Jessica Biel admits to being ‘shocked’ at how little she knew about her own body until she tried to start a family with husband Justin Timberlake.
The 42-year-old actress, whose new book aims to destigmatize and normalize the conversation around menstruation, made the revelation while discussing which of her own life experiences led her down the path of becoming an author.
‘I was probably about 30 when I got married and we were thinking about trying to start a family, and that’s when all these questions came up. “It wasn’t as easy as I thought it was going to be,” the mother of two said. People.
The Candy star shares sons Silas, nine, and Finneas, three, with Timberlake.
Because talking about menstruation has often been a taboo topic, the Limetown star said she sometimes still feels uncomfortable talking about them.
Jessica Biel, 42, tackles a difficult topic in her first children’s book, A Kids Book About Periods.
That’s why she thinks it’s important for children to read her book, A Children’s Book about Menstruation.
“I mean, even now I’m still working on feeling confident and saying, I don’t know, to a colleague or someone like, ‘Excuse me, I really need to go to the bathroom.’ I need to change my tampon. I need to go right now.’ I still have trouble saying that openly, and that’s really not okay with me.’
The actress said that having the knowledge she has now can help others.
“When I was in that phase of my life where I was really trying to start my family, I was surprised at how little I knew,” he explained.
‘I mean, I knew the basics. She had been dealing with the basics forever. But as I got older, things changed and my cycle was different and I didn’t get pregnant. What’s going on? And I also had a lot of trouble getting pregnant the second time.”
‘I didn’t know who to turn to. And I kept finding people I knew, loved, admired and respected, who also had questions. In my mind I kept thinking, “How do we all have all these questions?”
“I thought it was just me, I thought I was an idiot,” she said, “and then it became clear that a lot of us don’t know enough about our bodies.”
Part of this is due to a lack of research on women and a lack of knowledge about women’s bodies as a whole.
A 2021 study looking at federal funding found that twice as much money was spent studying diseases that primarily affect men, compared to diseases that primarily affect women, according to the National Institutes of Health.
The actress revealed that she and her husband Justin Timberlake, 43, had difficulty getting pregnant and that difficulty led her to study the topic of menstruation (pictured in Los Angeles in May 2022).
Timberlake was spotted kissing her baby bump in 2015 while she was pregnant with her first child.
The couple are parents to sons Silas, nine, and Finneas, three.
Biel’s research led her to the nonprofit group Period.org, with whom she formed a partnership to write the book. The organization works to end period poverty and stigma through advocacy, education and service. She also worked with media company A Kids Co.
“I wanted to cover all the really technical things that happen because I really think our kids are capable and we don’t give them enough credit on what they can understand,” she told the outlet.
‘Telling the truth about my own experience, hoping to inspire other people to feel safe telling their truthful stories and then telling the facts like, “This is what it is.” Can we change our minds about this? Can we realize that the process of having a menstrual cycle is powerful and absolutely incredible?’
Biel partnered with the nonprofit group Period.org and the media company A Kids Co. to write the book.
“I wanted to cover all the really technical things that happen because I really think our kids are capable and we don’t give them enough credit on what they can understand,” the actress said.
Biel has been making the media rounds promoting the book and is receiving some pushback on social media over the title.
‘Book for girls, not for boys. ‘Only girls have periods!!!’ she exclaimed into the fan.
“I’m confused from the beginning as to why the word ‘girl’ is obviously avoided,” said another.
According Family planning, intersex people People who are born with an extra chromosome, or develop biological sex characteristics that are not typically male or female, also have periods.
The United Nations estimates that 1.7 percent of the world’s population is born intersex.