{"id":3663,"date":"2025-06-03T07:20:57","date_gmt":"2025-06-03T07:20:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/?p=3663"},"modified":"2025-06-03T18:48:07","modified_gmt":"2025-06-03T18:48:07","slug":"what-i-carried-up-the-mountain-wasnt-just-a-backpack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/what-i-carried-up-the-mountain-wasnt-just-a-backpack\/","title":{"rendered":"The Quiet Strength Nobody Talks About"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\"\"
The trail didn\u2019t need to know I was bleeding.
But I did. And I kept walking anyway.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

On Day 2 of my period, I cancel a Zoom call, reheat the same cup of coffee for the third time, and stare at the ceiling fan like it owes me rent. Meanwhile, my maid walks in, sweeping and cooking like it\u2019s any other day. I don\u2019t even know when she gets her period\u2014she never lets on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I lie there, curled up with a hot water bag, and think:
how is she this steady while I\u2019m a puddle of hormones and heat packs?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Women in offices don\u2019t miss a beat either. Sharp kurtas, back-to-back meetings, probably managing cramps beneath the table while giving feedback on quarterly performance.
They don\u2019t call it resilience. They just call it Tuesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before every trek, I\u2019d make a silent bargain with the universe:
bhagvan, is baar bacha lo.<\/em>
For five treks, the universe played along. Then came trek number six\u2014Kuari Pass and a -20C snow trek at that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Same trail I\u2019d done a few months earlier (without snow). But this time, every step dragged like I had weights strapped to my legs. The fatigue didn\u2019t make sense. Then, the night before summit day, it all clicked: my period had arrived.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I told my trek leader.
She didn\u2019t blink. She didn\u2019t do that \u201coh no, poor you<\/em>\u201d thing either.
She just asked, \u201cWhat do you want to do?\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

And that was the first time I realized how rarely anyone asks women that in moments like these\u2014not what you should do, or what others have done, but what you want.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Could I have pushed through the summit? Absolutely.
But I didn\u2019t need to prove anything.
Not to the mountain. Not to her. Not to myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I stayed back at base camp. Watched the others leave for the summit.
Let myself cry, not because I doubted the choice, but because I\u2019d never allowed myself that kind of gentleness before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It wasn\u2019t a big, bold, movie moment.
It was quiet. I watched the sunrise from base camp while others climbed.
And I felt… fine. Whole. Still me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That moment redefined strength for me. I unpacked it fully in this blog: Kuari Pass Trek\u2014An Unexpected Journey of Self-Discovery<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two months later, another winter trek. This time, I came prepared. Pads were tucked in with my thermals. No big deal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At base camp, while laying out clothes for the next day, a woman noticed them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou brought pads?\u201d
\u201cYeah.\u201d
\u201cYou\u2019re expecting your period?\u201d
\u201cAlready on it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She blinked like I\u2019d just told her I planned to summit barefoot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My tentmate found out later. We\u2019d shared four nights and hadn\u2019t once talked about blood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When she heard, she said,
\u201cWait\u2014you\u2019ve had your period this whole trek? I couldn\u2019t even tell. <\/em>
I don\u2019t think I could ever do that.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And for a moment, I didn\u2019t know how to respond.
Because it had never occurred to me that I was doing something worth noticing.
That maybe I had been carrying something difficult with more grace than I\u2019d allowed myself to believe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Her reaction used to be mine too. Back when I thought periods and mountains couldn\u2019t coexist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now it\u2019s just part of my trek.
Annoying, yes.
Inconvenient, always. <\/em>
But manageable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We don\u2019t tell these stories.
We talk about summits.
We post sunrise photos and write poetic captions about clarity.
We don\u2019t talk about crouching in snow to change a pad.
Or waddling through ascents with bloated hips and aching backs.
We don\u2019t talk about the quiet decisions we make in our sleeping bags\u2014like choosing rest over glory.
Or the fact that sometimes the real summit is internal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve now done two winter treks on my period.
Changed pads in freezing bio-toilets with fingers so stiff I could barely grip the ziplock.
Managed cramps and cold together. Carried used napkins quietly tucked away.
Kept walking, kept laughing, didn\u2019t say a word.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I never saw it as strength\u2014
because I didn\u2019t make the summit,
because no one noticed,
because I didn\u2019t speak up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But some kinds of strength don\u2019t need an audience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s strength in loud, visible pushes forward.
But there\u2019s another kind\u2014the kind that just keeps going without narration. The kind that walks silently through snow, bleeding, aching, and still managing to laugh at chai jokes in the lunch tent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That kind isn\u2019t always applauded. Sometimes, it\u2019s not even noticed.
But when it is\u2014especially by another woman\u2014you start to see yourself differently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maybe that\u2019s the kind of strength I want to grow into:
Not the performative kind. Not the one that posts summits.
But the kind that surprises even me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And sometimes someone finally says, \u201cYou did all that?<\/em>\u201d
You nod, not out of pride, but recognition.
\u201cYes. I did.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Day 2 of my period, I cancel a Zoom call, reheat the same cup of coffee for the third time, and stare at the ceiling fan like it owes me rent. Meanwhile, my maid walks in, sweeping and cooking like it\u2019s any other day. I don\u2019t even know when she gets her period\u2014she never […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3677,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","pgc_sgb_lightbox_settings":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[104,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-3663","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-learnings","8":"tag-periods","9":"tag-trek","10":"entry"},"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/bleeding-600x400.png","featured_image_src_square":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/bleeding-600x600.png","author_info":{"display_name":"vasudha","author_link":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/author\/vasudha\/"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3663"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3663"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3663\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3679,"href":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3663\/revisions\/3679"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3677"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3663"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3663"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ideaweb.me\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3663"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}