Answered by Shaykh Hamza Karamali, SunniPath Academy Teacher
If a woman’s period seems to cease when she is outside the house and unable to shower, does she just make tayyamum for all subsequent prayers until she can make a ghusl? Is it permissible to go out for a non essential trip (that others may be relying on meeting one for) or to work when one is expecting this might happen/ must one stay at home on the days of waiting at the end of bleeding?
In the Name of Allah, Most Merciful and Compassionate
assalamu `alaykum wa rahmatullah wa barakatuh
Certainty is not Removed by Doubt
Scholars explain that a woman who is approaching the end of her menstrual period is assumed to be in a state of menstruation unless she achieves certainty that her period has stopped. Although it is religiously more precautionary for women nearing the end of their periods to check during every prayer time if their period has ended, this is not technically obligatory. It is instead permissible for women to deliberately prolong their uncertainty by choosing not to check if their bleeding has stopped.[1] When they do check and find that their period has ended, they may simply ascribe the end of their period to the last possible moment before they checked.
An Example
It is 12.00 p.m and Aisha is nearing the end of her period, but she needs to go out and run an important errand that will last until 4 p.m. She leaves the house to run her errand and deliberately not check while she is out to see if her period has ended. When returns home and she checks herself at 4 p.m., she finds that her period has ended. She may assume at this point that it ended just before she checked and she doesn’t have to make up the zuhr prayer that entered at 1.00 p.m. and exited at 3.00 p.m. while she was out of the house.
Dry Ablution When Water is Available
If a woman is out of the house and does happen to achieve certainty that her period has ended, she is obligated to perform a purificatory bath before the end of the prayer time, even if this means that she has to return home or visit a friend’s house, for example. It’s not permissible for her to perform dry ablution (tayammum) when there is water available close by (as it always is in any modern city).
And Allah Most High knows best.
Hamza.
[1] Shaykh Amjad confirmed this with Shaykh Muhammad al-Khatib of Tarim.