Blog
Education
Revisioning menstrual education – Part 1
Part 1: Setting the context for a deeper shift By Kathy Walkling, co-founder of Eco Femme. Menstruation has, over the last 15 years, gone from being virtually off the radar to becoming a focal development issue receiving significant global attention,...
Collaborating with Sharana to give menstrual education to adolescent girls and women
Written by Sharana. Sharana collaborates with Eco Femme, Auroville to create Menstrual Cycle Literacy and encourage the use of Cloth Pads among Adolescent Girls and Women In Sharana, as an organization we have never claimed to be able to do it all on our own; we are...
Menstrual cycle: tracking or charting?
Your inbuilt health report card! In the hustle bustle of life, disconnection from one’s own body is inevitable. Have you ignored pain and aches in the body unsure about the root cause? Or accepted periodic energy dips and pushed through your days feeling scattered and...
The power of informed choice
(Excerpt from our interview with Maanushi Foundation) Some of the most inspiring stories from the field have been about individuals, alone or in groups, who have been able to bring about profound changes in their society through simple but effective interventions. In...
How to track your cycle and why it matters! – Part 2
How to track your cycle? There are many different ways to track your cycle - you can reference the moon and note which moon phase your bleeding starts on or you can keep a creative paper based journal noting your day 1 of bleeding and writing some words about your...
How to track your cycle and why it matters! – Part 1
by Kalvi Karunanithy and Kathy Walkling. First of all, let's understand what period tracking is. Period tracking is a powerful tool to become familiar with your menstrual cycle. We are passionate about cycle tracking and have long advocated for this...
From Pill to cycle tracking – a journey of empowerment
By Susana Bustos (Eco Femme’s Graphic designer) I started tracking my cycle one year ago with some reservations. I was used to using birth control pills to take care of my fertility but I knew that it would be difficult for me to continue this practice when I...
Peer-Led Menstrual education, a new experiment with NCC
In December 2020, Colonel Piyush Srivastava from National Cadet Corps (NCC), Puducherry approached us to explore a collaboration to offer menstrual health education and train young women cadets to become peer menstrual educators. The NCC is the youth wing of...
Journey with a purpose to Limi Valley in Nepal
It was exactly one year back when we had this idea to distribute sanitary pads to women in the Limi Valley as the lockdown had made it hard for them to access essential goods. Limi Valley is a beautiful trans-Himalayan community located in the north-western corner of...
Covid-19 and our Menstrual Health Management journey
The pandemic has been an eye-opener for many of us. It slowed down the pace of life and gave us a space to reconsider our choices and their impacts on our immediate environment and the planet as a whole. For me, personally, the...
Talking to Men and Boys about Sustainable Menstruation
So, why talk with men and boys about menstruation? The answer is simple: because one-sided conversations are not as effective as a two-way dialogue when it comes to change-making! Boys and men are the other part of our population and thus need to be involved in...
Meet the ambassador: Tanvi
It was a first for me when girls were paraded around almost in a walk of shame, simply because of a stain. It was a first for me when we were applauded about talking in whispers about Stayfree and Whisper. As I stood performing my piece on menstruation at a...
Menstrual health education: reflections from the field
Eco Femme Pad for Pad facilitator and trainer Nikethana, shares her reflections on giving menstrual health education sessions to girls and women around India. I have been working as a part of Eco Femme’s Pad for Pad programme for more than 2 years now as a...
We need YOU!
Dear Friends, we are posting regarding our Pad for Pad programme, which you may already be aware of. Pad for Pad: Passing on the power of informed choice. Through this programme, we deliver menstrual health education and offer cloth pads to...
Eco Femme & the Tibetan Community in India
Eco Femme has been cultivating a strong relationship with the Tibetan community in India with ambassadors such as Kalsang Dolma and Pema Llamo leading the work. Read about our recent visit to Ladakh here. Kalsang was born in Tibet but moved to India with her...
PAD FOR PAD 2016-17 REPORT
Here is a report on our Pad for Pad progress from 2016-17. Target for the year 2016-17: As Eco Femme continues to see sustained growth in commercial sales which finance the Pad for Pad program, we aimed to expand our reach from 4000 girls to 6000 – 2,000 via...
#ThePadEffect Campaign
From the 1st - 28th May (Menstrual Hygiene Day) we participated in #ThePadEffect campaign lead by Feminism In India (FII) to create more awareness about the harmful effects of disposable, plastic menstrual products and the benefits of switching to sustainable options....
Let’s Talk About Menstruation!
I am starting to write this article today and today I am on the first day of my period. Here I am sitting in front of the computer, I am tired and don’t feel like concentrating. I am feeling good overall but I’d just like to have some time for myself. Luckily I am...
Pad for Pad report 2015-16
Here is a report on our Pad for Pad progress from 2015-16. Target for the year 2015-16: Our plan was to reach out to 4000 girls – half through sessions we directly implement with girls in our bio-region and half via implementation partners spread across the...
Jane’s Magical Menstrual Tour Q&A
We caught up Jane, one of our ambassadors from Woman’s Wheel, about what makes a ‘menstrual pilgrim’ go to a country she knows no-one on a Magical Menstrual Tour’… When did you first come up with the idea of the tour? Hahaha no surprises here, it came to me...
Eco Femme goes to Chattisgarh
Between the 15th -20th June, our Pad for Pad facilitator Harishini made the journey up to Balrampur district in Chattisgarh. The aim was to conduct some workshops using our 'Make Your Own' kit where the women and girls would get to make their own pads following on...
The Menstrual Eco-System: A view from Society for Menstrual Cycle Research 2015 Conference
Our dear friend, Ilana attended the Menstrual Cycle Research 2015 Conference on 4th - 6th June - here, she writes about her time there and mentions some of the highlights from the conference. Our thanks Ilana! In early June Eco Femme participated in the Society for...
Fun and Lovely Ways to Introduce Menstruation
Language is not neutral; even when we want to talk about menstruation with daughters, younger female relatives or even sons, the scripts and resources commonly available tend to cast menstruation in a negative light—or make it purely biological. Here are 4 creative...
Pad for Pad sessions with Lunethica – Aug 2014.
Recently we had a visit from Federica and Elisa of Lunethica, an organisation based in Italy that hosts workshops on how to use menstrual cups and the benefits of this menstrual product for people and the planet. Their visit was part of a month-long trip through...