Pseudopod 112: Periods

[Zathras]

I'm going to say it.......it's bubbling up.....yep......there was womb for improvement! (forgive me).

That is probably the best thing to come out of this story!

[Cerebrilith]

I'm going to say it.......it's bubbling up.....yep......there was womb for improvement! (forgive me).

That is probably the best thing to come out of this story!

I second that opinion.  That awful pun is the best part of this story.

[DadOfTwins]

I found the story entertaining but not extremely well thought out.  The main character was not likeable with her only character development being the ability to whine more and more.  I would of felt for her but her inability to realize going to the hospital was in order really kind of blew the story.

That being said, I learned more about periods (even if we are talking extreme periods) than I have learned with two decades of being married.  

[Zathras]

Ok, gonna try to defend another plot hole. 

Is it possible that the vampires used their powers to keep her from going to another doctor? 

ACK!!!  That brings up another issue, why send her home at all?

[Ellspacer]

I was curious about that bit too. I assumed it's because they didn't wan't to be involved in the purification process. It's one of those oddities of human nature that, much as we hate smug authority figures, we force ourselves to trust them because "they know what they're doing".
A lot of the discomfort (setting aside the views on the artistic merit) about this story seems to be around the source of the blood, which most of us would not wish on our worst vampiric enemy. Made me squirm and good horror does that to me. Yes, there are problems aplenty among literary and structural purists, but you have to admire the idea and the descriptors. No?

[Drakoniis]

So I listened to this story, then forgot about it and went to the grocery store. When I got home, I had myself a big bowl of tomato-pepper soup... and then I remembered.

[600south]

Made me squirm and good horror does that to me. Yes, there are problems aplenty among literary and structural purists, but you have to admire the idea and the descriptors. No?

yes... and no. Yes, good horror makes me squirm too and this story did. but there are plenty of things I can do to make myself squirm. like pick up a big hairy spider; search "faceplant" on Youtube; check out Rotten.com; or simply buy a cow's tongue at my local butcher. but I come here for horror fiction, which needs to work as a well-constructed story to satisfy me.

[Dwango]

I think Nancy has learned a valuable lesson in today's story, something she should use next time if Buffy ever comes by.  Remember kids, get a second opinion when you are not confident about your OBGYN, or any doctor.  I think vampires can learn an important lesson too.  Always check you victim for HIV.  Its really important if you want to remain a healthy undead person.

[Thaurismunths]

For the reasons already listed by other posters, I really couldn't get in to this one. Body horror has never really been my bag. Also, and I say this with all due respect to women, eew!

[Loz]

Yeah, so the drawbacks for me were much the same as for everyone else,

1) The vampire-thing was obvious going in,
2) My sympathy for the woman wained when, 48 hours in, and things are now even more serious, she's not heading for the ER,
3) She can lose several bodies worth of blood with no more ill-effects than not feeling particularly fresh 'down there'.

It might have redeemed itself by going for the over-the-top, grand guignol finish but instead went for the sub-Cronenberg, less body horror, more body slight-discomfort.

[FamilyGuy]

This story was more of a semicolon than a period for me.

[eytanz]

So, I don't think anyone commented on the "480 grams - that's almost 4 liters" thing.

I guess Vampires aren't very good with math, or with metric measures.

[deflective]

i think you put your finger on the root of the myth that if you scatter grain across the threshold vampires wont be able to enter until they count each individual grain.

along that vein, what's happened to the quainter parts of the vampire myth? nowadays it's all sunshine and holy water and sexy silver. i'd like to see an extended wire-work sequence end when a black leather clad vampire looks down, sighs, and hunches over to start counting. that'd be awesome.

[DKT]

Hrm. No wirework or sleek black leather, but there was a really funny episode of the X-Files where a pizza delivery boy is a vampire and shows up at Mulder's hotel room, pizza in hand, ready to suck his blood. Mulder recognizes scatters something (loose change? I can't remember...) to throw him off.   

It was a really funny episode.

[Sgarre1]

Theodore Sturgeon's SOME OF YOUR BLOOD crossed with that Australian vampire film THIRST from 1979 with the ending from that TALES FROM THE CRYPT story, "Midnight Mess" from 1953.

