#1 Menstruating woman runs marathon without tampon to break taboos around periods.
Kiran Gandhi, who has played drums for singer M.I.A. and Thievery Corporation, decided to run the London Marathon without a tampon to raise awareness about menstruation.
Gandhi let her blood flow freely to raise awareness about women who have no access to feminine products and to encourage women to not be embarrassed about their periods.
#2 She got her period just the night before the run.
Kiran Gandhi had spent a year enthusiastically training hard for the 42.2 km London marathon, which incidentally was also her first marathon. But, she got her period just the night before the run.
#3 She participated in the marathon for a cause.
Drummer and feminist Kiran Gandhi, participated in the marathon to raise money for Breast Cancer Care. Cheering her on all the check point were her very supportive father and brother, who wore cheer tee-shirts.
#4 Kiran wrote in her blog:
"As I ran, I thought to myself about how women and men have both been effectively socialized to pretend periods don't exist. And if you can't see it, it's probably not a big deal. Why is this an important issue? Because THIS is happening, right now. And so I started bleeding freely."
"I ran with blood dripping down my legs for sisters who don't have access to tampons and sisters who, despite cramping and pain, hide it away and pretend like it doesn't exist."
#5 Kiran Hugging her dad at the mile 18 cheer point!!!!
Clad in all pink for breast cancer awareness, the 26-year-old finished the race in four hours, 49 minutes and 11 seconds. She told Cosmopolitan that she ran through the pain of cramps and the anxiety of the race (which she had spent a year preparing for) and felt empowered as she did so.
"I felt kind of like, Yeah! F--- you!," she said. "I felt very empowered by that. I did."
#6 After the race, she took photos with her family and friends, wearing her period-stained running pants proudly.
Gandhi tells PEOPLE that she decided to run without a tampon to highlight the sentiment of period-shaming and the language surrounding women's menstrual cycles. She wrote on her site that "on the marathon course, sexism can be beaten."
"If there's one way to transcend oppression, it's to run a marathon in whatever way you want," she wrote. "Where the stigma of a woman's period is irrelevant, and we can re-write the rules as we choose."
