After college, I moved away from home and to the state of Washington. Even though I had a college degree, my first job was working at a bookstore for minimum wage, about $7 at the time.

Similar to my mom, I developed painful, sometimes crippling menstrual periods. Planned Parenthood allowed me to see a physician on a sliding scale and helped me figure out a way to reduce and alleviate my cramps. They also afforded me the opportunity to be examined to make sure the cramps weren’t an indicator of something greater being wrong.

This may seem like a small action, but having access to affordable medical treatment is not something that should be taken lightly. It drastically relieved my stress and provided me with a way to reduce the chronic pain from my menstruation.