A few days ago, I was asked again a question I receive quite often, “How did you grow up so differently from the ghettos where you were raised?” My answer has always been simple, the...
#YoungWomenSay
Stories submitted by women under 30…
A Blessing In Disguise: My Experience With Acne
Three years ago, my skin broke with, in my eyes, severe adult acne. I was devastated to say the least. My self-esteem and self confidence entirely depleted as everyday I looked in the...
The Adolescent Girl Puzzle
In my community, being a girl is like putting together a really difficult puzzle. Being a girl can often mean that the different pieces of you don’t quite fit together. You should not be...
A Girl from Sinking Bottom
Early in my childhood, my parents separated and eventually got divorced. My sister and I went to live with our grandmother in rural Jamaica. We lived in a farming community called James...
Building Support and Trust Through Volunteering
When I was 15 years old, I joined Youth for Youth, a Romanian non-governmental organization working on youth sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR). I became a volunteer and a...
You are the change
As a girl growing up in Kenya, a patriarchal society with a strong cultural heritage, I knew from the onset that achieving my goals was not going to be a walk in the park. Most of the time...
The Limitless Power of Girls
I first uncovered the inequalities and challenges that girls face at a very young age. When I was a girl, I loved basketball. It made me feel free, fast, strong, and in control of my own...
The Voice of a Survivor
During the three decades I have lived as a woman, I have experienced, felt, and witnessed many discriminatory practices, especially harmful traditional practices such as female genital...
Building Intergenerational Bridges
I started my work as a volunteer and I still volunteer. Late at night, in the weekends, travelling in and out of my city alone for 10 hours for both work and volunteer work, sometimes I get...
Every Woman is Powerful
I believe that every woman is powerful, and just needs to explore her inner strengths. This is a story of an ordinary woman who opened her eyes in the very normal middle class family, where...