Not very original but not bad. Needed to be shorter by half.  Although I'm sorry to say that even subtle attempts to suggest vampires (pales hands, pointed teeth) just scream out in a story front-loaded with a lot of talk about blood.  It might actually be creepier if they were just amoral blood fetishists.

Good descriptions, though, and effective dialogue.

Thanks For Listening

“Blood was flowing – in Bluebeard’s house, in the abattoirs, in the circuses where God had set his seal to whiten the windows. Blood and Milk flowed together.”

Arthur Rimbaud, “After The Deluge”

[goatkeeper]

GROSSSS!  That made me throw up in my mouth a little.

[Coyote]

Occasionally I will listen to Pseudopod while playing a computer game (this one happened to be Oblivion). I was phazing in and out of the story, and about halfway through I just had to turn the thing off. When I listened to it later, undistracted, I had been hoping that I missed something. Looks like I didn't.

*Throws up in mouth a little*

[mudguts]

The story definitely broke new ground though and being that I am a middle-aged guy, I did stay glued to the entire story while walking my dog (which is normally when I listen).

I wouldn't say that I enjoyed the story as it didn't have enough 'action' for me and also a bit of a predictable ending.   It dragged a little bit in the middle when the main character was describing in agonizing detail what was happening.

The story to me rated a solid 6.5/10 but I guess I'm comparing it to other Pseudopod stories.   If it was a short in a Stephen King collection, It would rate higher.  And it is something that he would write in my opinion.

[umamei]

As usual, since I'm catching up on stories still, I'm a little late to this thread. 

I didn't listen to the whole story.  Once I realized that the doctor was a vampire, there was nothing more that I wanted to hear.  Gynecology is horrific enough as it is for reasons worthy of a longer rant elsewhere.  And her first clue that she should see another doctor, even before thinking "hey maybe this guy is a vampire" should have been his decision that she's got endometriosis before running tests.  This is a symptom caused by a wide variety of issues (and is regrettably common), and unless she grew up under a rock, she should at least be aware that tests are in order.  Yes, the dude's a vampire, but still... his medical incompetence should have been a clue to her that she should go.

[Unblinking]

I didn't finish this one.  And not for the reason that you might think:  "ew, menstruation!"  While I can't say I particularly cherished the body horror here, it was at least an original idea, and I was willing to give it a try.

But the first ten minutes of the story were both unrealistic and with an unbelievably annoying protagonist:

1.  She's been losing liters of blood a day for 3 weeks, and hasn't gone to the ER?  Even if she's used to having a heavy flow she should've been concerned long before this.

2.  I don't believe that anybody could lose that amount of blood for that amount of time without feeling any ill effects.  Frankly, I find it hard to believe she's still alive.  At the very least she would severely dehydrated and anemic.  She doesn't mention any symptoms of either.  Perhaps she's been guzzling water and eating lots of red meat to counteract this, but if she had been, it should've been mentioned.

3.  Yes, the gynecologist was incompetent, and yes he was creepy, but her biggest problem with him in the first scene seemed to be that he was a man.  Now, I can understand why a woman would want a female gynecologist, it makes perfect sense.  But why would you schedule an appointment with a male gyno and then complain about his maleness?  If she didn't want to go to a male doctor, she should've found a female doctor instead.

4.  Besides #3, when he mentioned iron pills she got unbelievably whiny.  "I have to take another pill, how much is that going to cost me?"  She is losing liters of blood every day, OF COURSE she needs iron!  That's not the doctor's fault, that's just a medical fact that would be obvious to most people--if you're losing large amounts of iron, you need to ingest large amounts of iron.

[Bdoomed]

^lol.

[umamei]

I agree with you, but I want to offer some minor counterpoints regardless (I'm in a "devil's advocate" mood today, I guess).

Re: #1.  I assumed "liters" was some sort of exaggeration, but I don't remember the story clearly enough to be certain how clear this was (or wasn't) made in the story.  I've had heavy flow before, and it sure FEELS like liters.

#2.  Totally agree--there'd be side-effects.  She's whiny, so I'd imagine she'd whine about it, but you can never be sure.  I rarely whine about my menstruation-related side effects, except to a very select audience who are in a position to help (or be helped by hearing about my experiences).  There are occasional exceptions, and the hormones make me temporarily crazy and occasionally incapable of restraining myself (like today).  Just sayin'... 

