When The Odd’s Are Against You
At just 16-years-old Nadaya Okamoto already knew she would be onto something great by helping to bring awareness to the power of “the Period”. Now, at 21-years old, Nadya runs the largest youth-runned NGO focused on women’s health within the United States. Period is a non-profit geared towards ending the stigma around women’s menstrual cycles, and hygienic resources for women during that special time in the month through education, service, and advocacy.
The inspiration to start “Period” sparked during her Junior year in High School. That was the year her family lost their home. Nadya explained how this period became inspirational to her because she started interacting with women that were homeless living in horrible conditions. “During this time, on my commute to school on the public bus, I had many conversations with homeless women in much worse living situations than I was in. I was inspired to learn more about menstrual inequity and period poverty after collecting an anthology of stories of their using toilet paper, socks, brown paper grocery bags, cardboard, and more, to take care of something so natural” Nadya explained how the menstrual cycle is the leading cause as to why girls all across the world miss school.
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“The effects for disadvantaged menstruators here in the US, and the systemic barriers to proper menstrual health management. It’s 2019, and yet, 34 US states still have a sales tax on period products because they are considered luxury items (unlike Rogaine and Viagra), period-related pain is a leading cause of absenteeism amongst girls in school, and periods are the number one reason why girls miss school in developing countries. Over half of our global population menstruates for an average of 40 years of their life on a monthly basis, and has been doing so since the beginning of humankind. It’s about time we take action”.
The organization officially started in 2014, and now has helped address issues dealing with period of 500,000 women, or as Nadya would describe it 500,000 periods, and has over 300 chapters within different colleges all over the U.S. But, as successful as it may seem Nadya is with her organization she explained how she is still fighting till today against the skeptics, and naysayers about her mission. “Starting an organization focused on periods was definitely difficult. I was met with a lot of giggles and scepticism and I still am. This is why education and advocacy are so important in the menstrual movement. However, at the same time, that sort of pushback was motivating for me because it showed me that we still had so much work to do, and what I was doing was needed. We have to break the stigma and teach people about why menstrual equity is so important”.
The organization has been able to manage and fund the products to distribute to women with the help of sponsors, donations, the community, and their partners Tampax, Alway, Diva Cup and a few others. As interesting as the name may sound, Nadya explained the reason why she chose to name the company Period is because;
“We have to start talking about periods! Say the word, start a conversation. We can’t keep whispering and hiding like periods are something to be ashamed of! Periods are a normal, natural, biological function. Not gross, not dirty, not shameful- natural!”
Nadya is making moves with her mission, and is willing to break down doors. Her advice to anybody interested in becoming an entrepreneur is “Sleep more”. To learn more about her organization and their changes they are striving to make around the conversation of “The Period” follow her @nadyaokamoto