What if Your Daughter/Niece/Sister was Forced to Marry at 10?

Oct 4, 2011

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sitting on the couch last night next to my daughter, Lilly, I was moved to tears – as I often am these days (senior year, enough said) by this young woman.

Her kindness. Her focus and resolve. Her silly dances. Her wholeness. Her stunning and complete Lilliness.

Then I thought,

What if she had been forced to marry at 11?

What if she had 3 children by now (she’s 17)?

What if her husband beat her?

What if he had given her AIDS?

What if there was nothing I could do to stop any of this?

I don’t have to witness my daughter suffering this life but a hundred million+ mothers do.

They watch their girls’ lights, their brilliance, be snuffed out.

Their girls never get a chance to be their stunning and complete selves.

In the personal development world we talk so much about letting our light shine, about expressing our gifts, our brilliance.

How about these girls? What about their light?

Can you help one of them, just one, to have a chance to shine her light?

  • When a girl in the developing world receives seven+ years of education, she marries 4 years later and has 2.2 fewer children.
  • Each extra year of primary school boosts girls’ wages by 10 to 20 percent. That’s can be the difference between starvation and health for many women and their children.
  • When women and girls earn money, they reinvest 90 percent of it into their families, as compared to only 30 to 40 percent for a man.

What can you do today?

Take 3 minutes and watch one of these videos with girls you love.

Then ask your girl team what they want to do to educate a girl?

  • Gluten-free sugar-free bake sale? (hee hee)
  • Pet wash?
  • Show a Girl Effect video in their classroom and brainstorm with other kids what action to take? Excellent Girl Effect event guide here.

Create a community of girls and savor saving a girl’s light. Plus it will be so fun!

 

 

P.S. Want to make a donation directly to Girl Effect right now? Go here.

P.P.P.S. As you have read this post, 20 girls became child brides. Let’s see if we can slow that number down, shall we?

 

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