Days for Girls club normalizes menstrual health everywhere
For some girls, freedom comes in a package. In certain areas, access to menstrual products can mean the difference between being able to go to school or staying at home.
Oftentimes, girls have to sit on dirt or cardboard for several days, losing time they could have spent getting an education.
Days for Girls, an international organization with clubs and chapters all over the U.S, seeks to give girls around the world these days back in the form of reusable pads.
“People can’t get their education or they can’t go to school or to work because they’re shamed for basically just being who they are,” said Tayli Hillyard, a previous USU Days for Girls club president.
Reusable pads show girls how something as normal as menstruating shouldn’t be a limiting factor.
“It’s empowering to know that it’s not something to be ashamed of,” said Brynlee Beus, USU’s Days for Girls current president.
The Days for Girls club at USU supports the organization’s Logan chapter. But, beyond the chapter, the club strives to normalize and advocate for menstrual health everywhere.
The club began in 2019 with the goal of sewing Days for Girls kits. However, the club members soon realized this approach was impractical. It was difficult transporting materials and teaching club members how to sew.
“It became too much work so they focused more on advocacy work,” Hillyard said.
Advocacy work for the club consists of cutting fabric, assembling Days for Girls kits, fundraising efforts, advocacy nights and aiding the Logan chapter with various projects.
The club meets Tuesdays at 7 p.m. Every week, the small room in Old Main 229A fills with a palpable energy as students assemble kits, chat and bop along to music blasting from a nearby speaker.
“You give an hour every week to help these girls and that’s something that I feel really good about,” Michelle Felix, a club member, said.
After prepping kits, the club sends the materials to the Logan chapter to be sewn. The kits are then assembled and sent out to girls who need them.
Although club members are far removed from the actual impact of the kits — they don’t personally give them out — the act of service is still felt.
After Hillyard attended a Days for Girls event a few years ago, finished kits were sent to Zambia where a photographer took pictures of the girls as they received their reusable pads.
Girls of various ages holding bright, patterned bags full of hand-sewn pads, stared back in picture, their lips frozen in grins.
These pictures helped Hillyard realize the impact a few hours of her time and a sheet of fabric could have on the lives of girls around the world.
“That’s when I knew that I was like okay, I have to continue working with this,” Hillyard said.
The club has advocated for menstrual health in the local community in addition to globally. Club members played a part in USU’s efforts to stock public restrooms with free pads and tampons.
“We made sure that all gender bathrooms had them as well as a handout for resources,” Beus said.
The club has also helped provide resources for people around Cache County.
“We assembled little kits to put in the local Porch Pantries,” Hillyard said.
Porch Pantries are stations around the community that provide free hygiene supplies and other necessities, no questions asked.
Girls in developing countries aren’t the only ones who struggle to gain access to menstrual supplies. The need is everywhere as menstrual products can be expensive or hard to access, such as for homeless populations.
“There’s a lot of help that we can do right here,” Felix said.
In addition, efforts such as stocking restrooms with free pads and tampons help break the stigma, especially since not all areas on campus have this resource.
“There’s opportunities for us to get funding for more dispensers,” Hillyard said, “or to put dispensers in unisex bathrooms and things like that.”
Half the population deals with periods, yet it’s a topic often unrepresented and silenced, according to Beus.
Submitted photo.