#3.  Female gynecologists are hard to book appointments with in an emergency, or even for regular visits, unless you're pregnant or trying to get pregnant.  She may have waited as long as she did to go to the doctor because she was dreading the hassle of finding one who would take her.  It's hard to even get an appointment for my annual exam without either lying to the doctor (not a good thing), or going to a cheapo clinic where they spend most of the appointment trying to educate me about the wonders of hormonal birth control (there's a mundane horror story behind that snide comment, but I'll save it for later).

#4.  You're absolutely right.  Anemia sucks.

I didn't finish this one.  And not for the reason that you might think:  "ew, menstruation!"  While I can't say I particularly cherished the body horror here, it was at least an original idea, and I was willing to give it a try.

But the first ten minutes of the story were both unrealistic and with an unbelievably annoying protagonist:

1.  She's been losing liters of blood a day for 3 weeks, and hasn't gone to the ER?  Even if she's used to having a heavy flow she should've been concerned long before this.

2.  I don't believe that anybody could lose that amount of blood for that amount of time without feeling any ill effects.  Frankly, I find it hard to believe she's still alive.  At the very least she would severely dehydrated and anemic.  She doesn't mention any symptoms of either.  Perhaps she's been guzzling water and eating lots of red meat to counteract this, but if she had been, it should've been mentioned.

3.  Yes, the gynecologist was incompetent, and yes he was creepy, but her biggest problem with him in the first scene seemed to be that he was a man.  Now, I can understand why a woman would want a female gynecologist, it makes perfect sense.  But why would you schedule an appointment with a male gyno and then complain about his maleness?  If she didn't want to go to a male doctor, she should've found a female doctor instead.

4.  Besides #3, when he mentioned iron pills she got unbelievably whiny.  "I have to take another pill, how much is that going to cost me?"  She is losing liters of blood every day, OF COURSE she needs iron!  That's not the doctor's fault, that's just a medical fact that would be obvious to most people--if you're losing large amounts of iron, you need to ingest large amounts of iron.

[Unblinking]

#3.  Female gynecologists are hard to book appointments with in an emergency, or even for regular visits, unless you're pregnant or trying to get pregnant.  She may have waited as long as she did to go to the doctor because she was dreading the hassle of finding one who would take her.  It's hard to even get an appointment for my annual exam without either lying to the doctor (not a good thing), or going to a cheapo clinic where they spend most of the appointment trying to educate me about the wonders of hormonal birth control (there's a mundane horror story behind that snide comment, but I'll save it for later).

Thanks for the counterpoint.  I didn't know that (not too surprising since I don't require a gynecologist), and those are good explanations.  If that's what the author had in mind, the story would've benefited by putting that in the story itself.  And maybe that explanation was there and I just simply missed it. 

[umamei]

Yeah, I know what you mean.  I couldn't finish the story either. LOL

#3.  Female gynecologists are hard to book appointments with in an emergency, or even for regular visits, unless you're pregnant or trying to get pregnant.  She may have waited as long as she did to go to the doctor because she was dreading the hassle of finding one who would take her.  It's hard to even get an appointment for my annual exam without either lying to the doctor (not a good thing), or going to a cheapo clinic where they spend most of the appointment trying to educate me about the wonders of hormonal birth control (there's a mundane horror story behind that snide comment, but I'll save it for later).

Thanks for the counterpoint.  I didn't know that (not too surprising since I don't require a gynecologist), and those are good explanations.  If that's what the author had in mind, the story would've benefited by putting that in the story itself.  And maybe that explanation was there and I just simply missed it. 

[Millenium_King]

I thought the beginning was a little slow.

The middle was strong, creepy, great imagery, real body horror.

Hated the ending.  I felt the buildup coming and, when she woke up with a bunch of tubes in her, I was rivetted: I suppose I was expecting her to be a part of some sort of really, really gross and horrific medical experiment or something.  When the doctor turned out to be some lame Anne Rice vampire, I felt really let down.  I had expected a supernatural component to her period (since it seemed like she would have bled out long before the end) and I had been thinking the pills were some part of that.  Good concept - dull ending.

EDIT: forgot to mention that the passive and - let's face it - totally naive protagonist bugged me too.