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| Some of the MFM team - finished!!! |
Miles for Moms 2013 was yet another colossal challenge, with 11 of us taking on the Jonkershoek Mountain Challenge on 5 May. I am happy to say that we all survived and did extremely well. We have an amazingly fit and fearless team of runners of who I am very proud. Anthony, James and Charles undertook the extreme 35km distance. Brave men, all three of them! Emily, Willemien, André-Hugo, Jan, Ben and myself braved the 21km (very, very far for a trailrun) and speedsters Monique and Hanel sprinted the 10km.
Why did we do this? We are running to raise awareness for our project, the plights of mothers in our area and to raise some funds. Thank you for your help in spreading our message – that every new life is a celebration, that all mothers need support and compassion, that we are eliminating infant mortality and morbidity in our area through empowerment and education of mothers.
On Sunday 12 May we celebrated Mother’s day. It is on these days that I would like to encourage our supporters to particularly keep disadvantaged mothers in mind and in prayer. Too many of the women we meet are never celebrated, never acknowledged for their roles and tireless work in raising their children, often alone with little or no support from husbands or partners.
In South Africa, it is with more than poverty we struggle with. We are continuously battling legacies from a past that we can’t seem to shake off. Our constitution is of the best in the world, yet our legal and judicial system is sluggish and practically often works against women. Marriage seems to be a custom that is out-dated and not practiced too often, even in relatively conservative cultures in South Africa. Mothers are getting younger, with teenage pregnancies on the increase in the Western Cape, while infant and maternal deaths are on the rise. The gap between rich and poor seems to be on the rise – and at the bottom of the barrel is the woman, and consequently her children. She is poverty-stricken, exhausted and often so intent on survival that she forgets to look beyond her day-to-day existence to the future of her children. I see too many children who don’t attend school, even if schooling might be readily available and affordable. When asked why, the answer is often that the child does not want to go to school. With a mother too tired of fighting for basic rights such as sanitation and water, maintenance payments by an absent father, and a violent society, she does not feel up to the struggle of forcing the child to go to school.
Bosom Buddies is a feminist organisation. We aim to define and determine social justice for women, in particular for mothers. We educate, empower and encourage mothers. We are activists for the rights of mothers. We meet pregnant and breastfeeding mothers and communicate, listen and teach. We dream of one day shrugging off the remnants of inequality and disparity when it comes to daily living, access and traditional roles.
