Menstrual Hygiene Kits for 1300 orphan girls,India

Recently CSA adopted a new home in interior parts of Mumbai. It is an all-girls home with girls aged between 9 to 16 years. As part of our Adopt a Home project the first initiative that we do with these children is a Health Check-up Camp and Hygiene Kit supply. These children underwent a health check-up first time in their life and experienced many new things and some do’s & don’ts. One of the most important aspects of this health check-up camp is Menstrual Hygiene. Around 55% of the girls in this home have hit their puberty and many were unaware about menstruation as a concept.

CSA staff along with the Doctor made them aware about menstruation, menstrual hygiene made them understand the concept of sanitary napkins, their usage etc.

Many of these girls are not fortunate enough to have this guidance from the care takers of the home. One of the most commonly asked question by the girls was How to tackle the period cramps?

The doctor present during the health check-up camp guided them with some home remedies to tackle the period cramps and also suggested a few super foods that they can indulge in.

During this session, we realised that many girls at the institute were shy and could not talk openly about their periods because until now they were not encouraged to discuss this topic with the Child Care Institute Staff. What we made them aware was that menstruation is not a taboo and a very normal bodily act that happens to every girl once they hit their puberty and that everything is very normal about it and there is no harm in openly asking questions related to their periods. Frequent visits and a few sessions with the lady doctor will help girls gain some confidence and they will start opening up about their Challenges with menstruation.

 So many of the terrible tales happened to children.

As young as nine. Burdened with cramps, heavy flow and interacting with rude or unsympathetic people.

Menstruation is a completely natural part of life, but most girls are inducted into puberty with feelings of shame.

It's unbelievably upsetting to discover how poorly we treat young girls — kids, really — going through this biological phenomenon that is no fault of their own.

So we conducted a Gynac visit session at one of our Child Care Institute in Mumbai (CCI). Around 40 girls from the CCI got access to this check-up session from age group 12-16. Regular check-ups were done for younger girls and menstrual guidance was given to 18 girls who hit their puberty.

Many of them had just hit their puberty and were suffering through period cramps and they were so not used to the pain and PMS. Proper Menstrual hygiene guidance was provided to them by the Dr answering each of their queries pertaining to their first period or 10th period.

We feel Lack of knowledge and awareness of menstruation leads many girls, regardless of their socio-economic strata, feel like they are alone in their suffering.

The silence also leads to deeper stigma around this body function. What’s worse, the health,

Schooling and dignity of girls is at stake – more girls drop out of school when they reach puberty.

This has far-reaching consequences on social development.

By doing such sessions we feel we can get an ease to their otherwise curious mind and also add tackle the Lack of knowledge issue too.