As a single mother, Maryse Cassamajor struggled to afford basic necessities.
Until one afternoon at the Arbor House, a supportive home for single mothers and their children, she discovered the Alachua County chapter of Days for Girls, a nonprofit that handmakes reusable feminine hygiene kits that include cloth pads and liners.
Cassamajor, a Gainesville resident, was able to pick kits for herself and her daughter. Cassamajor declined to give her daughter’s age.
“To have to spend the money you earn buying for two is expensive,” she said.
The group provided her with hygiene kits, a reusable menstrual product, that can be reused for three years, said Radha Selvester, the chapter’s chairwoman since 2016. She said the length of use helps limit waste.
These kits contain two handmade underwear shields, which are made from cotton-flannel material and a water-resistant layer, that would be clipped around underwear like a traditional menstrual pad. Eight absorbent shield liners are also included and made from the same material, Selvester said.
Selvester was inspired to start the local initiative after hearing a woman at the Alachua Branch library talk about how her daughters sometimes missed school because she didn’t have enough money to buy pads for the whole family.
“We never thought that this could be an issue for people here,” she said.
The Days for Girls Alachua chapter will receive a $1,940 UF Medical Guild grant Oct. 17 to make reusable, eco-friendly feminine hygiene products for 120 local low-income women and girls, Selvester said.
Each kit would cost $10 to $15 to put together, but donated items, including undergarments, a bar of soap, a bath towel and two gallon-size freezer bags, bring the price down to $6 per kit, Selvester said. A menstrual chart and instructions on how to use products are also included.
Days for Girls will use the money to make reusable menstrual hygiene kits that will be provided to nine local organizations, such as the Rural Women's Health Project, a nonprofit geared toward community-based health education projects, for distribution around the county, Selvester said.
The nonprofit was given the grant as part of the UF Medical Guild’s special projects for its promise to help low-income Alachua County women within a year, Selvester said.
Diane Yang, the UF Medical Guild president, said the guild, a philanthropic organization created in 1959, received more than 40 applications from local organizations and had $50,000 to reward. The group collects grant money from a percentage of the UF Health Shands Hospital gift shop sales and from internal fundraising.
Days for Girls was one of five community project winners, Yang said.
“We have a lot of worthy causes asking for money,” Yang said.
After Bradley Gracy, the chapter secretary, sewed kits to send off to Malawi, Africa, she got back a photograph of girls receiving them.
“When you volunteer with the right organization you benefit more than the person you’re helping,” she said.
A photo of tampons.
