The Lily Cup wasn’t a brand I had heard of until their “Lily Cup Compact” hit Kickstarter. I watched the video with interest and shared their project with my readers on Facebook not knowing that soon it would go viral and blow past their initial goal. Unfortunately that product (the compact menstrual cup) didn’t work well for me. The good news is that they also sent their standard Lily Cup model for me to try and I’m glad they did because it worked great and has given me a new cup that I can recommend to other women.
The embedded video is my “review” and demonstration of the Lily Cup. If you dislike watching videos I will share some key points here in the blog post along with some product photos I took and 15 second video clips using Virginia. This is Virginia’s video debut so please be nice to her!
The Lily Cup standard model comes in two sizes, A and B. A would be for women who have not given birth or who are younger, though it may also work for others not in the category. Size B is intended for women who have given birth or who are older but again, it may also work for women not in that category. Don’t get boxed into a size if you feel in your gut you may need a different one.
The cup has a slanted top and Lily Cup recommends that the highest side face towards your back for insertion. A quick insertion demo using the “C Fold” is show below.
The Lily Cup, like all menstrual cups, works by creating a seal against the vaginal walls and catches menstrual flow. The cup can be worn 10-12 hours at a time and most women with a medium or heavy flow should still be able to go for this amount of time since it has a higher capacity than the Lily Cup Compact. This was true for me.
Both the Size A and Size B Lily Cups are longer than comparable menstrual cups. Above are examples of a Size A Lily Cup, Size 2 Diva Cup, and Size 2 Lily Cup Compact for your reference. For women who find that their menstrual cup moves up during wear and can’t be reached for removal this would be a good option. For women with a short cervix it may be too long even with the stem cut off. Unlike the Diva Cup the Lily Cup cannot be turned inside out and worn due to the unique rim, something many women do to shorten cups.
The rim is nice and firm, even firmer than the Diva Cup but a small margin, and the cup has a unique “spine” in the taller side. It can’t be felt from the outside of the cup but can be felt from the inside. The spine along with the reinforced bottom make this a great cup for beginners- it can be pushed higher for a good fit even after opening internally. In the above images I used backlighting to show the thickness of the rim and the spine in the cup which are darker than the thinner portions of the cup.
So how did it work?
After a few leaks in the beginning that were light enough to just wear a cloth liner I got the hang of this cup and found it to work great at all times of my cycle. I was able to use it for two full cycles and part of a third. At first the cup did make itself known (it is a tad larger in size than the cup I normally use) but because it is so smooth and stays in place (like all cups should) I quickly got used to it and forgot it was there. I know some people look at cups and think “how could you NOT know it is in there” but honestly, you don’t if it is a good fit and in place correctly. I tried it with the stem first and it was too long so I did wind up trimming the stem as much as I could safely do so.
Where to buy: Amazon.com has the Lily Cup in stock for $40 which is comparable to similar brand name cups in price.
For more menstrual cup resources look to DDL’s ultimate