know what the fuss was about. We were all on our chairs by then exept a few boys who were stroking this `mouse`. Until year 6 I believed that tampons were mice.

confuzzled

One day, I happened to see my mom in the bathroom, pulling out a tampon. At that age, I was not even aware that I had a vagina and I thought she was pulling it out of her anus, so I screamed "Mom, what did you just pull out of your butthole?!"

Anon