I work on a farm near to Mutoko and since the money has gone up I can’t afford to buy sanitary products or cotton wool. It is also very difficult to get transport to Mutoko to buy such things as it is too expensive to take the bus and it is too far to walk. I haven’t had such products for many years now.

 

I was forced to take time off work because of bleeding. I did not know what to do without sanitary pads or cotton wool so I just had to stay at home. I hated it because I had to lie to my husband and tell him that I was ill. We are only paid when the farming work is completed, and my husband would argue with me and accuse me of being lazy. He also resorted to hitting me at times because he was frustrated that he was doing all the work and that we were not earning as much money as before. It also meant that we didn’t have enough money to buy enough food for the family or pay for the kids’ school fees sometimes.

 

I was so unhappy when my husband was hitting me and calling me lazy, I was crying so much at night. We hope that the kind people in the UK will continue to support us. At the moment things are so hard here that we are trying simply to survive. These gifts each month make it a little easier to go to work.