Niddah 4: Teaching Through Errors; Women Checking For Blood Twice Each Day

In today's daf, Rabba asserts that Hillel said that women can feel the sensation of menstruation and thus need not to be concerned about imparting ritual impurity to objects retroactively.  His student Abaye challenges Rabba.  That can't be so, for that is Shammai's argument!  Rabba states that he was only suggesting this analysis to challenge his student.

Our Gemara continues to provide examples, including that of a basket that is ritually pure but then is found holding a slithering animal.  From what point was it ritually impure?  Another example - is one ritually impure if s/he touches a body in the middle of the night, not knowing whether that person is alive or dead, and that person is found to be dead in the morning?  The rabbis debate both the answers to these questions and their applicability to the case at hand.  

We are also made aware of women who have blood stains on their clothing.  From what point were they called ritually impure?  

The rabbis recommend that women examine themselves morning and evening.  The morning check is to ensure that nothing they touched at night has become ritually impure and the evening check is to ensure that nothing they touched during the day has become ritually impure.  This seems to be a needlessly onerous task for women.  Further, it is demeaning to think of women's bodies as in a perpetual state of "possibly ritually impure".  Such traditions have caused many women - and men - great sorrow because they are not able to derive comfort from each other when women are unable to touch their husbands, even non-sexually, for extended periods of time.