Support a healing integral house for Nahuat Women

Hello dear donors,

We are infinitely grateful for your support. With your contributions we have managed to impact the lives of 8 women, their daughters and sons, with the aim of generating cultural and social changes where they can reflect and acquire knowledge and tools that allow them a life based on good treatment.

On this occasion, your support was used to maintain some spaces in the Yolpajti Healing House. The actions taken help us to have a comfortable and livable space for the families that are with us.

On the other hand, we have also managed to acquire food supplies for women, girls and boys, in addition, we have already harvested the Yolpajti orchard, harvesting our own food gives us great pride and happiness, now we are preparing for the second planting.

Many reasons justify our walk, during this time we have had ups and downs that have allowed us to look at the strengths we have and also our areas of opportunity to move forward and we continue to build this healing space for and with indigenous women day by day.

Thank you very much for all your valuable collaboration.

Hello dear donors, 

We would like to thank you very much for your support. We have been able to work with and re-establish the way of life of, at least, 9 women and their children. Above all, we work to achieve a life free of violence for these women. 

On this occasion your support was used to improve our childhood services. We were able to buy some educational toys and some other equipment to play and work with the children. We always try to work with children in a way that is both joyous for them and educational. We want them to have fun and to learn and acquire new skills.

Although working with children can bring distinct challenges, our personnel are trained to work effectively with children and get good results.

In addition, we’re continuing our work on our large garden where we raise chickens and grow vegetables. This venture has allowed women to relax and feel integrated into our project.

We continue on our mission to help women heal the wounds they have suffered due to violence.

Casa Sanación Yolpajti is a shelter for indigenous and non-indigenous women and for children, who have been living under extreme gender-based violence. In Casa Yolpajti, we give them a place where they can feel safe in. Moreover, in our shelter, they receive holistic treatment that meets their psychological, legal, and medical needs. However, we do not offer the type of treatment most shelters offer – or at the very least, we do not offer it in the same sort of way. Instead, being based in a town with a strong indigenous majority, we take seriously the knowledge and traditions which women enter the shelter with. Indeed, according to the indigenous philosophy of the region, health involves body, mind, and the environment. These three elements have to be in equilibrium and develop in a harmonious manner. Thus, our goal is to re-establish this harmonious triad. This endeavour is not easy. In these past few years, we have been training a professional team. We have written a manual in which we develop a specific model for sheltering and helping indigenous women and their children who experience of gender-based violence. We now train a professional team based on this model and work to improve it when we interact with the team. 

A crucial and critical element in our model is how we develop Strategies of Attention for each woman and her children. In order to build a specific Strategy of Attention, the team gets together every week. In a meeting, different departments exchange information and ideas, and the coordinator moderates and illuminates the analysis, so we can build a general Strategy of Attention, and, then, each department can go and work with women and children according to the specific strategy developed by the team. Our team is composed of two social workers, two lawyers, a traditional healer, a nurse, two psychologists (one for adults, and one for adolescents and children), a translator (Nahuatl-Spanish), an administrator, and a director.

So far, we have developed 10 Strategies of Attention, each tailored to the women and children who are with us (we have had 10 cases from April to July). Some of these women and their children have been able to leave the shelter and re-establish, in a way, the equilibrium between their mind, body, and the environment, so as to live a life free of violence. In some cases, the legal processes are still not finalized, but despite this, the women still feel safe and secure.

Our hope is that these women, and every woman who might enter our shelter in the future, can receive holistic treatment and re-establish the equilibrium they need to live in peace and free of violence. Our goal is always to respect the traditions and knowledges that the women bring with them, while at the same time healing wounds that were produced by the violence that they have experience. We use a variety of tools to reach this goal. All the tools are explained in our holistic model 

The money we kindly received from you has helped us in developing some of those tools, such as the construction of a vegetable garden in which we also have medicinal plants. This money has also allowed us to buy some garden furniture.

We are very thankful for all your help and wish to keep receiving this valuable support

In Casa de Sanación Yolpajti, over the last eight months, we have been able to support 19 women who suffered extreme violence. 

With our support these women were able to form a life plan which integrated strategies to avoid re-entering the cycle of violence in which they found themselves priorly. 

In Casa de Sanación we have formed a team of professional women who work tirelessly, supporting women and their children so they can better reflect on their lives and find the tools they need to end violence in their lives. 

We count on a lawyer, two psychologists  (one for women and one for adolescents and children), two social workers, one interpreter (a necessity since most of the women we help are indigenous women who are more comfortable speaking their mother-tongue), and a team of four professional and experienced women who  handle coordination.

 Although the federal government helps us with a bare-bones budget, it  is not enough to completely pay our workers' salaries. It is because of your kind donations that we have been able to pay their full salaries. salaries. 

Women who face situations of extreme violence are able to live in Casa de Sanación Yolpajti for a period of three to six months either alone or with their children if they have any. Once there, they receive legal and psychological support so they can rebuild their lives. Not all the cases are legally resolved. Although we seek legal resolutions whenever possible, what we stress the most is the healing of their souls and their economic and psychological self-empowerment.

In Casa de Sanación Yolpajti, women receive technical training so they can learn and acquire new and helpful skills that allow them to build entrepreneurial businesses. Luisa, for example, learned how to make earrings and some other crafts that she is able to sell while taking care of her children. Her children were able to catch up on school tasks, so that they could return safely and happily to classes.

We have also spent some of your donations on building a greenhouse. This green house achieves a twofold objective. One objective is for the women to learn how to cultivate their own food and the other is to give these women some much needed time for relaxation and self-care. Greenhouse personnel are not only horticulturally trained, but also trained in gender issues so that they can connect horticultural training with lessons about relevant self-care. 

We appreciate your donations very much. We hope to continue our practice of supporting indigenous women who face situations of extreme violence. 

During July, Casa de Sanación Yolpajti was required to move to a bigger location. Although we found a new location, the property needed various adjustments and renovations. Your donations have helped pay for these much needed renovations, all of which were essential to the functioning of the shelter.
 
At Casa Yolpajti, the women and children we work with receive amiable, empathetic, and warm treatment; above all, our goal is to run a shelter which respects and reflects the culture, beliefs, and values of the women and children we work with. The making of tortillas is an important ritual of daily life for the women we work with. Thus, we made a traditional stove, so that they could make their tortillas by hand. The solar panels, with which we heat the house, also needed maintenance. Other necessary practical renovations and purchases included: a new washing machine, which the women use to clean their clothes, and electrical and plumbing maintenance, since these had begun to deteriorate.
 
Working to defend indigenous women facing violence continues to be a great but rewarding challenge for us. As we have said before, although our current location is a rental, our dream is to be able to purchase land where we can build our very own Casa de Sanación Yolpajti, Yolpajti House of Healing, with all the amenities and services we require.  
 
We continue to invite you to make any donation you can for our cause. We are grateful for your donations and collaborations.