Menstrual Dignity for Refugee Women

Thank you for choosing to support African refugee women and girls. Even in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, thanks in large part to your donations, our East African Enterprises have remained busy. With your donations as well as collaboration from a humanitarian aid organization, our Enterprise leaders have recently accomplished the following:

1. Provided a Training of Trainers course for partner staff in Ambassadors for Women’s Health  (AWH) and Men Who Know (MWK) curricula, equipping them with the tools and training they need to provide comprehensive menstrual health education in the refugee communities where they work.

2. Provided Days for Girls Kits and AWH education to at least 3,000 women and girls in refugee communities across East Africa.

3. Provided MWK education to men and boys in the same refugee communities across East Africa.

With the COVID-19 pandemic spreading across Africa, many of our Enterprises have pivoted to sewing masks, while continuing to sew our patented menstrual products. Days for Girls continues to support the women and girls in those vulnerable communities with the tools they need to handle their periods safely and with dignity. 

We are so grateful for the opportunity to continue this important work. And your support has made this possible.

Thank you!

Thanks to your donation, we are helping girls who are learning to be proud and not fearful of their periods. Our programs work to shatter stigma and limitations associated with menstruation by giving them the tools and knowledge to end the silence. This allows for increased confidence in managing menstruation, increased body literacy, and decreased shame and embarrassment around puberty. As a result, communities view menstruation as healthy and positive and women and girls have a supportive environment to manage their periods to stay in school and enjoy life 

Each health education class opens up life-changing conversations about dignity and self-worth. This is where we celebrate girls and change the narrative from shame to celebration.

 
Thanks to you, these conversations have reached 1.7 million women and girls around the world! 

Wherever you are in the world this time of year, it feels that celebrations abound! The DfG team in Nepal recently celebrated Dashain. Our Uganda team rejoiced at Independence Day. The Canadian Chapters gathered for Thanksgiving. And ahead are many more celebrations that will bring together families, communities, and a spirit of togetherness. In the midst of these varied festivities, Days for Girls continues to look for ways to give back days and bring together girls and women from around the world.

The volunteer DfG Chapters are about to begin a distribution of more than 33,000 DfG Kits to refugees in Lebanon. To a similar end, the East Africa team is gearing up for their final distribution of the year for South Sudanese refugees in northern Uganda - and they need your help to make it happen! So far, your support has given thousands of girls and women access to long-lasting, environmentally-friendly menstrual health products. As we forge ahead with self-sustaining ventures like our DfG Enterprises, there are still urgent situations that require immediate donations, such as our refugee communities. Your support now - even just $10 - can translate to immediate impact for a girl or woman in one of Uganda's many refugee settlements. Thank you for being part of the Days for Girls global family! 

In an area in Western Uganda, a refugee  settlement named Kiryandongo was reopened in 2014 to respond to the growing influx from the South Sudanese emergency and now hosts almost 60,000 refugees. The majority of refugees are from South Sudan, with a small number from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Burundi, and Sudan. 

Thanks to your donation, Days for Girls was able to organize health classes and distributions of menstrual DfG Kits to 711  women and girls this past quarter at the settlement. The classes were taught directly at the schools and were enthusiastically received. 

An added bonus was that all DfG Kits were made by local women in Uganda.  By supporting local women through our Enterprise program you not only bring employment opportunities to the local community, but you empower women to be leaders which enables long lasting change.  

Thank for for being a global champion for good.

While Uganda is one of the friendliest locations to refugees from around the region, and many stakeholders have come together provide basic necessities like access to land, cooking & housing supplies, and basic provisions, the challenges facing refugee populations are immense. I remember my first visit to the Adjumani Refugee Settlement in northern Uganda in 2014. As we drove along the dusty road, I barely registered that we had entered the settlement. The rounded thatched huts blended into the local community almost seamlessly, dotted along the horizon. The long, narrow roads were periodically interrupted by protruding rocks and trickling streams. As we navigated to our training location within the settlement, I saw our participants gathering. With colorful cloths tied around their shoulders, the women and girls who joined us made a bright and beautiful crowd. For many of them, the clothes they wore were the only ones they owned as they had left home in a time of crisis, and with no time to pack or prepare for the journey ahead, and little opportunity since to buy more. 

During that first visit, the women and staff shared more about the structure of the settlement. Refugees were given plots of land and basic tools for planting. Schools and health centers were established throughout the settlement, and initial provisions were made available. However, in many ways, these families and unaccompanied children have been expected to navigate much of this new journey on their own - as is the case with refugee populations around the world. It is in this vein that Days for Girls made the commitment to ease their journey by providing access to menstrual health products and women's health education. We can't solve every problem, but this is one that we can tackle!

With a wonderful alignment to Menstrual Hygiene Day on May 28th, and World Refugee Day on June 20th, our East African team is on track to deliver more than 1,000 DfG Kits to refugees in northern Uganda this June. The production team is in full swing sewing each DfG Kit, and our trainers are fully engaged with partners to ensure that the women's health sessions are delivered with care and attention. We are grateful for the opportunity to continue our on-going refugee support programs, and see many more girls and women reached throughout the year. Thank you for all that you do to make this possible!