Women on Zalanthas

[Morgenes]

Let's bring this topic back around to the original topic, or it will be locked.

[Tyriel]

Women exposed to heavy labor, tough athletic conditions, or who are starved or overly skinny may have erratic cycles or nothing at all until the conditions where pregnancy could be tolerated emerge. As I see it so far on Zalanthas that means not running around doing half the stuff most normal have to do to survive, and still having the wealth for a healthy diet.

Does this help? Does an actual woman know if my understanding of physical strain vs the cycle would be accurate for Zalanthas?

[path]

I was having the same thought recently. I think if there was some way to distinguish the phases of the moon, that would help. It might also be effective in alerting a woman if she's -missed- her period, so she'd know when to start rejoicing/freaking out the mul mix didn't work.

But that's all the thought I gave to it. Moon cycles.

[Packersfan]

I say we let Hymwen be the supreme authority on this matter.

Women exposed to heavy labor, tough athletic conditions, or who are starved or overly skinny may have erratic cycles or nothing at all until the conditions where pregnancy could be tolerated emerge. As I see it so far on Zalanthas that means not running around doing half the stuff most normal have to do to survive, and still having the wealth for a healthy diet.

Does this help? Does an actual woman know if my understanding of physical strain vs the cycle would be accurate for Zalanthas?

Read this one again. Only nobles and those getting fed regularly would have a stable cycle realistically. In medieval Europe, as well as in Zalanthas, women's cycles would be irregular. "Having those" would be an exception to the rule rather than a common accurrance - this rarity was why it got labeled as a curse from devil in medieval times as well as numerous old cultures of Earth.

So no, propably not reagular with all the physical strain. Not to even mention the mental - this I believe is individual, but stress affects me at least...

[Seeker]

There is another way to approach it.  Seeker's theory:

Female menstruation on Zalanthas -may- be connected to the moons, but the link is mathematically too complex to calculate.  The physics of the gravitational effects of the two interacting bodies are absolutely foreign concepts to the inhabitants.

Instead of understanding the interplay of the moons and its connection to the female cycle, the populace has learned instead to find the easier connection between the female cycle and the most visible, regular effect of those forces:  the silt sea tides.

Without having to know the reasons why the silt sea tides are regular and predictable, the sailors and residents have been able to chart and predict their regularities as far back as anyone can remember. And it relates precisely to the average female cycle.

(The actual tidal cycle in Zalanthan days is not important.  Could be anything.  Lets call it 28.4 Zalanthan days and pretend the moons rotations fits all this somehow.  Or perhaps the tide cycle is freaky-deaky, but mostly predictable, and that allows any player running a female to imagine her cycle whenever she wishes for whatever reason at any time.)

This explains why so many Zalanthan references to menstruation are tied to Red Storm and the seas (thank you, flurry).

"Give her some room.... silt's rising"
"My friend from Red Storm is visiting"
"Don't need mul mix.  My man is a skimmer pilot.  He knows the tides."
"Sure we're wanting a baby.  I just always seem to be at low ebb."

Or not.


Seeker

[Tyriel]

That is cute, the little sayings. I also think 'the rag' would be an obvious slang or coarse term to use, given the level of swearing I've seen IC amongst the lower class characters.

Again, this is how I see it:

If you want to play your cycle, hell, you would know it best. No one else is going to be keeping track or counting the days for you.

On the other hand, if you don't want to play it you can either assume it to a 'fade' area, just like nasty mudsex, or even just not have one because your ms. 'Run-From-Carru'.


Or, you can play a male character!!!

[flurry]

To my understanding (and I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong), it's not clear whether real life cycles have anything to do with the lunar cycle.  For instance, in chimpanzees, the cycle is about 37 days.    We already know human biology on Zalanthas is somewhat different than on earth, too.  So I'd just assume that it's reasonably similar to RL (in terms of cycles per year), with some variation among the races.

I still like that "quirri has a nosebleed" one.

[spawnloser]

Wow...female PCs would be getting their period 12 times in a year then, which means about 12 times in 6 weeks, or about twice a week, or once every 3-4 days.  That's PMS WAY too often for my liking.

[flurry]

Yeah, but that's RL days.   It's more like 50 days ICly.

[spawnloser]

But that's still pretty often to have to roleplay PMS.

But that's still pretty often to have to roleplay PMS.

I agree. I wouldn't like to play PMS twice a week when I'm not gutting squirrels and random bystanders... >_>;

And really now - pms and having "those" isn't neccesarily such a big thing as modern whiny women may make it seem. Women of Zalanthas might just try to ignore it and are able for sure - they are tuffer than the coddled girls of today, I think they can deal with a little pain on their gut without raving about it.

[Angela Christine]

The lunar cycle and the tides and whatnot have nothing to do with it, the timing is coincidental.  If the mystic resonances, gravitational forces or whatever other lunar influences you can imagine were really affecting human reproductive cycles, then all women would have the same cycle at the same time (or at least all the women in a geographic area).  Every non-pregnant woman would ovulate on the same day.  Every non-pregnant woman would get PMS on the same day.  :shock:   What a joy that would be.


Angela Christine

[Bestatte]

Though, there seems to be -some- correlelation in real life. There've been articles about how women in workplaces often end up starting their periods within a few days of each other, if they've been working together for awhile and aren't hormonally controlled by the Pill. Could you imagine all the Lirathans menstruating at the same time? <shudder>

It's theorized to be effected by (in real life)
a) Light at night-time - that's why lunar cycles are mentioned here.
b) Hormones. Our noses know what we don't. And this has been scientifically proved in girl schoold and in other communities where women are closely together... So yes, all female templars of a certian order have PMS at the same time.  :twisted: