Sickle cell and reproductive health part 2 (Menstruation)

Information is power and whoever has the information has the power to make an informed decision. Limited reproductive health information for people living with sickle cell has made them vulnerable. Unlike other groups of people with chronic disease who receive appropriate reproductive information like HIV patients, sickle cell patients do not have the opportunity to receive the information they need.

Reproductive health information is not a “one shoe fits all” so each class of people has to receive information that fits that group. For example girls with sickle cell disease always have delayed menstruation periods compared to other girls. If a reproductive health educator don’t pass on this information to these girls they will be affected as they may think that they are abnormal.

Many girls with sickle cell disease have a more than one year of delayed menses. Everybody in this world wants to move at the same pace as peers. Nobody wants to be the last person. The frustration and long waiting causes trauma and psychological torture. Just imagine the school emphasizing that every girl of your age should come with sanitary towels enough for the school term. You carry the sanitary towels and don’t use them because you have not started. You return home with your pads. If someone counselled these girls and they get to understand how their bodies are different from other bodies.
#redsmearmonth #SCAM2016 #sicklecellawareness #sickleptember