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Ruling 488

6. A forgetful woman (nāsiyah) 

A nāsiyah is a woman who has forgotten the duration and/or time of her habit. If such a woman experiences bleeding for three days or more but less than ten, then all of it is ḥayḍ. However, if her bleeding lasts for more than ten days, then there are some scenarios to consider:

  1. The woman had a habit of time or duration or both but she has completely forgotten it, such that she cannot remember its time or duration, even in general. For this type of woman, the rules of a mubtadiʾah that were mentioned earlier apply;
  2. The woman had a habit of time and may or may not also have had a habit of duration, and she remembers something in general about the time of her habit. For example, she knows that a particular day is part of her habit, or that her habit is in the first half of the month. For this type of woman, the rules of a mubtadiʾah apply as well; however, she must not consider ḥayḍ to be at a time that is definitely contrary to her habit. For example, if she knows that the seventeenth day of the month is part of her habit or that her habit is in the second half of the month, and if she experiences bleeding from the first to the twentieth of the month, then she cannot consider her habit to be in the first ten days of the month even if it has the attributes of ḥayḍ and the bleeding in the second ten days has the attributes of istiḥāḍah;
  3. The woman had a habit of duration but she has forgotten the duration of her habit. For this type of woman, the rules of a mubtadiʾah also apply; however, she must not knowingly underestimate the duration of her ḥayḍ for example, if she knows that the number of days of her habit is at least seven days, she cannot consider her ḥayḍ to be less than seven days]. Similarly, she cannot knowingly overestimate the duration of her ḥayḍ to be more than her habit.

A similar rule must be observed by a woman with an incomplete habit of duration, i.e. a woman whose habit of duration fluctuates between two figures that are more than three days and less than ten. For example, a woman who experiences bleeding for either six or seven days every month cannot consider her ḥayḍ to be less than six days or more than seven days by means of the attributes of ḥayḍ, or by the habit of her close relatives, or by choosing a number in case she experiences bleeding for more than ten days.