Protracted Menstruation

By Atom Bergstrom

Atom’s Blog

Michel Ferin, Raphael Jewelewicz, & Michelle Warren (The Menstrual Cycle: Physiology, Reproductive Disorders, and Infertility, 1993) wrote …

“The human female, contrary to females of other species, has a life span that extends considerably beyond reproductive age. In the industrialized world, the median age at menopause lies within a narrow age. For instance, in the Netherlands, the median age at menopause is 51.7 years while that in the United States is 49.8. In developing countries, however, the median age at menopause is less than 44 years. Menopause at an earlier age has been reportedly related to lower socioeconomic class, smoking, and late onset of menarche, while menopause at a later age may occur in women who experienced early onset of puberty or were at an older age at the time of the last pregnancy.”

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George M. Gould, M.D., & Walter L. Pyle, M.D. (Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine, 1898) wrote …

“Instances of protracted menstruation are, as a rule, reliable, the individuals themselves being cognizant of the nature of true menstruation, and themselves furnishing the requisite information as to the nature and periodicity of the discharge in question. Such cases range even past the century-mark. Many elaborate statistics on this subject have been gathered by men of ability.”

According to the same source …

“Dewees mentions an example of menstruation at sixty-five, and others at fifty-four and fifty-five years. Motte speaks of a case at sixty-one; Ryan and others, at fifty-five, sixty, and sixty-five; Parry, from sixty-six to seventy-seven; Desormeux, from sixty to seventy-five; Semple, at seventy and eighty-seven; Higgins, at seventy-six; Whitehead, at seventy-seven; Bernstein, at seventy-eight; Beyrat, at eighty-seven; Haller, at one hundred; and highest of all is Blancardi’s case, in which menstruation was present at one hundred and six years. In the London Medical and Surgical Journal, 1831, are reported cases at eighty and ninety-five years. In Good’s System of Nosology there are instances occurring at seventy-one, eighty, and ninety years. There was a woman in Italy whose menstrual function continued from twenty-four to ninety years. Emmet cites an instance of menstruation at seventy, and Brierre de Boismont one of a woman who menstruated regularly from her twenty-fourth year to the time of her death at ninety-two.

“Strasberger of Beeskow describes a woman who ceased menstruating at forty-two, who remained in good health up to eighty, suffering slight attacks of rheumatism only, and at this late age was seized with abdominal pains, followed by menstruation, which continued for three years; the woman died the next year. This late menstruation had all the sensible characters of the early one. Kennard mentions a negress, aged ninety-one, who menstruated at fourteen, ceased at forty-nine, and at eighty-two commenced again, and was regular for four years, but had had no return since. On the return of her menstruation, believing that her procreative powers were returning, she married a vigorous negro of thirty-five and experienced little difficulty in satisfying his desires. Du Peyrou de Cheyssiole and Bonhoure speak of an aged peasant woman, past ninety-one years of age, who menstruated regularly.

“Petersen describes a woman of seventy-nine, who on March 26th was seized with uterine pains lasting a few days and terminating with hemorrhagic discharge. On April 23d she was seized again, and a discharge commenced on the 25th, continuing four days. Up to the time of the report, one year after, this menstruation had been regular. There is an instance on record of a female who menstruated every three months during the period from her fiftieth to her seventy-fourth year, the discharge, however, being very slight. Thomas cites an instance of a woman of sixty-nine who had had no menstruation since her forty-ninth year, but who commenced again the year he saw her. Her mother and sister were similarly affected at the age of sixty, in the first case attributable to grief over the death of a son, in the second ascribed to fright. It seemed to be a peculiar family idiosyncrasy. Velasquez of Tarentum says that the Abbess of Monvicaro at the very advanced age of one hundred had a recurrence of catamenia [menstruation] after a severe illness, and subsequently a new set of teeth and a new growth of hair.”

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According to Adano Ley (Swami Nitty-Gritty) …

“You can grow a third set of teeth.”
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