How the teenage mother and widows journey begun



Hi there am Esther Natukunda. I come from Jinja Uganda east Africa. Am a mother of 2 and I raise my children single handedly because we were abandoned while I was pregnant and with a one and two month old baby. Life was too hard and embarrassing because in my community you would rather loose your life than loosing your marriage, that's why women are abused a lot and children in communities.



All this happened in Kampala city and one day I watched news on television and pregnant women were dying in labour suites because midwives couldn't attend to them without out a mama kit ( it contains gloves, surgical blade, cotton wool, birth mat and other requirements used while a mother is giving birth). So I packed 100 mama kits to visit my community and to my surprise I saw young girls pregnant and they were very hungry and others didn't know what to do all they wanted was to go back to school they wanted to continue with education but unfortunately their parents lost hope in them and were mistreated and  neglected. They were between the age of 13 and 19 and the majority were 16 years.



I went back home restless and couldn't stop thinking about them, I begun by visiting 10 pregnant teens giving them basic needs and helping them go for antenatal check up.



 



After sometime they begun delivering and I would help them to the hospital in the community for if I left them to go on their own they would be neglected because they were too Uganda, I registered a community based organization to help them better.



 



I later on realised that most of them were orphans and lacked basic needs like food, shelter,medication and education.the number increased and their widowed mothers couldn't attend to their needs because of land grabbing which is a challenge in my community. Widows loose right of ownership of their husbands property while their husbands pass on.



 



So I want to help many teenage mothers and widows better by having a teen mother school, a skills training centre for women faced with challenges, a medical centre to provide free medical services to widows, orphans and teenage mothers and a home for teen moms that are mistreated in their homes and thrown out and I want to get land for widow's farming because they don't have where to plant food and women don't inherit property in my community and am trying to fight for them by engaging legal services which is now a challenge due to lack of resources So I became a voice of teenage mothers , widows, orphans, abused mothers and old people. I know one day they will raise up to support other vulnerable people.



The reason why my heart breaks and aches for such people is because they go through what I came out of and I believe they will also come out of such challenges to support other women and girls facing the same challenges.



 



 

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