Puberty brings a lot of changes
Under Wasiliana and Msichana thabiti , NIHEP has focused in the school visits to talk with the adolescent girls about puberty and its consequences to their minds ,physically and emotionally. .
Wasiliana – project in Sahwa school:- We have been talking a lot about
puberty with the girls. The girls understood more about different symptoms and
why some changes are happening in the body and the mind. We educated the girls
about the hormonal system and told them that the changes during puberty are
physical and emotional. We encouraged the girls to have self-esteem and
confidence even though the puberty can be difficult time in many ways. We also
shared our own experiences about their puberty and told the girls which kind of
difficulties we faced during our adolescence. The girls were curious to listen and some girls had similar experiences with us. The most important thing
in Wasiliana is to communicate . Wasiliana means communicate and we
are working towards that goal.
Msichana Thabiti – project in Luchelele school:- The topic of the week in Luchelele was menstrual hygiene and menstrual disposal. With the girls we talked different menstruation protections such as pads, tampons and menstrual cup. We also discussed how important it is to take good care of the hygiene. Menstruation is a difficult time for many girls in Tanzania. The lack of hygienic facilities and menstrual pads cause girls not to attend the school during their periods. This of course effects negatively to the girls school results and it is possible that they don’t do as well in school than boys
Because the menstruation and puberty are topics which are not spoken at the girls homes even in school, NIHEP is trying to educate the girls to feel more comfortable about these topics. We had successful sessions in both projects.
trainees Sonja & Fanni