If you have periods, you’ll have an embarrassing period story. It’s part of growing up; we’ve all had the humiliation of having a blood explosion in an inconvenient place or the middle of a football match (just me?) and come out the other side. We spend years trying to avoid, lessen or ‘improve’ our periods, only to feel punished when they go missing. There’s nothing more terrifying than losing your cycle before your menstrual system is ready to retire.

That’s why period positivity is so important. Sometimes, periods can be crap; you feel like your uterus is trying to claw itself free or cockblock you ahead of a fancy date. But knowing they’re a vital reflection of our health also means we can laugh when things get messy.

Everyone’s got an embarrassing period story – here are 17 women on the worst bloody thing that’s happened to them