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Adolescence is a crucial time for tremendous growth, it is imperative to empower adolescent girls with adequate information and skills for menstrual hygiene and its management. Moreover, sanitary waste disposal is another rising problem in India due to poor solid municipal waste management systems. The unhygienic menstrual practices followed by girls/women would often lead to increased vulnerability to RTI’s, PID’s and other complications. Therefore, good menstrual hygiene is crucial for health, education and dignity of girls and women. It is important to make menstrual hygiene a part of health education for the girl child.
The workshop on ‘Hygiene Management ’was conducted for the girls from 20th Feb’17 to 22nd Feb’17 in two batches -one batch attended the session in the morning and the other attended the session in the noon.
The trainer was Ms. Sakshi Pandey, an AOL volunteer who is an Engineering Graduate with an MBA from IIT Delhi. She has two years of experience in the corporate world.
Prof Nikitha Sreekantha, HOD introduced the trainer to the girls. Dr Veena K N, Dean and some faculty members were present for the seminar.
After the introduction, Ms Sakshi told the girls the objective of the seminar. She said, a woman’s menstrual health is crucial to her well-being, and also to the well-being of her family and community. But too often — especially in the developing world — mindsets, customs and institutional biases prevent women from getting the menstrual health care they need to thrive. Menstrual hygiene continues to be amongst the most challenging development issues today. Menstruation is associated with the onset of puberty in girls and many a times, it brings with it rules, restrictions, isolation, and changed expectations from the girls by the society. This changed attitude towards girls such as restrictions on their self-expressions, schooling, mobility and freedom has far reaching consequences on the mindset of women.
Ms Pandey stated her surprise- menstruation is still considered a taboo subject in the Indian society. Even today, the cultural and social influences on the people create a major hurdle in ensuring that the adolescent girls are given proper knowledge on menstrual hygiene. The mothers are reluctant to talk about this topic to their daughters, and many of them lack scientific knowledge on puberty and menstruation. And even if they have knowledge, the women in India rarely approach a doctor to seek help for the menstrual problems they are facing. The silence around this natural phenomenon in the communities combined with limited to no access to information regarding this subject both at home and in schools has resulted in the girls and women living in these areas having no knowledge about menstruation and the changes that happen in their bodies with its onset every month, how to deal with it and good menstrual hygiene practices.
She stated that a positive attitude towards menstruation and menstrual practices needs to be inculcated in the girl child at the onset of menarche. To ensure this, it is important to make menstrual hygiene a part of health education for the girl child.
The second day session provided information on how to handle menstruation and improved the girls’ knowledge of personal hygiene. Girls were also taught yoga asanas and breathing exercises (pranayama) that can relieve menstrual discomfort. Ms Sakshi also taught them mudras/ hand gestures for instant relief from menstrual pain- Vata Naashak Mudra, Surya Mudra & Shakti Mudra. Students practised the mudras for a few minutes along with deep Ujjayi breaths. After this, students also practised Bhastrika Pranayama. Since all the students had completed the YES! + Course from Art of Living, she suggested that they keep on practising yogasanas, pranayama meditation and Sudarshan kriya regularly.
The third day was an interactive session. At length, Ms Sakshi discussed about the types of absorbents used by women, menstrual waste disposal techniques used by women, consequences of menstrual waste disposal, strategies for the management of menstrual waste and better ways/ideas of disposing menstrual wastes. Social taboos, myths and misconceptions are still strong don’t allow for a conversation about periods. Hence, she provided information on the facts, myths and taboos surrounding this issue. This helped the students in learning how to dispel myths and superstition Many myths were busted with scientific reasoning. The girls listened to her awe-struck!
Prof Meera Krishnan proposed a vote of thanks and Prof Nikitha handed a token of appreciation to Ms Sakshi Pandey. The seminar empowered the girls with knowledge and awareness on menstrual hygiene and to manage their mensuration in a hygienic way.
Pavana D
I Year BCom
